scholarly journals O FETICHE DA MERCADORIA-CIÊNCIA, O CIENTISTA COMO MERCADORIA E A DOMINAÇÃO TECNOLÓGICA

2020 ◽  
Vol 13 (4) ◽  
pp. 379
Author(s):  
Valdemir Pereira de Queiroz Neto ◽  
Maria de Fátima Vieira Severiano
Keyword(s):  
Social Inequality ◽  
Frankfurt School ◽  
Theoretical Discussion ◽  
Values In Science ◽  
Political Values ◽  
Human Needs ◽  
Technological Rationality ◽  
Educational Formation

This article has the objective of promoting reflections on the Technological Rationality and its implications to the production of science and the educational formation of scientists. With support on the theoretical reference of the Frankfurt School and other thinkers of the issue of technique and science, a critic is addressed to the existing disequilibrium between technical and humanitarian progress, denouncing the need of a redirection of scientific propositions to human needs and to the combat of the ever-increasing social inequality. Methodologically, this article is constituted of a theoretical discussion about the matter of the use of science as an instrument capable of enhancing the dominations directed to individuals, both scientists and consumers of science products. The findings reinforce the importance of the recovery of social and political values in science to the construction of a fairer and more balanced society.

Values in Science and the Erosion of Trust

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Inmaculada de Melo-Martín ◽  
Kristen Intemann
Keyword(s):  
Knowledge Production ◽  
Social Values ◽  
Stakeholder Involvement ◽  
Negative Influence ◽  
Political Agenda ◽  
Values In Science ◽  
Scientific Communities ◽  
Alternative Strategies ◽  
Political Values ◽  
The Public

This chapter considers another factor that plays a role in eroding the public’s trust in science: concerns about the negative influence of nonepistemic values in science, particularly in controversial areas of inquiry with important effects on public policy. It shows that the credibility of scientists can be undermined when the public perceives that scientists have a political agenda or will be biased by their own personal or political values. However, to assume that the best way to address this problem is try to eliminate such values from science altogether would be a mistake. Ethical and social values are necessary and important to knowledge production. Consequently, the chapter explores alternative strategies to increase transparency and stakeholder involvement so as to address legitimate concerns about bias and sustain warranted trust in scientific communities.

Human Nature, Non-human Nature, and Needs

2016 ◽  
Author(s):  
Andrew Biro
Keyword(s):  
Critical Theory ◽  
Political Theory ◽  
Human Nature ◽  
Deliberative Democracy ◽  
Frankfurt School ◽  
Instrumental Rationality ◽  
Communicative Rationality ◽  
Human Beings ◽  
Human Needs

This chapter assesses the relevance of Frankfurt School critical theory for contemporary environmental political theory. Early Frankfurt School thinkers such as Adorno, Horkheimer, and Marcuse developed a critique of instrumental rationality that provides a powerful framework for understanding the domination of nature in modernity, including an inability to articulate and defend human needs. Habermas subsequently attempts to mitigate this totalizing critique, countering instrumental rationality with a focus on communicative rationality. This Habermasian turn both provides new openings and forecloses certain possibilities for environmental political theory; deliberative democracy is emphasized, but with a renewed commitment to anthropocentrism. The chapter then explores whether Habermas’s communicative turn could be “greened,” either through an expansion of the subjects of communicative rationality, or by critically examining the extent to which human beings themselves can articulate their genuine needs.

How lost and accomplished revolutions shaped psychology: Early Critical Theory (Frankfurt School), Wilhelm Reich, and Vygotsky

2020 ◽  
Vol 30 (2) ◽  
pp. 202-222
Author(s):  
Gordana Jovanović
Keyword(s):  
Social Psychology ◽  
Soviet Union ◽  
Critical Theory ◽  
Psychological Theory ◽  
Frankfurt School ◽  
Human Beings ◽  
The Unconscious ◽  
Human Needs ◽  
The Soviet Union ◽  
Wilhelm Reich

On the occasion of recent centenaries of revolutions in Europe (1917, 1918–19), this article examines, within a general theme of different forms of relationships between revolution and psychology, two types of theories. First, this paper analyses Western theories that, while developing under conditions of a missed or lost revolution in Germany, argued for radical social change by referring to Marxism and psychoanalysis as necessary theoretical tools (Frankfurt School and Wilhelm Reich). Second, this paper analyses the influence of the October Revolution on the development of the psychological theory of Lev Vygotsky in the Soviet Union. In sum, psychology under the conditions of missed or lost revolution was conceptualized as a psychology of the unconscious, of the repression of human needs. Psychology under the conditions of accomplished revolution was conceptualized as a historical social psychology of self-mastery of human beings as social beings.

Using Values as Evidence When There’s Evidence for Your Values

2020 ◽  
Vol 26 (1) ◽  
pp. 5-37
Author(s):  
Sharyn Clough ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Evidence Based ◽  
Values In Science ◽  
Political Values ◽  
Normative Force ◽  
Evaluative Beliefs

I have argued that political values are beliefs informed, more or less well, by the evidence of experience and that, where relevant and well-supported by evidence, the inclusion of political values in scientific theorizing can increase the objectivity of research (e.g., Clough 2003, 2004, 2011). The position I endorse has been called the “values-as-evidence” approach (Goldenberg 2013). In this essay I respond to three kinds of resistance to this approach, using examples of feminist political values. Solomon (2012) questions whether values are beliefs that can be tested, Alcoff (2006) argues that even if our values are beliefs that can be tested, testing them might not be desirable because doing so assigns these important values a contingency that weakens their normative force, and Yap (2016) argues that the approach is too idealistic in its articulation of the role of evidence in our political deliberations. In response, I discuss the ways that values can be tested, I analyze the evidential strength of feminist values in science, and I argue that the evidence-based nature of these values is neither a weakness nor an idealization. Problems with political values affecting science properly concern the dogmatic ways that evaluative beliefs are sometimes held—a problem that arises with dogmatism toward descriptive beliefs as well. I conclude that scientists, as with the rest of us, ought to adopt a pragmatically-inclined appreciation of the fallible, inductive process by which we gather evidence in support of any of our beliefs, whether they are described as evaluative or descriptive.

scholarly journals A Critique of the Political Economy of Algorithms: A Brief History of Google’s Technological Rationality

2018 ◽  
Vol 16 (1) ◽  
pp. 315-331
Author(s):  
Paško Bilić
Keyword(s):  
Frankfurt School ◽  
Internet Usage ◽  
The Political ◽  
Surplus Value ◽  
Corporate Growth ◽  
Technological Rationality ◽  
History Of ◽  
Quality Rating ◽  
Flexible Management ◽  
Search Quality

In this article, I argue that the debate about the irrational consequences of rationality, discussed within the tradition of the Frankfurt School, and applied to technology and machinery in the concept of technological rationality (Marcuse 1941; 1960; 2007/1964; 2009/1965), can help us better understand and criticise contemporary algorithmic capitalism. In particular, the dialectical relation between technics and technology proposed by Marcuse (1941) can help us better understand the contexts of building digital technologies as tools for control and dominance. I analyse Alphabet Inc.’s (Google) documents, such as the Securities and Exchange Filing (SEC) Form 10-Ks in the period between 2004 and 2016, as well as Search Quality Rating Guidelines (SQRG) between 2016 and 2017. Based on recorded corporate growth, I argue that the company developed on the foundation of three interconnected technological rationalities: organisational rationality of flexible management values and labour utilisation; informational rationality of generating value from advertising and audience labour; and rationality of surplus value accumulation based on reification of labour and consciousness. The company produces two main types of commodities: audience commodity and algorithmic commodity, each solidifying the company’s control and dominance over Internet usage habits.

scholarly journals Genética humana y el valor de los valores no-epistémicos en la restitución de identidad en Argentina

2021 ◽  
pp. 255
Author(s):  
Livio Mattarollo
Keyword(s):  
Scientific Paper ◽  
Sufficient Evidence ◽  
Values In Science ◽  
Epistemic Values ◽  
Main Hypothesis ◽  
Political Values ◽  
Science And Politics ◽  
The Relationship ◽  
Probability Index ◽  
The Ideal

Within the context of the discussion about value-free science ideal, Heather Douglas claims that in several cases non-epistemic values are needed for good reasoning in science. In this article I aim at recovering her viewpoint in order to examine the research driving to the Genetic Grandparent Inclusion-Probability Index, a crucial element to restitute the identity of children who were abducted during Argentinean dictatorship (1976-1983). Thus, my purposes are (i) to reconstruct Douglas´ main theoretical contributions, specifically her reasons to reject the ideal as well as the distinction between direct and indirect roles for values in science; and (ii) to analyze the scientific paper resulting from the “Grandparent-Inclusion Index” research. The main hypothesis is (iii) that several decisions of this research, particularly the establishment of what is to be considered sufficient evidence, should be explained by reference to social, ethical and political values. Both because of the non-epistemic consequences of the inquiry related to its inductive risk and because such inquiry is a case in which there is legitimate and necessary integration between epistemic and non-epistemic values and that it is also a case in which Douglas’ criteria of objectivity is reached. By virtue of these reasons, the significance of Douglas’ contribution to the analysis of the relationship between science and politics is emphasized.

Feminist Resources for Biomedical Research: Lessons from the HPV Vaccines

Hypatia ◽  
2011 ◽  
Vol 26 (1) ◽  
pp. 79-101 ◽  
Author(s):  
Inmaculada De Melo-Martín ◽  
Kristen Intemann
Keyword(s):  
Biomedical Research ◽  
Equal Opportunity ◽  
Geographical Location ◽  
Social Benefits ◽  
Hpv Vaccines ◽  
Values In Science ◽  
Socially Responsible ◽  
Scientific Communities ◽  
Political Values ◽  
Scientific Phenomena

Several feminist philosophers of science have argued that social and political values are compatible with, and may even enhance, scientific objectivity. A variety of normative recommendations have emerged regarding how to identify, manage, and critically evaluate social values in science. In particular, several feminist theorists have argued that scientific communities ought to: 1) include researchers with diverse experiences, interests, and values, with equal opportunity and authority to scrutinize research; 2) investigate or “study up” scientific phenomena from the perspectives, interests, and conditions of marginalized stakeholders potentially affected by the research; and 3) make gender, ethnicity, class, and geographical location “visible,” or use them as categories of analysis when appropriate. Yet, more work is needed to determine what exactly these recommendations would require, and the benefits they would yield, in specific research contexts.Using the recent development of the human papillomavirus (HPV) vaccines, we examine how these three feminist recommendations would have applied. We argue that these principles would have yielded several epistemic and social benefits in the HPV case, as well as in biomedical research more generally. That is, biomedical research guided by these principles would not only be epistemically superior, but also more socially responsible.

Bullet Screens (Danmu): Texting, Online Streaming, and the Spectacle of Social Inequality on Chinese Social Networks

2019 ◽  
pp. 026327641987767 ◽  
Author(s):  
Xuenan Cao
Keyword(s):  
Social Networks ◽  
Social Network ◽  
Social Inequality ◽  
Digital Economy ◽  
Theoretical Discussion ◽  
Online Streaming

For theorists interested in screen cultures and the digital economy, looking beyond Facebook and YouTube prompts a more refined conceptualization of participation and monetization on social networks. This paper examines YY as representative of Chinese platforms that monetize spectacles of social inequality. I first discuss why these financially successful platforms have eluded the attention of media and cultural critics, and then explain how these social network platforms blend subversive texting with streaming through a format called ‘bullet screen’. This format collapses social inequality into a spectacle of money flowing and vanishing on screen. This investigation contributes to the theoretical discussion of mixed-semiotics, reorients several Marxian neologisms and explains what texting means on screen in both semiotic and economic terms.

scholarly journals A Critique of the Political Economy of Algorithms: A Brief History of Google’s Technological Rationality

2018 ◽  
Vol 16 (1) ◽  
pp. 315-331 ◽  
Author(s):  
Paško Bilić
Keyword(s):  
Frankfurt School ◽  
Internet Usage ◽  
The Political ◽  
Surplus Value ◽  
Corporate Growth ◽  
Technological Rationality ◽  
History Of ◽  
Quality Rating ◽  
Flexible Management ◽  
Search Quality

In this article, I argue that the debate about the irrational consequences of rationality, discussed within the tradition of the Frankfurt School, and applied to technology and machinery in the concept of technological rationality (Marcuse 1941; 1960; 2007/1964; 2009/1965), can help us better understand and criticise contemporary algorithmic capitalism. In particular, the dialectical relation between technics and technology proposed by Marcuse (1941) can help us better understand the contexts of building digital technologies as tools for control and dominance. I analyse Alphabet Inc.’s (Google) documents, such as the Securities and Exchange Filing (SEC) Form 10-Ks in the period between 2004 and 2016, as well as Search Quality Rating Guidelines (SQRG) between 2016 and 2017. Based on recorded corporate growth, I argue that the company developed on the foundation of three interconnected technological rationalities: organisational rationality of flexible management values and labour utilisation; informational rationality of generating value from advertising and audience labour; and rationality of surplus value accumulation based on reification of labour and consciousness. The company produces two main types of commodities: audience commodity and algorithmic commodity, each solidifying the company’s control and dominance over Internet usage habits.

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