Philosophy of Information

Everything in a human 'universe' (a human mind) depends upon finance. This is because finance is the tokenization, and, therefore, the conservation (the representation) of an uber-basic circle. One zero and (or) one one produces an unlimited number (variation) (combination) of zeroes and ones. Which is exactly what is happening in all disciplines (philosophy, physics, psychology, biology, technology, media).

There is a conserved circular-linear relationship between an individual and a group (a part and a whole) (half and whole) (whole and half). Explaining mereology and producing the 'singularity' (a universal theory of everything, all disciplines) (which may be impossible for humans to accept).

Why Mathematics Can Never ‘Explain’ Reality: Well, for one thing, as everybody knows, there is no ‘Reality.’ All symbolic systems require the conservation of a circle, which is the core, and, thus, the only, dynamic in Nature. It is not possible to have X without Y (X without one other X) because it is not possible to have a circumference (a zero) without a diameter (a one). So, this proves the token for 'tokenization' that is necessary for general relativity (more (...) technically, universal relativity) (what humans call 'reality') requires duplication (which is, technically, another word for negation). This explains why identity is another word for 'representation' and, always, vice versa. Where everything in Nature is a token for (what humans know as) the arithmetic number 'two.' (Because it is impossible to have a half without a whole, and, again, always, vice versa.) Technically, negating all of the 'numbers' (all of the symbolic representations) humans assume are 'realities' in Nature. (shrink)

Space joins (and separates) any X and-or Y. X and-or Y is, necessarily, 0 and-or 1. 0 and-or 1 is, necessarily, circumference and-or diameter. Explaining (what humans think of as) gravity (general relativity) (the 'self' in all systems). Thereby, and, therein, explaining the relationship between mind and matter. Integrating philosophy and physics (abstract and concrete reality) (where you need both in order to have either). Thereby, and, therein, explaining everything in psychology (a completely tokenized ‘reality’). You can think of this (...) as philosophical, physical, and psychological fusion (absolute relativity). (shrink)

General ontology is a prominent theoretical foundation for information technology analysis, design, and development. Ontology is a branch of philosophy which studies what exists in reality. A widely used ontology in information systems, especially for conceptual modeling, is the BWW (Bunge–Wand–Weber), which is based on ideas of the philosopher and physicist Mario Bunge, as synthesized by Wand and Weber. The ontology was founded on an early subset of Bunge’s philosophy; however, many of Bunge’s ideas have evolved since then. An important (...) question, therefore, is: do the more recent ideas expressed by Bunge call for a new ontology? In this paper, we conduct an analysis of Bunge’s earlier and more recent works to address this question. We present a new ontology based on Bunge’s later and broader works, which we refer to as Bunge’s Systemist Ontology (BSO). We then compare BSO to the constructs of BWW. The comparison reveals both considerable overlap between BSO and BWW, as well as substantial differences. From this comparison and the initial exposition of BSO, we provide suggestions for further ontology studies and identify research questions that could provide a fruitful agenda for future scholarship in conceptual modeling and other areas of information technology. (shrink)

Circular Thinking is essential (required) in order to understand ‘reality’ (Nature in general)… including the relationship between mind and matter (abstraction and representation).

A thought is not possible without the conservation of a circle. Thus, the representation of a thought is, also, not possible without (the conservation of) a circle.

Peter Fosl's new monograph offers a bold reading of Hume as a "radical," "coherent," and "hybrid" skeptic, who draws influence from both the Pyrrhonian and Academic skeptical traditions. I press some concerns about whether Fosl's reading of Hume can accommodate his scientific ambitions.

The conservation of a circle produces the universal system architecture of Nature, and, therefore, the architecture for a quantum information system. There is a mandatory circle (a circular-linear relationship) between mind and matter (abstract and concrete 'reality') explaining (and exposing) both (you need both in order to have either) (complementarity is required (another word) for 'identity').

Peter S. Fosl offers a radical interpretation of Hume as a thoroughgoing sceptic on epistemological, metaphysical and doxastic grounds. He first contextualises Hume's thought in the sceptical tradition and goes on to interpret the conceptual apparatus of his work - including the Treatise, Enquiries, Essays, History, Dialogues and letters.

The modern abundance and prominence of data has led to the development of “data science” as a new field of enquiry, along with a body of epistemological reflections upon its foundations, methods, and consequences. This article provides a systematic analysis and critical review of significant open problems and debates in the epistemology of data science. We propose a partition of the epistemology of data science into the following five domains: (i) the constitution of data science; (ii) the kind of enquiry (...) that it identifies; (iii) the kinds of knowledge that data science generates; (iv) the nature and epistemological significance of “black box” problems; and (v) the relationship between data science and the philosophy of science more generally. (shrink)

In this essay we examine the relationships between Big Data and cognition, in particular human cognition. The reason for exploring such relationships lies in two aspects. First, because in the domain of cognitive science, many speculate about the benefits that the uses of Big Data analysis techniques can provide to the characterization and understanding of cognition. Secondly, because the scientific and technological sectors that promote data analysis activities, particularly statistics, computer science and data science, naturally accustomed to working with Big (...) Data, have in recent years used the idea of ​​cognition. and its related concepts as terms that seem capable of remedying the deficiencies of the era of symbolic artificial intelligence, as a response to the automation of typically human activities in the process of analyzing data and using its results. of data science, seeking to understand what Big Data really is and to investigate whether the use of cognition models could be applied to the sector. On the other hand, we will analyze the potential of using Big Data to help cognitive science. We also tried to provide a certain didactic character in some points, aiming to help the understanding, by non-specialists, regarding some principles and aspects of the methodology of data science and statistics that will eventually be mentioned in the development of our analysis. (Translated from original). (shrink)

Complexity is dependent on the circular-linear relationship between an individual and a group, meaning we cannot use 'observation' to tell us what we need to know (to explain complexity).

Most current work in epistemology deals with the evaluation and justification of information already acquired. In this book, Jaakko Hintikka instead discusses the more important problem of how knowledge is acquired in the first place. His model of information-seeking is the old Socratic method of questioning, which has been generalized and brought up-to-date through the logical theory of questions and answers that he has developed. Hintikka also argues that philosophers' quest for a definition of knowledge is ill-conceived and that the (...) entire notion of knowledge should be replaced by the concept of information. He offers an analysis of the different meanings of the concept of information and of their interrelations. The result is a new and illuminating approach to the field of epistemology. (shrink)

I submit that the critical epistemology of race and standpoint literature has not explicitly focused on the properties of information about, say, racial or gender injustice in a way similar to how epistemologists have focused on propositions and information when they describe propositional justification. I describe information in the racial-injustice-information domain in a way similar to how epistemologists describe propositional justification. To this end, I argue (C1) that if subjects in racially unjust societies tend to violate norms that promote a (...) community’s reliable information flow because racial prejudice is widely held in racially unjust societies, then racial injustice can make information flow less reliably in a community. I also argue (C2) that if racial prejudice can make information flow less reliably in a community, then information that non-dominant subjects are more likely to have will less reliably flow to community members who lack it. (shrink)

Reality at any scale (a singularity of singularities) involves the conservation of a circle. This is because zero and one (modern) (yin and yang) (ancient) are, technically, and, thus 'realistically' (literally), circumference and diameter. This means we are, always, tokenizing space, explaining 'the matrix,' 'information,' 'information systems,' and algorithms (mathematics and technology). This is because, what humans label, 'mind' and 'matter,' like any X and X (X and Y) (X and X') articulate, and, thus, conserve an always-present (totally prescient) circular-linear (...) relationship. Also known as 'tokenization.' Conservation of the Circle. (shrink)

L’ontologie générale constitue un fondement théorique important pour l’analyse, la conception et le développement dans les technologies de l’information. L’ontologie est une branche de la philosophie qui étudie ce qui existe dans la réalité. Une ontologie largement utilisée dans les systèmes d’information, en particulier pour la modélisation conceptuelle, est l’ontologie BWW (Bunge-Wand-Weber), fondée sur les idées du philosophe et physicien Mario Bunge, telles que synthétisées par Wand et Weber. Cette ontologie a été élaborée à partir d’une ancienne version de la (...) philosophie de Bunge ; cependant, de nombreuses idées de Bunge ont évolué depuis lors. Une question importante est donc la suivante : les idées les plus récentes exprimées par Bunge appellent-elles une nouvelle ontologie ? Dans cet article, nous analyserons des travaux récents et antérieurs de Bunge afin de répondre à cette question. Nous présentons une nouvelle ontologie basée sur les travaux plus récents de Bunge que nous nommons ontologie systémiste bungéenne (Bunge’s Systemist Ontolgy ; BSO). Nous comparons ensuite BSO aux constructions de BWW. La comparaison révèle à la fois un chevauchement considérable entre BSO et BWW, ainsi que des différences substantielles. À partir de cette comparaison et de l’exposition initiale de BSO, nous proposons des suggestions pour diverses études ontologiques et identifions des questions qui pourraient alimenter un programme de recherche tant en modélisation conceptuelle qu’en technologie de l’information en général. (shrink)

In Pensare l’infosfera La filosofia come design concettuale, Luciano Floridi states the value of a correct analysis and philosophical responses within the information age we are living in. The aim of this paper is to suggest several ideas for reflecting on some of Floridi’s topics such as the analysis of presence, relationship and semantization. In the second paragraph, after a brief introduction about the author, I will analyse philosophical insights on the relationship between being and determination. In the third paragraph, (...) I am going to suggest the importance of a correct analysis of presence. In the fourth paragraph, a possible analogy between the philosophy of information and a certain form of neo-idealism will be shown. At last, I try to show how the philosophy of information can play a key role in the way we think about reality, but also its possible conceptual risks. (shrink)

In the 1950s and 1960s, Conservatives themselves sought to distinguish an authentic conservatism from what Peter Viereck called “Reactionary Nationalism” and George Nash termed “The Radical Right.” In The National Review, William F. Buckley sought to expel the John Birch Society and Ayn Rand from the emerging Conservative movement. Perhaps most famously, the renowned historian Richard Hofstadter distinguished between Conservatism on the one hand and Pseudo-Conservatism on the other, which exhibited an opposition to the broad consensus of American society and (...) culture and what he famously identified as “the paranoid style” that was characterized by a Manichean outlook, an uncompromising political stance, a sense of betrayal, and a conspiratorial mindset. The project of this chapter is to outline the philosophical origins of this development, locating the roots of this debasement deep in the project of modernity itself in which conservatism developed in opposition to the universalism of rationality, science, and liberalism. (shrink)

CAT4 is proposed as a general method for representing information, enabling a powerful programming method for large-scale information systems. It enables generalised machine learning, software automation and novel AI capabilities. It is based on a special type of relation called CAT4, which is interpreted to provide a semantic representation. This is Part 2 of a five-part introduction. The focus here is on defining key mathematical properties of CAT2, identifying the topology and defining essential functions over a coordinate system. The analysis (...) is from first principles. This develops on from the axioms introduced in Part 1. The interpretation of fact networks is introduced in Part 3, and the full application to semantic theory comes in Part 4, where we introduce general functions, including the language interpretation or linguistic functions. In Part 5, we turn to software design considerations, to show how files, indexes, functions and screens can be defined to implement a CAT4 system efficiently. (shrink)

Abstract. Could a person or mind be uploaded—transmitted to a computer or network—and thereby survive bodily death? I argue ‘mind uploading’ is possible only if a mind is an abstract object rather than a concrete particular. Two implications are notable. One, if someone can be uploaded someone can be multiply-instantiated, such that there could be as many instances of a person as copies of a book. Second, mind uploading’s possibility is incompatible with the leading theories of personal identity, insofar as (...) these assume the mind is a concrete particular. Moreover, because David Chalmers (2010; 2012; 2014) defends mind uploading without construing minds as abstract, I show Chalmers’ argument to be unsound. (shrink)

Philosophers have recently begun to address the new intellectual challenges arising from the world of information and the information society. Consequently, a new and vitally important area of research has begun to emerge, the philosophy of information (PI). This paper is the first attempt to analyse the potential nature of PI systematically. The paper aims to explain (1) what PI is (2) how PI has emerged (3) why there should be a new philosophical discipline such as PI, (4) what PI’s (...) scientific goals are and, finally, (5) what interpretations of PI are possible, either as a philosophy of science/technology or as a philosophy of information design. It is argued that PI is the philosophy for the information age, as it offers the systematic treatment of the philosophical foundations of the world of information and of an information society. (shrink)

Library information science (LIS) should develop its foundation in terms of a philosophy of information (PI). This seems a rather harmless suggestion. In Floridi (2002a), I have articulated some of the reasons why I believe that PI can fulfill the foundationalist needs better than SE can. In this contribution, I clarify some aspects of my proposal (Floridi, 2002a) in favor of the interpretation of LIS as applied PI. The aim of the article is to remove some ambiguities and possible misunderstandings (...) that might prevent the correct evaluation of my position, so that disagreement can become more constructive. (shrink)

The Philosophy of Information is a new area of research at the intersection of philosophy and computer science [4]. It concerns (a) the critical investigation of the conceptual nature and basic principles of information, including its dynamics (especially computation), utilization (especially computer ethics) and sciences; and (b) the elaboration and application of computational and information-theoretic methodologies to philosophical problems. Past work by members of our group has concentrated on (a), and in this paper we explore (b). In a nutshell, we (...) ask what computer science can do for philosophy, rather than what the latter can do for the former. -/- . (shrink)

“Misreading Skepticism in the Long Eighteenth Century: Studies in the Rhetoric of Assent” revisits the intellectual historical conditions that contributed to the widespread internalization of skepticism as an error-reduction strategy during the Enlightenment. To do so, it abandons a longstanding emphasis the special philosophical tradition of epistemological skepticism associated with the Scottish philosopher David Hume and pursues an alternative intellectual history of Enlightenment skepticism centered on the Anglophone tradition of “constructive skepticism” that informed not only Hume’s skeptical habits but those (...) of other influential Anglophone Enlightenment thinkers more often set in opposition to Hume. “Misreading Skepticism” draws on this tradition of constructive skepticism to generate a much different picture of the character of Enlightenment skepticism than the one extrapolated from radical Humean skepticism: one that is not anxious but assured, not theoretical but pragmatic, not preoccupied with the threat of “radical uncertainty” but resolved to attaining “moral certainty” sufficient to justify belief and action despite irreducible uncertainty. Readings of the philosophy of John Locke, Thomas Reid, David Hume, Samuel Johnson, and Dugald Stewart recover the broader Enlightenment project of practical rationality that encouraged the widespread internalization and instrumentalization of constructive skepticism. Readings of eighteenth-century rhetorical and legal treatises trace how this constructive skeptical ethos was disseminated beyond epistemology and embraced within a generalized theory of assent. “Misreading Skepticism” approaches this broader “misreading” in the modern intellectual history of skepticism through the special lens of Romantic literary studies, where scholars have traditionally framed the rise of British Romanticism as a response to a supposed epistemological “crisis” posed by Humean skepticism. “Misreading Skepticism” argues that, to understand the Romantic literary reaction to Enlightenment skepticism, we need to approach the intellectual history of British Romanticism not through Humean skepticism but through constructive skepticism. Readings of Romantic works by William Godwin, William Wordsworth, Mary Shelley, and other authors demonstrate how these Romantic writers use literary form to interrogate the confident embrace of constructive skepticism within the Enlightenment as a means for managing uncertainty, often by dramatizing or thematizing elements of subjectivity and error that skepticism fails to detect or discipline. Drawing insight from the constructive skeptical tradition as well as Romantic literary critiques of that tradition, “Misreading Skepticism” develops a revisionary account of skepticism that attends to the rhetorical and social dimensions that complicate any epistemological account of skepticism. (shrink)

Translation in Greek of "A Geneticist's Roadmap to Sanity" (2019) by G.B. Côté. Μεταφράστηκε και στα Γαλλικά από τους Gilbert B. Côté και Roger Lapalme και προστέθηκε η βιβλιογραφία στις 28 του Απρίλη 2020: Pour comprendre le monde et revenir à la raison. La théorie du tout d'un généticien. Η ώθηση για τη συγγραφή ήταν η ανήθικη προεδρία του Donald J. Trump. Σε αυτό το κείμενο, θέλω να εξερευνήσω τα θεμέλια της ύπαρξής μας. Θα θίξω σύντομα την ενσυνείδηση, την ελεύθερη (...) βούληση, τη θρησκεία, την ηθική, τα βάσανα της ζωής , το πρόβλημα της δυαδικότητας του νου και του σώματος, την αχρονικότητα, τα πολλαπλά σύμπαντα και το ανθρώπινο πεπρωμένο. Για να διευκολύνω αυτήν την παρουσίαση, θα πρέπει πρώτα να δείξω ότι ο μαθηματικός πλατωνισμός είναι μια λογική αναγκαιότητα για την ύπαρξη οποιουδήποτε σύμπαντος, και θα εισαγάγω τους αφηρημένους, κβαντικούς και υλικούς τρόπους ύπαρξης (στη φιλοσοφία) που αντιστοιχούν στην πληροφόρηση, την ενέργεια και τη μάζα (στη φυσική). Το κείμενο αυτό αποτελεί μια σύνοψη της προσωπικής μου θεωρίας των πάντων. (shrink)

Our world is under going an enormous digital transformation. Nearly no area of our social, informational, political, economic, cultural, and biological spheres are left unchanged. What can philosophy contribute as we try to under- stand and think through these changes? How does digitization challenge past ideas of who we are and where we are headed? Where does it leave our ethical aspirations and cherished ideals of democracy, equality, privacy, trust, freedom, and social embeddedness? Who gets to decide, control, and harness (...) the powers of digitization and for which purposes? Epistemologically, do most of us understand these new mediations – and thus fabrics – of our new world? Lastly – how is the new technological landscape shaping not only our living conditions but also our collective imaginary and our self-identities? (shrink)

Computational and information-theoretic research in philosophy has become increasingly fertile and pervasive, giving rise to a wealth of interesting results. In consequence, a new and vitally important field has emerged, the philosophy of information (PI). This essay is the first attempt to analyse the nature of PI systematically. PI is defined as the philosophical field concerned with the critical investigation of the conceptual nature and basic principles of information, including its dynamics, utilisation, and sciences, and the elaboration and application of (...) information-theoretic and computational methodologies to philosophical problems. I argue that PI is a mature discipline for three reasons: it represents an autonomous field of research; it provides an innovative approach to both traditional and new philosophical topics; and it can stand beside other branches of philosophy, offering a systematic treatment of the conceptual foundations of the world of information and the information society. (shrink)

The opinion defended in this paper is that the interrelationships between the phenomena of data and information can provide a strong basis for analyzing knowledge as a quantified and qualified construction. As other models (e.g., Augusto’s General Theory of Knowledge) suggest, it is important to distinguish knowledge from both data and information in the complicated trio composed of data, information, and knowledge (DIK). However, data and information can be combined into informative data. Taking into account quantified and qualified informative data, (...) I speak here of quantified and qualified knowledge structures. (shrink)

This chapter reviews some interesting research trends in the philosophy of information (PI). First, PI is defined; then, a series of open problems in PI on which philosophers are currently working is considered. The conclusion highlights the innovative character of this new area of research.

In this article, I outline the three main philosophical lessons that we may learn from Turing’s work, and how they lead to a new philosophy of information. After a brief introduction, I discuss his work on the method of levels of abstraction (LoA), and his insistence that questions could be meaningfully asked only by specifying the correct LoA. I then look at his second lesson, about the sort of philosophical questions that seem to be most pressing today. Finally, I focus (...) on the third lesson, concerning the new philosophical anthropology that owes so much to Turing’s work. I then show how the lessons are learned by the philosophy of information. In the conclusion, I draw a general synthesis of the points made, in view of the development of the philosophy of information itself as a continuation of Turing’s work. (shrink)

The primary goal of this essay is to provide a comprehensive overview and analysis of the various relations between material artifacts and the embodied mind. A secondary goal of this essay is to identify some of the trends in the design and use of artifacts. First, based on their functional properties, I identify four categories of artifacts co-opted by the embodied mind, namely (1) embodied artifacts, (2) perceptual artifacts, (3) cognitive artifacts, and (4) affective artifacts. These categories can overlap and (...) so some artifacts are members of more than one category. I also identify some of the techniques (or skills) we use when interacting with artifacts. Identifying these categories of artifacts and techniques allows us to map the landscape of relations between embodied minds and the artifactual world. Second, having identified categories of artifacts and techniques, this essay then outlines some of the trends in the design and use of artifacts, focussing on neuroprosthetics, brain-computer interfaces, and personalisation algorithms nudging their users towards particular epistemic paths of information consumption. (shrink)

Cryptocurrency is just the tip of a never-melting iceberg…because everything in Nature is connected to everything else by an always-conserved (and uber-simple) circle. Giving us, finally, an explanation (and, technically, a use-case, and proof) for a 'self.'.

The integration of biomimetics and memetics produces non-fungible tokens. Proving the Conservation of a Circle is the core, and, thus the only, dynamic in Nature, resulting in the tokenization of reality. Explaining the notion of 'self.' Across all disciplines.

Zero and one are the circumference and diameter of an always-conserved circle. Explaining everything in philosophy, physics, and psychology. This produces a completely tokenized 'reality' with important implications for governmental and financial systems. As is, already, happening, in the exploding 'world' of NFT ('crypto' 'currency' in general) based on the statement and the diagram, and the notion of identity (knowledge as power).

Zero and one are the circumference and diameter of an always-conserved circle. Explaining everything in philosophy, physics, and psychology. This produces a completely tokenized 'reality' with important implications for governmental and financial systems. As is, already, happening, in the exploding 'world' of NFT ('crypto' 'currency' in general) based on the statement and the diagram, and the notion of identity (knowledge as power).

What’s really behind NFT (the non-fungible ‘token’).

Duality explains everything. Language unnecessary, and, actually, superfluous.

Whether you know it or not…Whether you believe it or not….

Zero and one is circumference and diameter. Literally. And, figuratively.

Universal Circularity answers the most important question on every person’s mind: what is the core dynamic in Nature? It’s a short, easily digestible read that anyone can understand, targeted to the intellectually curious of any age, background, and-or cultural group. Why will people read it? It untangles, finally, the relationship between religion and science (biology and technology) (philosophy and physics) at the perfect time in a digital age, when we all need a shortcut to work through the cognitive dissonance called (...) ‘reality.’ The book is targeted to millenials, their parents, and grandparents, in some cases, great-grandparents, a US market of 200 million people, an international market of two billion people, that is, everyone on Facebook. These age groups connect everyone to everyone, which is, realistically, and pragmatically, the theoretical basis (validation, and motivation) for the book. Demonstrating, and proving, no matter what you're trying to understand, no matter what you're trying to explain, no matter what you're trying to accomplish, an uber-simple circle controls 'reality.'. (shrink)

Yin and Yang (ancient) is Zero and One (modern).

Noether's Theorem produces the configuration (and symmetry) for everything in Nature.

Conservation of the Circle is the only dynamic in Nature.

A sound and complete axiomatization of two tabloid blogs is presented, Leiter Logic (KB) and Deontic Leiter Logic (KDB), the latter of which can be extended to Shame Game Logic for multiple agents. The (B) schema describes the mechanism behind this class of tabloids, and illustrates the perils of interpreting a provability operator as an epistemic modal. To mark this difference, and to avoid sullying Brouwer's good name, the (B) schema for epistemic modals should be called the Blog Schema.

We undeniably live in an information age—as, indeed, did those who lived before us. After all, as the cultural historian Robert Darnton pointed out: ‘every age was an age of information, each in its own way’ (Darnton 2000: 1). Darnton was referring to the news media, but his insight surely also applies to the sciences. The practices of acquiring, storing, labeling, organizing, retrieving, mobilizing, and integrating data about the natural world has always been an enabling aspect of scientific work. Natural (...) history and its descendant discipline of biological taxonomy are prime examples of sciences dedicated to creating and managing systems of ordering data. In some sense, the idea of biological taxonomy as an information science is commonplace. Perhaps it is because of its self-evidence that the information science perspective on taxonomy has not been a major theme in the history and philosophy of science. The botanist Vernon Heywood once pointed out that historians of biology, in their ‘preoccupation with the development of the sciences of botany and zoology… [have] diverted attention from the role of taxonomy as an information science’ (Heywood 1985: 11). More specifically, he argued that historians had failed to appreciate how principles and practices that can be traced to Linnaeus constituted ‘a change in the nature of taxonomy from a local or limited folk communication system and later a codified folk taxonomy to a formal system of information science [that] marked a watershed in the history of biology’ (ibid.). A similar observation could be made about twentieth-century philosophy of biology, which mostly skipped over practical and epistemic questions about information management in taxonomy. The taxonomic themes that featured in the emerging philosophy of biology literature in the second half of the twentieth century were predominantly metaphysical in orientation. This is illustrated by what has become known as the ‘essentialism story’: an account about the essentialist nature of pre- Darwinian taxonomy that used to be accepted by many historians and philosophers, and which stimulated efforts to document and interpret shifts in the metaphysical understanding of species and (natural) classification (Richards 2010; Winsor 2003; Wilkins 2009). Although contemporary debates in the philosophy of taxonomy have moved on, much discussion continues to focus on conceptual and metaphysical issues surrounding the nature of species and the principles of classification. Discussions centring on whether species are individuals, classes, or kinds have sprung up as predictably as perennials. Raucous debates have arisen even with the aim of accommodating the diversity of views: is monism, pluralism, or eliminativism about the species category the best position to take? In addition to these, our disciplines continue to interrogate what is the nature of these different approaches to classification: are they representational or inferential roles of different approaches to classification (evolutionary taxonomy, phenetics, phylogenetic systematics)? While there is still much to learn from these discussions—in which we both actively participate—our aim with this topical collection has been to seek different entrypoints and address underexposed themes in the history and philosophy of taxonomy. We believe that approaching taxonomy as an information science prompts new questions and can open up new philosophical vistas worth exploring. A twenty-first century information science turn in the history and philosophy of taxonomy is already underway. In scientific practice and in daily life it is hard to escape the imaginaries of Big Data and the constant threats of being ‘flooded with data’. In the life sciences, these developments are often associated with the socalled bioinformatics crisis that can hopefully be contained by a new, interdisciplinary breed of bioinformaticians. These new concepts, narratives, and developments surrounding the centrality of data and information systems in the biological and biomedical sciences have raised important philosophical questions about their challenges and implications. But historical perspectives are just as necessary to judge what makes our information age different from those that preceded us. Indeed, as the British zoologist Charles Godfray has often pointed out, the piles of data that are being generated in contemporary systematic biology have led to a second bioinformatics crisis, the first being the one that confronted Linnaeus in the mid-18th century (Godfray 2007). Although our aim is to clear a path for new discussions of taxonomy from an information science-informed point of view, we continue where others in the history, philosophy, and sociology of science have already trod. We believe that an appreciation of biological taxonomy as an information science raises many questions about the philosophical, theoretical, material, and practical aspects of the use and revision of biological nomenclatures in different local and global communities of scientists and citizen scientists. In particular, conceiving of taxonomy as an information science directs attention to the temporalities of managing an accumulating data about classified entities that are themselves subject to revision, to the means by which revision is accomplished, and to the semantic, material, and collaborative contexts that mediate the execution of revisions. (shrink)

It is relatively easy to state that information retrieval is a scientific discipline but it is rather difficult to understand why it is science because what is science is still under debate in the philosophy of science. To be able to convince others that IR is science, our ability to explain why is crucial. To explain why IR is a scientific discipline, we use a theory and a model of scientific study, which were proposed recently. The explanation involves mapping the (...) knowledge structure of IR to that of well-known scientific disciplines like physics. In addition, the explanation involves identifying the common aim, principles and assumptions in IR and in well-known scientific disciplines like physics, so that they constrain the scientific investigation in IR in a similar way as in physics. Therefore, there are strong similarities in terms of the knowledge structure and the constraints of the scientific investigations between IR and scientific disciplines like physics. Based on such similarities, IR is considered a scientific discipline. (shrink)

In this thesis I describe an ethological approach to the study of information which moves from the traditional ethological binary of body + environment in creating a subjective world, called an Umwelt, to include a third element, technics. In moving from a dyadic to a triadic relationship, I show the fundamental interconnectedness of these three elements of being inthe- world in the specific grounding context of information and demonstrate how we form and interact with new environments through media, computing and (...) digital technologies, thereby creating meaningful spaces for interactions and information sharing. I begin with an introductory discussion regarding ethology and information. I then examine the nature of our interconnected dwelling in environments through the ethological lens of Jacob von Uexküll’s notion of Umwelt, and the cognate fields of cybernetics, biosemiotics and cybersemiotics which he greatly influenced. I use this ethological lens in order to further explore ideas of space, place and dwelling in thinkers such as Heidegger, Westling and Ingold, whose notion of the ‘meshwork’ I repurpose for thinking through digital connection. I discuss phenomenological engagement, body development, bodily performance, and the body’s integration with technology through the work of Husserl, Merleau-Ponty and Nancy among others. From there I move to technical development, evolution and environments through the philosophical ideas of Ernst Kapp, Ernst Cassirer and Gilbert Simondon. Simondon in particular is of great importance when considering the interlinking of technical and human environments in terms of information studies and digital information environments. This is followed by an exploration of four thematic theoretical lenses: entanglement, rhizome, interface and diffraction through which to bring together and frame the previous research. Finally, I close the main thesis argument with a multimodal media phenomenological account of first-person research in the University of Colorado Boulder’s Media Archaeology Lab in order to demonstrate the use of an ethological approach to the study of information, media and computing technologies. Through this research, including photography and text, I demonstrate the phenomenological use of historic technologies to step outside of the reticulated meshwork of technology use and bodily integration, to slow down and listen to the body in strange multimodal mediatic encounters in order to demonstrate how these technologies are integrated within the horizon of experience which is our subjective world. I end with a conclusion that focuses on the ethics of information, technologies, media and being-with. (shrink)