Be warned: what counts as ethics is reformatted when ethical programmes are digitized

Purpose The purpose of this work is to contribute to an interdisciplinary dialogue on moral coding and ethical programming. Such a dialogue is challenging because ethics, as traditionally framed and articulated in analogue theorizing, does not lend itself well to digital applications and to the programming of smart technologies. When ethical programmes are digitized, what counts as ethics undergoes a reformatting that can be reductive. Design/methodology/approach We adopt a conceptual perspective, drawing mostly from Niklas Luhmann's digital theorizing on distinction-based operations, meaning-imparting distinctions, moral codes and ethical programmes. The focus is on Luhmann's theory. References to Paul Ricœur and Hanna Arendt analogue theorizing on meaning, ethics and morality are also brought into the discussion to illustrate how the explanatory power of both forms of theorizing can contribute to the interdisciplinary study of moral coding and ethical programming. The three authors refer to Husserlian phenomenology, relying on this tradition but also bringing it into question in their own study of meaning-making processes. This common background allows us to look for connecting points between their theorizing on meaning, ethics and morality. Our approach is text-driven; it requires quoting extensively from Luhmann's writing to show how the text itself guides our demonstration. Luhmann's theory is not enlisted merely to support the author's narrative. Giving room to Luhmann's voice is deemed necessary here to draw attention to the explanatory power of his theory. Discursive endnotes are added to provide context and elucidations without interrupting the main argument. Findings We offer three warnings about ethical programmes. They can be impaired by artificial exclusions, convenient fictions and derailments of thinking. The capacity to learn is a requirement for ethical programming. We propose three guidelines for such learning, focusing on the following distinctions: changing/unchanging, conditions/consequences, means/ends and logical thinking/bodily perception. Originality/value With the advent of artificial moral agents, there are urgent calls for smart technologies to be designed more ethically. This study innovates by proposing the concept of meaning-imparting distinctions to facilitate a dialogue and a partnership among analogue and digital researchers on the design of ethical programmes. To examine moral coding and ethical programming as distinction-based operations is a departure from the traditional approaches used in applied ethics.