Telepresence and Trust: a Speech-Act Theory of Mediated Communication

Philosophy and Technology 30 (4):443-459 (2017)
  Copy   BIBTEX

Abstract

Trust is central to our social lives in both epistemic and practical ways. Often, it is rational only given evidence for trustworthiness, and with that evidence is made available by communication. New technologies are changing our practices of communication, enabling increasing rich and diverse ways of ‘being there’, but at a distance. This paper asks: how does telepresent communication support evidence-constrained trust? In answering it, I reply to the leading pessimists about the possibility of the digital mediation of trust, Philip Pettit and Hubert Dreyfus. I also rebut Media Richness Theory, which proposes a linear relationship between the volume of mediated information and the quality of communication. Positively, I develop a speech-act theory of digitally mediated communication, drawing on Austen’s identification of the illocutionary act. The choice of a particular technology of communication constitutes part of what is communicated, including a setting of the social ‘frame’, and thus the possibilities for trust to be sustained or eroded. How something is said is part of what it is that is said.

Other Versions

No versions found

Links

PhilArchive



    Upload a copy of this work     Papers currently archived: 98,109

External links

Setup an account with your affiliations in order to access resources via your University's proxy server

Through your library

Similar books and articles

Studying the ethical implications of e-trust in the lab.Cristina Bicchieri & Azi Lev-On - 2011 - Ethics and Information Technology 13 (1):5-15.
The Philosophy of Trust.Paul Faulkner & Thomas Simpson (eds.) - 2017 - Oxford, GB: Oxford University Press.
Trust, authority and epistemic responsibility.Gloria Origgi - 2008 - Theoria: Revista de Teoría, Historia y Fundamentos de la Ciencia 23 (1):35-44.

Analytics

Added to PP
2016-09-19

Downloads
53 (#327,749)

6 months
11 (#271,417)

Historical graph of downloads
How can I increase my downloads?

Author's Profile

Thomas W. Simpson
Oxford University

Citations of this work

No citations found.

Add more citations

References found in this work

How to do things with words.John L. Austin - 1962 - Oxford [Eng.]: Clarendon Press. Edited by Marina Sbisá & J. O. Urmson.
Virtue, Vice, and Value.Thomas Hurka - 2001 - New York, USA: Oxford University Press.
Testimony, Trust, and Authority.Benjamin McMyler - 2011 - , US: Oxford University Press.
Deciding to trust, coming to believe.Richard Holton - 1994 - Australasian Journal of Philosophy 72 (1):63 – 76.

View all 27 references / Add more references