Codes and Codings in Crisis

2011 ◽  
Vol 28 (6) ◽  
pp. 3-23 ◽  
Author(s):  
Adrian Mackenzie ◽  
Theo Vurdubakis
Keyword(s):  
Urban Life ◽  
Special Issue ◽  
Will To Power ◽  
Highway Engineering ◽  
Contemporary World ◽  
Neoliberal Capitalism ◽  
Wide Range ◽  
The Will ◽  
The Many ◽  
And Control

The connections between forms of code and coding and the many crises that currently afflict the contemporary world run deep. Code and crisis in our time mutually define, and seemingly prolong, each other in ‘infinite branching graphs’ of decision problems. There is a growing academic literature that investigates digital code and software from a wide range of perspectives –power, subjectivity, governmentality, urban life, surveillance and control, biopolitics or neoliberal capitalism. The various strands in this literature are reflected in the papers that comprise this special issue. They address topics ranging from social networks, mass media, financial markets and academic plagiarism to highway engineering in relation to the dynamics and diversity of crises. Against this backdrop, the purpose of this essay is to highlight and explore some of the underlying themes connecting codes and codings and the production and apprehension of ‘crisis’. We analyse how the ever-increasing intermediation of contemporary life by codes of various kinds has been closely shadowed by a proliferation of crises. We discuss three related aspects of the coupling of code and crisis (signification, performativity and excess) running across these seemingly diverse topics. We and the other contributors in this special issue seek to go beyond the restricted (and often restricting) understanding of code as the language of machines. Rather, we view code qua programs and algorithms as epitomizing a much broader phenomenon. The codes that we live, and that we live by, also tell us about the ways in which the ‘will to power’ and the 'will to knowledge' tend to be enacted in the contemporary world.

Exploring ‘digital placemaking’

2021 ◽  
Vol 27 (3) ◽  
pp. 573-578
Author(s):  
Germaine Halegoua ◽  
Erika Polson
Keyword(s):  
Digital Media ◽  
Sense Of Place ◽  
Media Use ◽  
Special Issue ◽  
Social Actors ◽  
Broad Framework ◽  
The Many ◽  
And Control ◽  
Connected Spaces

This brief essay introduces the special issue on the topic of ‘digital placemaking’ – a concept describing the use of digital media to create a sense of place for oneself and/or others. As a broad framework that encompasses a variety of practices used to create emotional attachments to place through digital media use, digital placemaking can be examined across a variety of domains. The concept acknowledges that, at its core, a drive to create and control a sense of place is understood as primary to how social actors identify with each other and express their identities and how communities organize to build more meaningful and connected spaces. This idea runs through the articles in the issue, exploring the many ways people use digital media, under varied conditions, to negotiate differential mobilities and become placemakers – practices that may expose or amplify preexisting inequities, exclusions, or erasures in the ways that certain populations experience digital media in place and placemaking.

scholarly journals M. Heidegger: Metaphysical character of technical scientific civilisation

2009 ◽  
Vol 20 (1) ◽  
pp. 107-140
Author(s):  
Mico Savic
Keyword(s):  
Science And Technology ◽  
The Other ◽  
Western Philosophy ◽  
Will To Power ◽  
World Picture ◽  
Contemporary World ◽  
Modern Age ◽  
The World ◽  
The Will ◽  
Paper Author

In this paper, author deals with Heidegger's account of the modern age as the epoch based on Western metaphysics. In the first part of the paper, he shows that, according to Heidegger, modern interpretation of the reality as the world picture, is essentially determined by Descartes' philosophy. Then, author exposes Heidegger's interpretation of the turn which already took place in Plato's metaphysics and which made possible Descartes' metaphysics and modern epoch. In the second part of the paper, author explores Heidegger's interpretation of science and technology as shoots of very metaphysics. Heidegger emphasizes that the essence of technology corresponds to the essence of subjectivity and shows how the metaphysics of subjectivity subsequently finds its end in Nietzsche's metaphysics of the will to power, as the last word of Western philosophy. In the concluding part, author argues that the contemporary processes of globalization can be just understood as processes of completion of metaphysics. They can be identified as a global rule of the essence of technology. On the basis of Heidegger's vision of overcoming metaphysics, author concludes that it opens the possibility of a philosophy of finitude which points to dialogue with the Other as a way of resolving the key practical issues of the contemporary world.

scholarly journals Discussion to the special issue: Supporting the transition of a diversity of students: Developing the “whole student” during and beyond their time at higher education.

2021 ◽  
Vol 9 (2) ◽  
pp. 170-178
Author(s):  
Jacques Van der Meer
Keyword(s):  
Higher Education ◽  
New Zealand ◽  
20Th Century ◽  
South Pacific ◽  
Student Diversity ◽  
Special Issue ◽  
The South ◽  
Wide Range ◽  
The World ◽  
The Many

Apart from the current Covid19 context, the higher education sectors across the world have been faced with major challenges over the last few decades (Auerbach et al., 2018; Haggis, 2004), including increased numbers and diversity. Considering the many challenges in higher education, especially the rise of students’ mental health issues, I am strongly convinced that education sectors, but in particular the higher education sector, have a societal responsibility to not just focus on students as learners of knowledge and/or professional skills, but to support them in being developed as “whole students”. All these challenges also raise a need for research into the broader context to identify how we can better support the diverse student population as they transition into higher education, but also how to prepare them for a positive experience during and beyond their time in higher education. Overall, it can be said that the contributions to this special issue beneficially addressed some of the main foci to widening the perspectives on diversity related to the transition into higher education. The contribution came from different European countries, including Belgium, Germany, Italy, Sweden, Switzerland, The Netherlands and the United Kingdom. De Clercq et al. (in this special issue) indicated that environmental characteristics, such as distinctiveness of countries, is often overlooked in research. In this discussion article, therefore, some particular references will also be made to a specific country, New Zealand. This may be of interest and relevant for the particular questions raised in this special issue as focusing on student diversity in educational contexts has been considered important for some time in this country. Aoteraroa New Zealand is a country in the South Pacific colonised by Europeans in the 19th century. In the second part of the 20th century, the focus across the New Zealand education sectors, including higher education, started to develop beyond just a European perspective, and started to focus more on recognition of student diversity. Initially, the main focus was on the indigenous population, the Māori people. In the last few decades of the 20th century, the focus was extended to the Pacific Island people, many of whom migrated to New Zealand from a wide range of different islands in the South Pacific. In the 21st century, the focus on Culturally and Linguistically Diverse (CALD) groups was further extended, and over the last decade also because of the increase of refugees from the Middle East and Asia. Providing some insights from the other end of the world, in quite a different and de-colonised ex-European nation may help European (and other) countries to reflect on their own approaches.

SPECIAL ISSUE ON INNOVATION AND APPLICATION OF MECHANICAL ENGINEERING GUEST EDITORIAL

2015 ◽  
Vol 39 (3) ◽  
pp. ix-ix
Author(s):  
Wen-Hsiang Hsieh
Keyword(s):  
Peer Review ◽  
Mechanical Engineering ◽  
Technology Innovation ◽  
Research Area ◽  
Industrial Applications ◽  
Canadian Society ◽  
Special Issue ◽  
Wide Range ◽  
Mechanical Products ◽  
The Many

Machines make all industrial artifacts and mechanical products in the world. In this 21th century, people enjoy mechanical products that made lives well and convenient. However, creating a useful mechanical product mainly relies on academic development and technology innovation especially in the field of mechanical engineering. This special issue focuses on the innovation and application of mechanical engineering, which covers a wide range of fundamental studies, technical innovation, and industrial applications by applying the knowledge of mechanical-related approaches, processes and techniques. It presents 33 selected papers (Part 1) from the 3rd International Conference on Engineering and Technology Innovation (ICETI 2014) which was held from October 31 to November 4, 2014, in Kenting, Taiwan. These selected papers underwent a complete Transactions of the Canadian Society for Mechanical Engineering peer-review. Acceptance in this special issue was based on completion of the reviewers recommended and mandatory changes and final examination by the Guest Editor. We thank all of the authors who have submitted their work for publication in this special issue. We are also grateful to the many reviewers that provided their time and expertise in providing valuable peer review. Special thanks also go to Professor Paul J. Zsombor-Murray, Editor of Transactions of the Canadian Society for Mechanical Engineering, who had the foresight to support a special issue in this research area. This special issue is expected to be a core issue for academic researches and industrial engineers in the mechanical engineering field.

Responsible Belief, Influence, and Control: Response to Stephen White

2019 ◽  
Vol 44 ◽  
pp. 53-62
Author(s):  
Rik Peels ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Crucial Difference ◽  
Wide Range ◽  
Reasons Responsiveness ◽  
Control Response ◽  
The Will ◽  
Doxastic Responsibility ◽  
Epistemic Obligation ◽  
And Control ◽  
Epistemic Obligations

I reply to Stephen White’s criticisms of my Influence View. First, I reply to his worry that my Appraisal Account of responsibility cannot make sense of doxastic responsibility. Then, I discuss in detail his stolen painting case and argue that the Influence View can make sense of it. Next, I discuss various other cases that are meant to show that acting in accordance with one’s beliefs does not render one blameless. I argue that in these cases, even though the subjects act in accordance with their own beliefs, there is plenty of reason to think that at some previous point in time they violated certain intellectual obligations that led to them to hold those beliefs. Even on a radically subjective account of responsibility, then, we can perfectly well hold these people responsible for their beliefs. I go on to defend the idea that reasons-responsiveness will not do for doxastic responsibility: we need influence on our beliefs as well. Thus, doxastic compatibilism or rationalism is untenable. Subsequently, I defend my earlier claim that there is a crucial difference between beliefs and actions in that actions are often subject to the will, whereas beliefs are not. Finally, I respond to White’s worry that if one has a subjective epistemic obligation just because one believes that certain actions are epistemically bad, some people will have a wide range of absurd epistemic obligations, such as the obligation to listen to Infowars.

Translocal style communities

Pragmatics ◽  
2009 ◽  
Vol 19 (1) ◽  
pp. 103-127 ◽  
Author(s):  
H. Samy Alim
Keyword(s):  
Popular Culture ◽  
Recent Work ◽  
Hip Hop ◽  
Linguistic Anthropology ◽  
Hip Hop Culture ◽  
Global Era ◽  
Contemporary World ◽  
Wide Range ◽  
Youth Agency ◽  
The Many

This article addresses issues that lie at the intersection of debates about language, Hip Hop Culture, and globalization. Critically synthesizing a wide range of recent work on Hip Hop and foregrounding issues of youth agency as evidenced by Hip Hop youth’s metalinguistic theorizing, the article presents an empirical account of youth as cultural theorists. Hip Hop youth are both participants and theorists of their participation in the many translocal style communities that constitute the Global Hip Hop Nation. Highlighting youth agency, the article demonstrates that youth are engaging in the agentive act of theorizing the changes in the contemporary world as they attempt to locate themselves at the intersection of the local and the global. The article concludes by calling for a linguistic anthropology of globalization characterized by ethnographic explorations of and a theoretical focus on popular culture, music, and mass-mediated language as central to an anthropological understanding of linguistic processes in a global era.

Special Issue on the Great East Japan Earthquake Disaster: Part IV

2015 ◽  
Vol 10 (sp) ◽  
pp. 709-709
Author(s):  
Katsuki Takiguchi
Keyword(s):  
Nuclear Power ◽  
Pacific Coast ◽  
Current Issue ◽  
Great East Japan Earthquake ◽  
Special Issue ◽  
Earthquake Disaster ◽  
Kanto Earthquake ◽  
The Pacific ◽  
Wide Range ◽  
The Many

The basic policy of the Journal of Disaster Research (JDR), as a multidisciplinary academicjournal, is to cover all types of disasters ? except for war ? through a broad comprehensive perspective. Since its inaugural issue in August 2006, the JDR has been published bimonthly,with six issues a year. 2015 marks the tenth year since the JDRfs first issue. Among the many events happening during this decade is the March 2011 Great East Japan Earthquake Disaster which was induced by the 2011 off the Pacific coast of Tohoku Earthquake.This event had two major features ? that the tsunami accompanying the earthquake caused the main damage and that it triggered a nuclear hazard accident at a nuclear power plant. The 2011 Great East Japan Earthquake Disaster was a unprecedented earthquake disaster called catastrophic hazard following two others ? the 1923 Great Kanto Earthquake Disasterthat leveled Tokyo and the 1995 Hanshin Awaji Earthquake Disaster that destroyed parts of Osaka and Kobe. In view of this catastrophic hazardfs scale, the JDR decided to publish special annual issues on the Great East Japan Earthquake Disaster for five years since 2012 in addition to its regularissues. No publication fee was charged to contributors and support was asked from corporations. Papers on the special issues are published mainly online as an e-journal though printed editions are published for archival purposes. The current issue is the fourth of these special issues, and contributors have covered the 2011 disaster from many a wide range of perspectives. 21 papers were submitted and 8 papers are accepted for publication after peer review. The editors are confident that, like the previous three issues, this issue fully measure up to the quality that was expected for the special issue. I wish to express my gratitude to the contributors and reviewers and to thank corporations for their invaluable support.

Special Issue on Rescue Robots

2003 ◽  
Vol 15 (5) ◽  
pp. 473-473
Author(s):  
Koichi Osuka ◽  
Satoshi Tadokoro
Keyword(s):  
Great Earthquake ◽  
Main Stream ◽  
Special Issue ◽  
National Project ◽  
Urban Disaster ◽  
Wide Range ◽  
Rescue Robots ◽  
Human Operators ◽  
Set Up ◽  
The Many

This special issue brings together the many achievements on rescue robots development beginning after the Hanshin-Awaji Great Earthquake in Kobe. The earthquake that laid waste to most of Kobe, Seattle’s sister city, early on the morning of January 17, 1995, was a wakeup warning to robotics researchers who realized that the potential of their studies had not been realized in its greatest and most challenging arena – a disastrous earthquake where robots and similar strategies could have rescued people in situations where no other help or support was possible. Japanese robotics researchers set up academic working groups to study and promote such R&D. The national project involving key next-generation urban disaster prevention technologies includes the subtheme of rescue robots, with robotics researchers introducing concrete achievements. A Japanese national project had never used the term of rescue robots before then. Rescue robots range from simple instruments powered by human operators to intelligent machines able to operate virtually on their own. Some advanced rescue robots have built-in prime motive power and others use the latest in artificial intelligence. This special issue brings to readers a dozen articles introducing the many and varied achievements by Japanese robotics researchers covering a wide range of rescue robots. With this field poised to enter the main stream, these robots are close to practical application, and knowledge of their capabilities is essential to those able to utilize this latest technology in their current and future re search. This issue is a must to all who are interested in exploring the new world of robot rescue.

Suffocation in the Polis

2019 ◽  
Vol 25 (1-3) ◽  
pp. 332-338
Author(s):  
Jeffrey M. Perl
Keyword(s):  
Social Order ◽  
Common Knowledge ◽  
Contemporary Society ◽  
Human Beings ◽  
Special Issue ◽  
Will To Power ◽  
Anniversary Issue ◽  
Social Conduct ◽  
The Will ◽  
The Common

This introduction to the third and final part of the Common Knowledge symposium “Unsocial Thought, Uncommon Lives” (13:1 [Winter 2007]: 33–39) is reprinted here in a special issue of representative pieces from the journal’s first twenty-five years. The title is taken from an article by Isaiah Berlin in CK (7:3 [Winter 1998]: 186–214 and likewise reprinted in the anniversary issue). Perl’s essay argues against the Aristotelian (and, generally, commonsense) presumption that “man is a social animal” and explains that the CK symposium on unsocial thought was meant to substantiate that “societies do as a rule smother instinctive (along with distinctive) behaviors, but in the process they also as a rule incarnate the least respectable instincts with greater force than individuals can do independently. . . . If even heroism and altruism, let alone standard social conduct, are oblique expressions of aggression, cruelty, and the will to power (as the hermeneutics of suspicion maintains), then the obvious conclusion to reach is that human beings are not fit company for each other. . . . The standard means of veering off from this conclusion is to blame one’s own society, or aspects of contemporary society, and then to propose improvements. Historically, evidence suggests, efforts of this kind are (or else, become) opportunities for controversy and thus for exercise of the will to power. Social order is such that even the discussion of social order occasions conflict.” Perl goes on to argue that individualists and communitarians are “fundamentally in accord”: they are “teams” agreeing to the rules of a dubious conflict from which only “stylites, dendrites, and (on the hearty end of this spectrum) mendicants” have done what is required to exempt themselves.

Computers for data, control and simulation

1988 ◽  
Vol 46 ◽  
pp. 920-921
Author(s):  
David C. Joy
Keyword(s):  
Personal Computers ◽  
Monitoring And Control ◽  
Data Logging ◽  
Data Logger ◽  
Operational Conditions ◽  
Data Control ◽  
The Many ◽  
And Control

Personal computers (PCs) are a powerful resource in the EM Laboratory, both as a means of automating the monitoring and control of microscopes, and as a tool for quantifying the interpretation of data. Not only is a PC more versatile than a piece of dedicated data logging equipment, but it is also substantially cheaper. In this tutorial the practical principles of using a PC for these types of activities will be discussed.The PC can form the basis of a system to measure, display, record and store the many parameters which characterize the operational conditions of the EM. In this mode it is operating as a data logger. The necessary first step is to find a suitable source from which to measure each of the items of interest. It is usually possible to do this without having to make permanent corrections or modifications to the EM.

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