Limits of technology

What computers cannot do

Technique vs. the mind

Computer power and human reason

Reversing terms

Natural and artificial

Global and local

Automatic and maintained

Autonomous and regulated

Efficiency and sufficiency

Social constructivism

Research topics

Limits of technology

What computers cannot do

Mathematics themselves are limited through Gödel's incompleteness theorem.

The original computer paper is about a limit of the computer: the halting problem.

Computers are also limited by the hardware.

In limits.h , the C header file establishes what is the concrete reality that a program must be working with.

Technique vs. the mind

Can machines ever be intelligent?

Dreyfus, Hubert (1965). Alchemy and Artificial Intelligence , RAND corporation.

In the 1960s, it was expected that computers would be humans at chess, prove mathematical theorems, and represent theories of psychology as computer programs.

AI assumes the mind is a technical object:

Human minds work differently:

Limitations to AI:

After the shift from symbolic to probabilistic, are there new limits to machines thinking?

Computer power and human reason

Weizenbaum, J. (1976). Computer Power and Human Reason: From Judgment to Calculation (1st edition). W H Freeman & Co.

The first chatbot, 1965
The first chatbot, 1965

ELIZA against instrumental reason.

Computers can choose, but humans can judge.

What is the difference between a choice and a judgment?

The relationship between possibility and necessity: just because we can, does it mean we should?

From machine to human agency, from autonomy to heteronomy.

Reversing terms

A refusal is only valid with an alternative.

Reversing terms:

Natural and artificial

Theories of technical evolution are theories of biological evolution.

Leroi-Gourhan, Simondon and Stiegler talk of exosomatisation.

Limits of the environment:

Global and local

Technology makes distance disappear.

Technology also thrives in generalized (homogeneous) environments.

If the Anthropocene is the global expansion of techniques and technology, then limiting it involves going back to the local.

From the anthropocene to the Neganthropocene , from post-modernism to localism.

What are the pros and cons of preferring locality vs. globality?

Doing closer and doing less. But how much less?

CollapseOS

If computers made distance disappear, how do we make it reapper? And what kind of value judgment over things being far?

Is it just a matter of making it cost more? That is just a quantitative solution.

Reconsidering distance as (healthy) absence.

Distance as something created by the individuals/groups, rather than subjected to it.

Automatic and maintained

There is no endless motion. Energy means wear and tear.

Someone caring for a piece of technology
Someone caring for a piece of technology

Maintenance as invisible work, repair as heroic work.

Autonomous and regulated

What are the external rules and demands that can apply to a product?

The free market is heavily regulated.

The drug industry is also heavily regulated.

The forces that control the evolution of technology, according to Lessig :

Efficiency and sufficiency

What are the implications of doing the same with less?

Efficiency, and the Jevons paradox.

Sobriety, or sufficiency

A relationship to use as related to their collective consequences on the group (rather than individual consequence on the goal)

The question of use (as opposed to structure) reappears through ways of life.

Using technology for countering technology: the nudge and social engineering.

Social constructivism

The social construction of technology, and therefore the social control of technology.

In part, by breaking down the barrier between mechanical and living, in actor-network theory.

Between personal limits and collective limits.

Making limits to one's own practice? Limiting in general or as a group?

How does personal choice articulate with group choice?

Research topics

Practical:

Focusing on:

Discussing potential topics

Next meeting, presenting research.