Pub Date : 2024-08-05DOI: 10.1177/01622439241269983
Kristian Bondo Hansen
In this article, I argue that devoting analytical attention to the natively technical concept of “the stack” can help re-sensitize studies of algorithms in Science and Technology Studies (STS) and adjacent fields to the depths of interdependence between different layers and elements of computational systems. Inspired by Bowker and Star's three-decades old methodological gestalt-switch concept of “infrastructural inversion,” I propose a “stack inversion” that seeks to mitigate “algo-centrism”—an overemphasis on algorithms and algorithmic action—by shifting focus to the relational practices and material politics of “stacking.” To demonstrate the analytical value of this stack inversion, I examine and discuss how software developers, data scientists, computer engineers, and other so-called “quants” working in the financial industry talk about and reflect on their own practices of devising and operating automated trading systems. The empirical material I analyze consists of 182 interviews conducted in the US and Europe with people occupying a range of different roles in financial securities trading and investment management. The article contributes to the burgeoning STS-informed literature on algorithms by proposing a conceptual-analytic move that allows for reflexive engagement with the material politics, opacities, and dependencies created in and around automated computational systems.
{"title":"The Stack Inversion: On Algo-Centrism and the Complex Architecture of Automated Financial Securities Trading Systems","authors":"Kristian Bondo Hansen","doi":"10.1177/01622439241269983","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/01622439241269983","url":null,"abstract":"In this article, I argue that devoting analytical attention to the natively technical concept of “the stack” can help re-sensitize studies of algorithms in Science and Technology Studies (STS) and adjacent fields to the depths of interdependence between different layers and elements of computational systems. Inspired by Bowker and Star's three-decades old methodological gestalt-switch concept of “infrastructural inversion,” I propose a “stack inversion” that seeks to mitigate “algo-centrism”—an overemphasis on algorithms and algorithmic action—by shifting focus to the relational practices and material politics of “stacking.” To demonstrate the analytical value of this stack inversion, I examine and discuss how software developers, data scientists, computer engineers, and other so-called “quants” working in the financial industry talk about and reflect on their own practices of devising and operating automated trading systems. The empirical material I analyze consists of 182 interviews conducted in the US and Europe with people occupying a range of different roles in financial securities trading and investment management. The article contributes to the burgeoning STS-informed literature on algorithms by proposing a conceptual-analytic move that allows for reflexive engagement with the material politics, opacities, and dependencies created in and around automated computational systems.","PeriodicalId":48083,"journal":{"name":"Science Technology & Human Values","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":3.1,"publicationDate":"2024-08-05","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"141930450","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2024-08-02DOI: 10.1177/01622439241266055
Matthias Wienroth, Rafaela Granja
New and emerging forensic genetics technologies offer significant insight into personal information, changing the way that policing and criminal justice uses of such technologies are being considered and legitimized. In this article, based on data from Central and Western European countries and the United States of America, we analyze how the compounding, interdependent effects of four such technologies—massive parallel sequencing, forensic epigenetics, forensic DNA phenotyping, and forensic genetic genealogy—facilitate the dissolving of boundaries between forensic and medical, as well as between commercial and non-commercial domains. Mobilizing social epistemology and epistemic culture as dual analytical lens, we argue that we can witness the emergence of an increasingly complex forensic genetics assemblage, fostering dependencies between policing agencies, research scientists, and commercial companies. At the heart of this assemblage lies the transformation of central knowledge claims and distinct roles and responsibilities defining the legitimate application of genetics data and information in policing contexts. The dissolving of boundaries and deepening of co-dependencies within the assemblage encourage increased self-governance between the key stakeholders, to the detriment of the field's societal accountability and legitimacy. The discussion in this article provides a necessary starting point for reframing the discussion of forensic genetics’ governance.
新兴的法医遗传学技术为个人信息提供了重要的洞察力，改变了警务和刑事司法对此类技术的使用方式，并使之合法化。本文以中欧、西欧国家和美国的数据为基础，分析了大规模平行测序、法医表观遗传学、法医 DNA 表型分析和法医遗传系谱学这四种技术的复合、相互依存效应如何促进法医和医学之间以及商业和非商业领域之间界限的消解。利用社会认识论和认识文化作为双重分析视角，我们认为，我们可以见证一个日益复杂的法医遗传学组合的出现，它促进了警务机构、研究科学家和商业公司之间的依赖关系。这一集合体的核心是中心知识主张的转变，以及界定遗传学数据和信息在警务工作中合法应用的不同角色和责任。在这一集合体中，边界的消解和共同依赖的加深促使主要利益相关者之间的自我管理不断加强，从而损害了该领域的社会责任感和合法性。本文的讨论为重构法医遗传学治理的讨论提供了一个必要的起点。
{"title":"Dissolving Boundaries, Fostering Dependencies. the new Forensic Genetics Assemblage","authors":"Matthias Wienroth, Rafaela Granja","doi":"10.1177/01622439241266055","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/01622439241266055","url":null,"abstract":"New and emerging forensic genetics technologies offer significant insight into personal information, changing the way that policing and criminal justice uses of such technologies are being considered and legitimized. In this article, based on data from Central and Western European countries and the United States of America, we analyze how the compounding, interdependent effects of four such technologies—massive parallel sequencing, forensic epigenetics, forensic DNA phenotyping, and forensic genetic genealogy—facilitate the dissolving of boundaries between forensic and medical, as well as between commercial and non-commercial domains. Mobilizing social epistemology and epistemic culture as dual analytical lens, we argue that we can witness the emergence of an increasingly complex forensic genetics assemblage, fostering dependencies between policing agencies, research scientists, and commercial companies. At the heart of this assemblage lies the transformation of central knowledge claims and distinct roles and responsibilities defining the legitimate application of genetics data and information in policing contexts. The dissolving of boundaries and deepening of co-dependencies within the assemblage encourage increased self-governance between the key stakeholders, to the detriment of the field's societal accountability and legitimacy. The discussion in this article provides a necessary starting point for reframing the discussion of forensic genetics’ governance.","PeriodicalId":48083,"journal":{"name":"Science Technology & Human Values","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":3.1,"publicationDate":"2024-08-02","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"141884041","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2024-08-01DOI: 10.1177/01622439241262854
Giulia Anichini, Baptiste Kotras
In this paper, we investigate uses of AI (Artificial intelligence) in two distinct fields: radiology and prehistoric archaeology. We examine the normative tensions between the scripts encapsulated within the technology and pre-existing professional and epistemic cultures, as well as the situations in which mechanical objectivity fits with local norms. Through ethnographic observation and interviews in French field sites, we show how in radiology a specific definition of “normal” bodies, embedded within detection tools, conflicts with medical practice, and the way in which non-consensual knowledge in archaeology can challenge the prediction of soil occupation in a prehistoric site. We also highlight the conditions under which AI tools can adhere to certain epistemic norms and become part of professional practices in radiology and prehistoric archaeology. While in radiology AI is judged by its ability to close uncertainties without imposing binary categories, in prehistoric archaeology, its epistemic validity depends on mobilizing exogenous scientific data to increase researchers’ reflexivity about their practices and knowledge, suggesting new clues and explanatory paths. This article demonstrates the effectiveness of AI technologies is shaped by local constraints, and why their objectivity is not a given property but an emergent feature arising from specific contexts of use.
{"title":"Trained Judgements Artificial Intelligence, Epistemic Tensions and the Production of Scientific Objectivity","authors":"Giulia Anichini, Baptiste Kotras","doi":"10.1177/01622439241262854","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/01622439241262854","url":null,"abstract":"In this paper, we investigate uses of AI (Artificial intelligence) in two distinct fields: radiology and prehistoric archaeology. We examine the normative tensions between the scripts encapsulated within the technology and pre-existing professional and epistemic cultures, as well as the situations in which mechanical objectivity fits with local norms. Through ethnographic observation and interviews in French field sites, we show how in radiology a specific definition of “normal” bodies, embedded within detection tools, conflicts with medical practice, and the way in which non-consensual knowledge in archaeology can challenge the prediction of soil occupation in a prehistoric site. We also highlight the conditions under which AI tools can adhere to certain epistemic norms and become part of professional practices in radiology and prehistoric archaeology. While in radiology AI is judged by its ability to close uncertainties without imposing binary categories, in prehistoric archaeology, its epistemic validity depends on mobilizing exogenous scientific data to increase researchers’ reflexivity about their practices and knowledge, suggesting new clues and explanatory paths. This article demonstrates the effectiveness of AI technologies is shaped by local constraints, and why their objectivity is not a given property but an emergent feature arising from specific contexts of use.","PeriodicalId":48083,"journal":{"name":"Science Technology & Human Values","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":3.1,"publicationDate":"2024-08-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"141884042","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2024-07-26DOI: 10.1177/01622439241259411
Brice Laurent, Alexandre Violle
This paper problematizes the obsession with “scaling up” that is visible in numerous technological domains. Using the case of hydrogen mobility projects in France, we identify a tension between a discourse of rapid scaling for nationwide deployment, and projects undertaken by local authorities and private companies who make small-scale experiments with hydrogen cars and charging stations more dense, by adding uses, actors, and technical functionalities. We use the term “deep scaling” to characterize the latter approach. By examining projects focusing on “ecosystems” of hydrogen mobility, we discuss the consequences of deep scaling for the geographic and economic extension. In this configuration, technologies are not expected to expand to vast territories by remaining the same at a bigger scale. Instead, they are attached to local sites and develop alongside them, which raises the issue of the connections between those sites. The analysis of deep scaling allows us to identify potential alternatives to ready-made discourses of scalability and contribute to the analysis of the politics and practices of scaling.
{"title":"Scaling Up or Deep Scaling? Problematizing the Scalability Imperative in Technological Innovation","authors":"Brice Laurent, Alexandre Violle","doi":"10.1177/01622439241259411","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/01622439241259411","url":null,"abstract":"This paper problematizes the obsession with “scaling up” that is visible in numerous technological domains. Using the case of hydrogen mobility projects in France, we identify a tension between a discourse of rapid scaling for nationwide deployment, and projects undertaken by local authorities and private companies who make small-scale experiments with hydrogen cars and charging stations more dense, by adding uses, actors, and technical functionalities. We use the term “deep scaling” to characterize the latter approach. By examining projects focusing on “ecosystems” of hydrogen mobility, we discuss the consequences of deep scaling for the geographic and economic extension. In this configuration, technologies are not expected to expand to vast territories by remaining the same at a bigger scale. Instead, they are attached to local sites and develop alongside them, which raises the issue of the connections between those sites. The analysis of deep scaling allows us to identify potential alternatives to ready-made discourses of scalability and contribute to the analysis of the politics and practices of scaling.","PeriodicalId":48083,"journal":{"name":"Science Technology & Human Values","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":3.1,"publicationDate":"2024-07-26","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"141783395","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2024-05-29DOI: 10.1177/01622439241248499
Maisie Tomlinson
This article explores how an innovative animal welfare methodology (Qualitative Behavior Assessment) negotiates subjectivism and objectivism in its distinctive epistemology, as it strives to produce a certain kind of laboratory mouse—a complex, social subject. Through an ethnographic study of the development of a Qualitative Behavior Assessment (QBA) tool for laboratory mouse welfare, I show how QBA foregrounds the animal’s lived emotional experience by using qualitative language to assess their welfare, while also relying on statistical methods of validation. Drawing on Mol et al.’s understanding of care as something that parses, handles, and balances diverse “goods,” I argue that QBA practitioners’ care for the data must balance competing priorities and values. I take particular interest in what makes a “good” assessor as they transform between subject and object. When two observers are found to be outliers, with their divergent judgments marring the successful statistical validation of the QBA mouse tool, the situated nature of knowledge is brought to the fore. I argue that turning to the embodied practice of attention, as distinct from care, helps us understand why, and raises questions about the epistemic culture of conventional animal welfare science and the extent to which the human observer risks reification within QBA’s formal methodological practice.
{"title":"Observer 8: Outliers, Attention, and Situated Knowledge in a Qualitative Behavioral Assessment of Laboratory Mouse Welfare","authors":"Maisie Tomlinson","doi":"10.1177/01622439241248499","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/01622439241248499","url":null,"abstract":"This article explores how an innovative animal welfare methodology (Qualitative Behavior Assessment) negotiates subjectivism and objectivism in its distinctive epistemology, as it strives to produce a certain kind of laboratory mouse—a complex, social subject. Through an ethnographic study of the development of a Qualitative Behavior Assessment (QBA) tool for laboratory mouse welfare, I show how QBA foregrounds the animal’s lived emotional experience by using qualitative language to assess their welfare, while also relying on statistical methods of validation. Drawing on Mol et al.’s understanding of care as something that parses, handles, and balances diverse “goods,” I argue that QBA practitioners’ care for the data must balance competing priorities and values. I take particular interest in what makes a “good” assessor as they transform between subject and object. When two observers are found to be outliers, with their divergent judgments marring the successful statistical validation of the QBA mouse tool, the situated nature of knowledge is brought to the fore. I argue that turning to the embodied practice of attention, as distinct from care, helps us understand why, and raises questions about the epistemic culture of conventional animal welfare science and the extent to which the human observer risks reification within QBA’s formal methodological practice.","PeriodicalId":48083,"journal":{"name":"Science Technology & Human Values","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":3.1,"publicationDate":"2024-05-29","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"141189240","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2024-05-28DOI: 10.1177/01622439241253943
Vlas Nikulkin, Olga Zvonareva
This article investigates public issue formation catalyzed by Russian patient organizations (POs) that aim to change healthcare rules and practices following patients’ needs and expectations. Drawing on the socio-ontological approach of science and technology studies, which posits that issues do not exist independently of efforts to address them, we identify three main stages of public issue formation in the studied situation: (1) from individual troubles to systemic problems, (2) from systemic problems to shared concerns, and (3) from shared concerns to public issues. Transforming individual troubles into public issues is neither easy nor straightforward. Yet, as the key actors in the process, POs use events like conferences and roundtables, and consultative spaces like public councils to engage with healthcare experts and state policymakers. We propose to view these events and spaces as trading zones. Facilitating public issue formation through trading zones where collaboration with other healthcare governance actors occurs without consensus over meanings and priorities, POs address suffering among patients in nondemocratic situations where expert knowledge dominates and public participation is generally unwelcome. The resulting issues are public in scope and capability of mobilizing action, yet articulated in a de-publicizing manner that conceals conflicting stakes and commitments.
{"title":"The Trading Zones of Patient Participation: Public Issue Formation in Nondemocratic Situations","authors":"Vlas Nikulkin, Olga Zvonareva","doi":"10.1177/01622439241253943","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/01622439241253943","url":null,"abstract":"This article investigates public issue formation catalyzed by Russian patient organizations (POs) that aim to change healthcare rules and practices following patients’ needs and expectations. Drawing on the socio-ontological approach of science and technology studies, which posits that issues do not exist independently of efforts to address them, we identify three main stages of public issue formation in the studied situation: (1) from individual troubles to systemic problems, (2) from systemic problems to shared concerns, and (3) from shared concerns to public issues. Transforming individual troubles into public issues is neither easy nor straightforward. Yet, as the key actors in the process, POs use events like conferences and roundtables, and consultative spaces like public councils to engage with healthcare experts and state policymakers. We propose to view these events and spaces as trading zones. Facilitating public issue formation through trading zones where collaboration with other healthcare governance actors occurs without consensus over meanings and priorities, POs address suffering among patients in nondemocratic situations where expert knowledge dominates and public participation is generally unwelcome. The resulting issues are public in scope and capability of mobilizing action, yet articulated in a de-publicizing manner that conceals conflicting stakes and commitments.","PeriodicalId":48083,"journal":{"name":"Science Technology & Human Values","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":3.1,"publicationDate":"2024-05-28","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"141172547","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2024-05-27DOI: 10.1177/01622439241255733
Charlotte Kroløkke, Jonas Holm Larsen
Today, emergent space technology engages in visions of future off-world colonizing, while conservation technology is employed in ensuring the continuation of life on earth. In this article, we combine social science of outer space literature with biodiversity conservation work to analyze how utopian visions of off-world futures and dystopian visions of earth entangle in technoscientific future-making practices. Our case is the Lunar Ark, which is a proposed technoscientific project for a conservation base to be assembled inside the moon’s lava tubes comprising samples of the earth’s ecosystems. We investigate two interwoven imaginaries involving an imaginary of the Lunar Ark as a “reseeding of earth” and secondly, an imaginary in which the Lunar Ark becomes a platform for “escaping earth.” Based on scientific papers, web material, news articles, an interview with the head of the research group, and ethnographic observations, we conclude that the Lunar Ark engages with a speculative bioeconomy, wherein earth is imagined as an unstable and unfit protector of life. In contrast, the Lunar Ark emerges as a pan-humanitarian and maternal-like technoscientific environment.
{"title":"Saved by the Moon: Imaginaries of Earthly Afterlife in Space","authors":"Charlotte Kroløkke, Jonas Holm Larsen","doi":"10.1177/01622439241255733","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/01622439241255733","url":null,"abstract":"Today, emergent space technology engages in visions of future off-world colonizing, while conservation technology is employed in ensuring the continuation of life on earth. In this article, we combine social science of outer space literature with biodiversity conservation work to analyze how utopian visions of off-world futures and dystopian visions of earth entangle in technoscientific future-making practices. Our case is the Lunar Ark, which is a proposed technoscientific project for a conservation base to be assembled inside the moon’s lava tubes comprising samples of the earth’s ecosystems. We investigate two interwoven imaginaries involving an imaginary of the Lunar Ark as a “reseeding of earth” and secondly, an imaginary in which the Lunar Ark becomes a platform for “escaping earth.” Based on scientific papers, web material, news articles, an interview with the head of the research group, and ethnographic observations, we conclude that the Lunar Ark engages with a speculative bioeconomy, wherein earth is imagined as an unstable and unfit protector of life. In contrast, the Lunar Ark emerges as a pan-humanitarian and maternal-like technoscientific environment.","PeriodicalId":48083,"journal":{"name":"Science Technology & Human Values","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":3.1,"publicationDate":"2024-05-27","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"141172516","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2024-05-10DOI: 10.1177/01622439241252239
Sebastian Billows, Marc-Olivier Déplaude
Our daily activities rely on a proliferating number of things that are subject to decay. As stressed in a growing body of literature, repair is critical to the smooth functioning of material infrastructure. However, this scholarship has overlooked a crucial dimension: things become fragile not only due to material degradation but also as a result of regulatory change. This article introduces the notion of “legal repair” to describe how, in the face of legal change, certain actors reassemble the material world. We elaborate on this concept through an analysis of the domestication of European Union (EU) animal welfare legislation by the French pig sector. While it was feared that stricter pig housing standards would fragilize the existing farms, pig farmers complied using technical systems that failed to significantly improve animal welfare. We analyze this domestication of EU legislation as a process of legal repair. Alongside the political work of the leaders of the pig sector, agricultural advisers also played a key role. Their work reveals the relational nature of legal repair: in the production of “local specifications” matching the demands of existing farming systems, in the negotiation of the finer points of the legislation, and in the redefinition of farming performance.
{"title":"Legal Repair: Domesticating European Legislation on Pig Welfare","authors":"Sebastian Billows, Marc-Olivier Déplaude","doi":"10.1177/01622439241252239","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/01622439241252239","url":null,"abstract":"Our daily activities rely on a proliferating number of things that are subject to decay. As stressed in a growing body of literature, repair is critical to the smooth functioning of material infrastructure. However, this scholarship has overlooked a crucial dimension: things become fragile not only due to material degradation but also as a result of regulatory change. This article introduces the notion of “legal repair” to describe how, in the face of legal change, certain actors reassemble the material world. We elaborate on this concept through an analysis of the domestication of European Union (EU) animal welfare legislation by the French pig sector. While it was feared that stricter pig housing standards would fragilize the existing farms, pig farmers complied using technical systems that failed to significantly improve animal welfare. We analyze this domestication of EU legislation as a process of legal repair. Alongside the political work of the leaders of the pig sector, agricultural advisers also played a key role. Their work reveals the relational nature of legal repair: in the production of “local specifications” matching the demands of existing farming systems, in the negotiation of the finer points of the legislation, and in the redefinition of farming performance.","PeriodicalId":48083,"journal":{"name":"Science Technology & Human Values","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":3.1,"publicationDate":"2024-05-10","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"140929647","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2024-05-07DOI: 10.1177/01622439241248923
Samantha Croy, Marilys Guillemin
This article considers how Marilyn Strathern’s work on Western knowledge conventions can usefully contribute to debates at the intersection of the social and neurosciences: first, to understanding the nature of work at this intersection; and second, to providing new avenues for interdisciplinary engagement. The neuroscience explosion in the 1990s and the early twenty-first century held out the promise of understanding increasingly complex phenomena in terms of the brain. As the neurosciences ventured into questions of human sociality, social scientists found it difficult to make meaningful contributions within the confines of conventional models of neuroscientific work. This highlighted the need for conceptual and methodological innovation. In this article, we illustrate how Strathern’s concept of the merographic connection, which conceptualizes the link between overlapping parts belonging to separate wholes, is a useful frame for thinking about the shared objects of the social and neurosciences. We show how her consideration of analogy as an apparatus bringing different domains together assists in understanding work in this area. With social science experiments in working with neuroscientists ongoing, Strathern’s work encourages precision about what is being brought into relationship in interdisciplinary encounters and prompts innovative thinking about what might productively be brought into association.
{"title":"Beyond Neural Connections: Using Strathern to Explore Knowledge-making at the Intersections of the Social and Neurosciences","authors":"Samantha Croy, Marilys Guillemin","doi":"10.1177/01622439241248923","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/01622439241248923","url":null,"abstract":"This article considers how Marilyn Strathern’s work on Western knowledge conventions can usefully contribute to debates at the intersection of the social and neurosciences: first, to understanding the nature of work at this intersection; and second, to providing new avenues for interdisciplinary engagement. The neuroscience explosion in the 1990s and the early twenty-first century held out the promise of understanding increasingly complex phenomena in terms of the brain. As the neurosciences ventured into questions of human sociality, social scientists found it difficult to make meaningful contributions within the confines of conventional models of neuroscientific work. This highlighted the need for conceptual and methodological innovation. In this article, we illustrate how Strathern’s concept of the merographic connection, which conceptualizes the link between overlapping parts belonging to separate wholes, is a useful frame for thinking about the shared objects of the social and neurosciences. We show how her consideration of analogy as an apparatus bringing different domains together assists in understanding work in this area. With social science experiments in working with neuroscientists ongoing, Strathern’s work encourages precision about what is being brought into relationship in interdisciplinary encounters and prompts innovative thinking about what might productively be brought into association.","PeriodicalId":48083,"journal":{"name":"Science Technology & Human Values","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":3.1,"publicationDate":"2024-05-07","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"140929659","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2024-05-06DOI: 10.1177/01622439241246183
Jonathan Luke Austin, Anna Leander
How are socially and politically controversial security practices materially-technologically scripted into our lives in ever-deeper ways? This essay proposes that acts of aesthetic design are at the heart of that process and are being deployed by technology corporations to “smooth” the diffusion of security practices, discourses, and politics across global space. To substantiate that claim, we make three moves. First, we propose an understanding of the “script” that returns to the roots of the concept in theater and the arts. That understanding stresses that our material-technological enmeshing is governed strongly by aesthetic and affective factors that operate through forms of resonance (rather that reason). In consequence—we argue—much of the power of technology conglomerates is linked to their capacity to harness these aesthetico-affective resonances. Second, we demonstrate this through a case study focused on the material-aesthetic design activities of Google, teasing out how it deploys aesthetic practices to extend its sociopolitical power. Third, we speculatively conclude by introducing the architect Keller Easterling’s concept of “active form” to show how conceptualizing scripts in aesthetic terms also provides insights into how security practices are diffused across global contexts, irrelevant contextual sociopolitical differences, and seemingly without any limit.
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