Research in nanotechnology has advanced rapidly in recent years. Several researchers, however, warn that there is a paucity of research on the ethical, legal, and social implications of nanotechnology, and they caution that ethical reflections on nanotechnology lag behind this fast developing science. In this article, the authors question this conclusion, pointing out that the predicted concrete ethical issues related to the area of nanotechnology are rather similar to those related to the area of biotechnology and biology that have been (...) considered by ethicists since the 1970s. Hence, a knowledge base has already been acquired from ethical reflections on biotechnology and biology, which may be a good starting point and foundation for a discussion of ethical reflections on nanotechnology. The authors argue that a promising approach is the use of basic ethical principles as a method to analyze ethical issues of nanotechnology. (shrink)

This article explores the concept of queer temporality in the works of queer theorists Lee Edelman, Jack Halberstam, and José Muñoz and establishes a connection between a Marxist critique of abstract capitalist time and queer theory’s critique of the notion of future-oriented social value. Thereby, it shows how economic and social reproduction are both processes that involve a linear and progress-oriented temporality. Edelman uses the concept of reproductive futurism to criticize society’s focus on the child as the ultimate future-oriented goal (...) and argues that queer communities must completely abandon a concept of the future because it is always already embedded in the idea of reproduction. Halberstam examines queer countercultures to find an alternative to Edelman’s anti-social stance, and Muñoz creates a concept of a queer utopia as a future of potentiality that offers hope in the present. The article points out the lack of a sense of history in these theorists’ works on queer temporality and suggests an understanding of the concept that actively incorporates the past as a relevant strengthening of queer communities. (shrink)

This contribution examines Arrighi’s effort in Adam Smith in Beijing to understand the trajectory of China’s political economy and the effects of that trajectory on the current reforms and changes in China. This article discusses these reforms from the perspective of China’s ’internal’ dynamics and suggests that Arrighi’s argument has been developed without proper reference to China’s complex realities. As an alternative, the contribution proposes a research-agenda that could better account for these realities.

Certain critics, e.g. Manfred Frank and Hans-Herbert Kögler, claim that Hans-Georg Gadamer's philosophical hermeneutics reduces the individual subject to a mere instrument of history and tradition, the latter reproducing themselves through the subject. However, Gadamer also emphasizes the active role of the subject in shaping and creating history and tradition. In this article I argue that the critics mistakenly emphasize a one-sided conception of history. By incorporating both active and passive aspects of the subject, Gadamer's philosophical hermeneutics provides the means (...) by which the individual may be conceived more aptly in an interdependent, dialectical relation to their corresponding historical, cultural, and social context. (shrink)

Based on a dataset of more than 5,000 contentious collective actions from 1700-2000, this paper examines the relation between popular protest and democratization of the Danish political system. The first wave of protests began in the 1830s and culminated in 1848 with the fall of absolutism and the transition to constitutional monarchy. The next protest wave from 1885 to 1887 arose from the so-called ‘constitutional struggle’ and mobilized hundreds of thousands of ordinary Danes, and contributed to the parliamentarization and nationalization (...) of the political system. The third wave unfolded around the end of World War II, while the hitherto last wave of popular struggle erupted in 1968 with the youth rebellion. The analysis show that ‘democracy’ was the central issue of contention in all four of these protest waves, and support the main thesis that periods of intense interaction between popular protest and the state have had a decisive formative influence on the genesis and further development of Danish democracy. (shrink)

Tinguelys gesamtes Œuvre scheint vom Vanitas-Motiv grundiert: seine sinnlosen Maschinen aus Schrott, sich selbst vernichtenden, ephemeren Artefakte, die in Form von Flügelaltären stattfindende Auseinandersetzung mit dem Tod und erst recht der eine barocke Tragikomödie referierende Cenodoxus. Dass dieser Eindruck trügt, zeigt sich sobald das scheinbar Evidente mit den frühneuzeitlichen Spielarten der Vanitas konfrontiert wird. Dennoch adaptiert und inszeniert Tinguely das Motiv mit dem melancholischen Gestus des seines Heilshorizonts verlustig gegangenen Subjekts.

The volume advances research in the philosophy of technology by introducing contributors who have an acute sense of how to get beyond or reframe the epistemic, ontological and normative limitations that currently limit the fields of philosophy of technology and science and technology studies.

The essays both represent a variety of epistemological approaches, including those of the humanities, social studies, natural science, sociology, psychology, ...

This chapter contains sections titled: History of Technology Technology and Science Technology and Philosophy Technology and Environment Technology and Politics Technology and Ethics Technology and the Future.

Management consultants and their moral standards and behaviour have been questioned and caricatured, but it is not sufficiently appreciated that they frequently have to operate in situations which are characterized by ambiguity, ignorance, uncertainty and sensitivity and they cannot always simply apply ethical rules in cooperating with their clients. In addition, more attention should be given to the ethics of the client, and “dual ethics” should be a joint concern. Research among consultants and clients has identified several ethical dilemmas frequently (...) experienced by consultants which are explained and explored. Dr Poulfelt is Associate Professor of Management at the Department of Management, Politics and Philosophy at Copenhagen Business School, Blaagaardsgade 23 B, DK‐2200 Copenhagen N, Denmark. (shrink)

In this paper I will argue that medical specialists interpret and diagnose through technological mediations like X-ray and fMRI images, and by actualizing embodied skills tacitly they are determining the identity of objects in the perceptual field. The initial phase of human interpretation of visual objects takes place during the moments of visual perception before we are consciously aware of the perceived. What facilitate this innate ability to interpret are experiences, learning and training that become humanly embodied skills. These embodied (...) skills are actualized during the moments of visual perception. My argument is that biology, society and instruments constitute unique individual ontologies influencing specialist readings of the technological output, in other words, putting limits on the ‘‘truth-to-nature’’ relation, which is so much sought for in science. (shrink)

Friis and Crease illustrate the diversity of content and styles in postphenomenology, a burgeoning field that has attracted attention among scholars engaged in technology studies. Contributors to this edited collection seek to analyze, clarify, and develop postphenomenological language and concepts, expand the work of Don Ihde, the field's founder, and delve into areas that Ihde never tackled.

Public sector adoption of AI techniques in welfare systems recasts historic national data as resource for machine learning. In this paper, we examine how the use of register data for development of predictive models produces new ‘afterlives’ for citizen data. First, we document a Danish research project’s practical efforts to develop an algorithmic decision-support model for social workers to classify children’s risk of maltreatment. Second, we outline the tensions emerging from project members’ negotiations about which datasets to include. Third, we (...) identify three types of afterlives for citizen data in machine learning projects: (1) data afterlives for training and testing the algorithm, acting as ‘ground truth’ for inferring futures, (2) data afterlives for validating the algorithmic model, acting as markers of robustness, and (3) data afterlives for improving the model’s fairness, valuated for reasons of data ethics. We conclude by discussing how, on one hand, these afterlives engender new ethical relations between state and citizens; and how they, on the other hand, also articulate an alternative view on the value of datasets, posing interesting contrasts between machine learning projects developed within the context of the Danish welfare state and mainstream corporate AI discourses of the bigger, the better. (shrink)

Embodied cognition is an interpretative—or hermeneutical—cognition inherent in motor-sensory perception intrinsically informed by biological and sociocultural memory, a cognition embedded in the organism as well as the socio-cultural environment interacting with it (Ward et al. TOPOI 36:365–375, 2017), of which technologies are a part. Yet, smart machines are advancing on human abilities to perceive and interpret concerning the accuracy, quantity, and quality of the data processed. Machines process and categorize images, perform classification tasks, they calculate and perform pattern analysis, all (...) machine learning processes are task-specific. Machine learning processes resemble human interpretative processes; however, these are two very different ways of “dealing with something,” although both can be said to be hermeneutical, one enactive, the other material; the first is a meaning-generating interpretative process, the second a statistics-based information output. The information extracted from all the data fed into the computer is the end-product of machine learning, whereas human interpretative enactments are continuous and necessary for any application of the information output. (shrink)

Management consultants and their moral standards and behaviour have been questioned and caricatured, but it is not sufficiently appreciated that they frequently have to operate in situations which are characterized by ambiguity, ignorance, uncertainty and sensitivity and they cannot always simply apply ethical rules in cooperating with their clients. In addition, more attention should be given to the ethics of the client, and “dual ethics” should be a joint concern. Research among consultants and clients has identified several ethical dilemmas frequently (...) experienced by consultants which are explained and explored. Dr Poulfelt is Associate Professor of Management at the Department of Management, Politics and Philosophy at Copenhagen Business School, Blaagaardsgade 23 B, DK‐2200 Copenhagen N, Denmark. (shrink)

This article explores the profound impact of visualism and visual perception in the context of medical imaging diagnostics. It emphasizes the intricate interplay among vision, embodiment, subjectivity, language, and historicity within the realm of medical science and technology, with a specific focus on image consciousness. The study delves into the role of subjectivity in perception, facilitating the communication of opacity and historicity to the perceiving individual. Additionally, it scrutinizes the image interpretation process, drawing parallels to text interpretation and highlighting the (...) influence of personal biases and individuality in medical practice. By revisiting Husserl’s conceptualization of “image consciousness” and introducing the notion of “image theme”, the paper seeks to establish a theoretical framework for making sense of images within the context of technological interpretation. A key objective is to enhance the phenomenology of technology through a systematic analysis of medical imaging diagnosis, contributing to an expanded epistemological foundation for medical practice. The article recognizes that the construction of medical knowledge incorporates subjective elements, especially within a historical context. The interpretation of images involves both instrumental and expert interpretation, with human subjectivity playing a crucial role. The article asserts that human creativity and conscious engagement are indispensable in interpreting all medical images. (shrink)

Healthcare practitioners are often presented with vulnerable encounters where their professional experience is insufficient when dealing with patients who suffer from illnesses such as chronic pain. How can one otherwise understand chronic pain and develop practices whereby medical healthcare practitioners can experience alternative ways of doing their practice? This essay describes how a group of researchers have, over a number of years, developed improvised participatory theatre as a means of engaging healthcare practitioners, patients and other lay people in situations where (...) it is legitimate to reappraise their practice and reunderstand the nature of an illness such as chronic pain. One conclusion was to consider that it is a relational rather than an individual phenomenon that in turn demands alternative practice. Through iterative workshop processes of improvised theatre, participants are encouraged to experience the vulnerable, the unknown, and the need to be alternatively present when dealing with patients whose situation is imbued with suffering. (shrink)

This paper describes how body regimes are effectuated in the prevailing treatment strategy of physiotherapy. The process of self‐mastering in the context of sports‐related injuries is highlighted. Through a Foucauldian perspective on body regimes the aim is to shed light on the process of individualization and self‐mastery in rehabilitation. The treatment of illness in the physiotherapy clinic does not characterize the patient as sick, and exempt the patient from daily duties and expectations. The empirical data include 17 qualitative illness narratives (...) and several years of fieldwork observing patients with anterior cruciate ligament (ACL) injuries in a physiotherapy clinic. The study demonstrates how the expectation that the patients be active and self‐mastering permeates the total process of treatment. The individual responsibility for personal well‐being is a recurrent phenomenon in public health services in general, and specifically prominent in the rehabilitation of sports injuries. (shrink)

This book discusses key philosophical concepts and ideologies, including ontology, epistemology, logic, semantics, moral and political philosophy, theology and aesthetics during classical antiquity. Karsten Friis Johansen charts the history of ancient philosophy from the mythological oral tradition, Homer and early tragedy, to the giants of Plato and Aristotle through to paganism and the genesis of Christianity. A History of Ancient Philosophy also presents detailed analysis of individual ancient philosophers and interpretations and commentary on key philosophical passages.

Translated by Henrik Rosenmeier, _A History of Ancient Philosophy_ charts the origins and development of ancient philosophical thought. For easy reference, the book is divided chronologically into six main parts. The sections are further divided into philosophers and philosophical movements: *Pre-Socratic Philosophy, including mythology, the Pythagoreans and Parmenides *The Great Century of Athens, including the Sophists and Socrates *Plato, including The Republic, The Symposium and The Timaeus *Aristotle, including The Physics, The Metaphysics and The Poetics *Hellenistic Philosophy, including the Sceptics, (...) the Stoics, the Epicureans and Cicero *Late Antiquity, including Neoplatonism, Origen and St Augustine. This comprehensive and meticulously documented book is structured to make ancient philosophical thought and ancient thinkers accessible. It contains: *full references to primary sources *detailed interpretations of key philosophical passages, including surveys of previous philosophical readings *an overview of the development of ancient philosophical thought *discussions of the relationships between philosophers and their ideas *analyses of key philosophical concepts and ideologies including ontology, epistemology, logic, semantics, moral and political philosophy, theology and aesthetics *explanations of Greek philosophical terminology. (shrink)