Re: Thoughts/comments on "Philosophical Engineering: Toward a Philosophy of the Web"

Hi Brandt,

Le Fri, 03 Jan 2014 20:33:19 +0100, Brandt Dainow <bd@thinkmetrics.com> a
écrit:

> HI Alexandre. You raise, as always, an interesting point regarding the
> debate regarding the “technical meaning” of things like URL’s.

Ha, thanks.

> Coming
> into
> philosophy from a technical background I guess I have assumed that the
> technical meaning of a formally defined IT term is absolutely certain and
> that if people debated it, they simply didn’t understand the way
> technical
> standards work.

Part of that is true, but... (see below)

 Clearly I’ve been too harsh. While development of
> technical standards is clearly social practice, I don’t think it’s
> “merely”
> social practice in an arbitrary sense or that such terms can be as freely
> reworked by society as customary speech can.

I agree. The standards are important to me and, at best (not all standards
are on an equal footing), reflect some constraints of the Web as a system
or assemblage that may evolve, be hindered, etc. which ultimately prove to
be "ontologically dense" to my mind. Now, the issue is: which constraints?
And this is where we might a) disagree, b) moreover perform different
understandings of the Web through the very activity of disagreeing (if it
involves reworking the standards or implementing new ones for instance).

So, I guess I'm some sort of realist too, whence my insistence on
standards, the architecture of the Web, etc. (not a very common view of the
Web). It's just some (roughly speaking) actor-network-theory-flavored
realism :)

> My intuition is that this
> follows the pattern of simplistic dismissal of science as “merely
> cultural”
> we see in early phenomenology which completely misses the elements of
> science which are designed to eliminate cultural bias. To me this shows
> the
> need to develop some proper arguments to show how technical meanings are
> clear and precise, though sometimes obscured by social use.

Cultural biases do no interest me either, more intrinsic, ontological
plurality... Hence I almost agree though I would rather insist on the
importance of innovation and technology instead of science to ground the
so-called technical meaning ("ontological design" as Winograd and Flores
dubbed it).

I don't think logic for instance provides a definitive grasp of everything
that happens on the Web: reality is far richer than allowed by our logic
("There are more things in heaven and earth, than are dreamt of in our
logic/science" ;) ).

Or let's say, I don't think there exist a predefined set of principles
already available that we can use without restriction to find out the right
kind of *explanans *to account for the Web : we should rather try to
understand *everything* the Web purports to do and that might lead us to
introduce new principles/entities. Look at Pat Hayes' talk on Blogic; for
me, it is the most honest admission regarding this issue.

> If ever I
> get
> the time to develop such an argument, which is not really relevant to my
> own
> research at present, you’ll be (one of) the first to know…

I'd gladly discuss the matter with you again in the future!

Best,
A.

> B
>
>
> From: aamonnz@gmail.com [mailto:aamonnz@gmail.com] <aamonnz@gmail.com]>On Behalf Of Alexandre
> Monnin
> Sent: 02 January 2014 22:28
> To: Michael Brunnbauer; Brandt Dainow
> Cc: public-philoweb@w3.org
> Subject: Re: Thoughts/comments on "Philosophical Engineering: Toward a
> Philosophy of the Web"
>
>
> Hi,
>
>
> Le Thu, 02 Jan 2014 19:35:58 +0100, Brandt Dainow <bd@thinkmetrics.com> a
> écrit:
>
>> Hi folks, it seems to me as an outside observer of this fascinating
>> conversation that you are in danger of building structures on dangerous
>> uses
>> of terminology. Information is a difficult concept, and certainly not
>> restricted to the web.
>
>
> Absolutely, we have so many different definitions that it's indeed one
> tricky concept.
>
>
> For example, Floridi’s Theory of Information
>> Ethics
>> treats all beings as “informational objects” in a very useful way, and
>> it
>> seems to me anything perceived has informational properties. To use
>> “information objects” as a defining characteristic of web entities or
>> even
>> web experience is therefore suspect.
>
>
> I agree. That's precisely why I don't. I referred mostly to models like
> FRBR, or widely used ontological design patterns like physical
> realization
> of information objects (without advocating such models).
>
>
> Furthermore, it strikes me that
>> this
>> is defining web entities in terms of their material nature, when we’d be
>> better searching for functional characteristics as these do not depend
>> on
>> specific technical protocols, digital substrates, etc, and thus are more
>> future-proof.
>>
>> On the other hand, it seems to me there is no real issue with what
>> http://times.com represents. This is a URL, which has a precise
>> technical
>> meaning and can be taken to represent the files forming the website
>> without
>> worrying about what constitutes a website, and clearly does not
>> represent
>> any other ontological type of being, such as the organisation. That is
>> not
>> to say that the URL may not become associated with other experiences or
>> entities in the minds of individuals, but those are not properties of
>> the
>> URL. I think it’s very important to be 100% clear about technical terms,
>> such as URL’s, which have very specific meanings.
>
>
> There, I completely disagree :) If it were so simple, we wouldn't have so
> many debates archived on similar mailing lists ;) Plus, what is the
> "technical meaning" of such a URL (I prefer to speak only of URIs), apart
> from the social meaning? These questions were well addressed by Harry in
> his
> thesis and they have no easy answer.
>
>
> We may wish to discuss
>> the manner in which people (mis)use them for other purposes, such as
>> referencing the organisation, but we need to understand such usages have
>> no
>> impact on the precise and prior technical meanings.
>
> I see no misuse here...
>
>
> Cheers,
>
> A.
>
>
>
>
>>
>>
>> Regards,
>>
>> Brandt Dainow
>>
>> http://nuim.academia.edu/BrandtDainow
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>> From: aamonnz@gmail.com [mailto:aamonnz@gmail.com] <aamonnz@gmail.com]>On Behalf Of
>> Alexandre
>> Monnin
>> Sent: 31 December 2013 15:14
>> To: Michael Brunnbauer
>> Cc: public-philoweb@w3.org
>> Subject: Fwd: Thoughts/comments on "Philosophical Engineering: Toward a
>> Philosophy of the Web"
>>
>>
>> Hi again Michael,
>>
>>
>> Le Tue, 31 Dec 2013 15:02:10 +0100, Michael Brunnbauer
>> <brunni@netestate.de>
>> a écrit:
>>
>>
>>> Hello Alexandre,
>>
>>
>>>
>>> On Tue, Dec 31, 2013 at 01:46:23PM +0100, Alexandre Monnin wrote:
>>>> True, just like more or less than 25% of Wikipedia edits are generated
>>>> by
>>>> bots. I've co-written a piece myself about the evolution of the Web
>>>> that
>>>> might be somehow relevant for this discussion:
>>>> http://ceur-ws.org/Vol-859/
>>>
>>
>>> Thanks. I will read that.
>>
>>
>>>
>>>> > It is difficult for me to see a *qualitative* difference between the
>>>> pre
>>>> > Web
>>>> > state and now. What is so special about the Web ?
>>>>
>>>> See above.
>>>>
>>>> Also, I think the more philosophical papers tried to address this
>>>> issue
>>>> ;)
>>>> My answer had to do with the very notion of "resources" and the
>>>> details
>>>> behind the making of the Web, drawing from Brian Cantwell Smith to
>>>> state
>>>> that to account for the Web, on needs to reopen questions pertaining
>>>> to
>>>> ontology, intentionality, etc.
>>>
>>
>>> The following question came to my mind when reading your essay: What is
>>> the fundamental difference between "The New York Times" and
>>> http://times.com/ ?
>>> I can walk to a kiosk at any time and say "Give me the New York Times".
>>
>> Interesting, you're not the first person to raise this question.
>>
>> I think the comparison is often drawn with regards to the idea of the
>> physical realization of information objects (whatever that means!). In
>> that
>> case, you can say that an information object is realized just as the URI
>> identifying a resource is dereferenced to an Http representation.
>>
>> But the comparison fails to grasp important aspects of objects in
>> general -
>> not just information objects.
>>
>> http://times.com/ might refer to the institution that is the Times, or
>> the
>> newspaper, or its online version, or just the website (but then again,
>> what
>> exactly is a website now? Certainly not something that can ever be
>> realized
>> with paper...), etc. All of which might have different identity
>> conditions.
>> That why the question of individuation, for me, is at the heart of the
>> Web.
>>
>> Also, since most objects are extended over time, you only access slices
>> of
>> them ("representations" if you will :) ) - whatever these objects are,
>> not
>> just the so-called "information objects". Hence, the issue raised by the
>> Web
>> is a very generic one, albeit tied to a very specific architecture. That
>> is
>> where the (main) difference lies in my opinion.
>>
>>
>> I might go on and on but I'll leave it here. :)
>>
>>
>>>> That would be my answer but Harry has another one for instance, more
>>>> related to the extended-mind hypothesis.
>>>
>>
>>> I also could not see a fundamental change in Harrys example. We've had
>>> maps
>>> for some time and those maps were updated. That more people can do this
>>> now
>>> in a shorter timeframe does not strike me as qualitative change.
>>
>>
>>>
>>>> It seemed to me that chapter 8 made a nice link between the Web and
>>>> the
>>>> Semantic Web thanks to a renewed notion of content negotiation - an
>>>> idea I
>>>> am in deep agreement with.
>>>
>>
>>> I really liked that essay - it resonated much with my mind. I just
>>> wondered
>>> at the implicitness the Semantic Web was presented as next step in mind
>>> extension. Maybe we will one day learn important Web ontologies in
>>> school and
>>> use compact URIs like words :-) Or maybe the Semantic Web is simply not
>>> well
>>> suited or flexible enough for the human mind and other technologies
>>> will
>>> be
>>> used to "extend" it. The Semantic Web has its use cases anyway.
>>
>> Yes, and they're not necessarily those found in academic textbooks. I
>> guess
>> acknowledging this would prove helpful for the entire semweb community!
>>
>> Maybe we won't live see the advent of "The Semantic Web" in the future
>> and
>> it'll remain behind the scene but extant, just as it somehow remains
>> implicit in the essay? :)
>>
>>
>>
>>>> That's why we might want to specify next what we talk about we we say
>>>> "the
>>>> Web" (not unlike what happens when we say "society"). I'm more
>>>> interested
>>>> in the architecture of the Web and its potentialities for instance but
>>>> others might want to put forward other aspects.
>>>
>>
>>> True :-)
>>
>> :)
>>
>>> Regards,
>>
>> Best!
>> A.
>>
>>
>> * Membre du collège d'experts Open Data de la mission Etalab du
>> Premier Ministre
>> * Chercheur associé chez Inria (EPI Wimmics, Sophia Antipolis)
>> * Co-initiateur du projet DBpedia Francophone et SemanticPedia
>> * Docteur en philosophie à Paris 1 Panthéon -Sorbonne (PHICO, EXeCO) -
>> Thèse sur la philosophie du Web : disponible et annotable sur
>> http://philoweb.org <http://philoweb.org/>
>> * Co-chair du Community Group "
>> <http://www.w3.org/community/philoweb/> Philosophy of the Web" au W3C
>> * Organisateur des " <http://www.meetup.com/paris-web-of-data/>
>> Rencontres du Web de données"
>>
>>
>> <http://web-and-philosophy.org/> http://web-and-philosophy.org/,
>>
>> Twitter : @aamonnz & @PhiloWeb,
>>
>> PhiloWeb on <http://www.dailymotion.com/PhiloWeb> Dailymotion, PhiloWeb
>> <https://lists-sop.inria.fr/sympa/info/philoweb> discussion list @INRIA



   - Membre du collège d'experts Open Data de la mission Etalab du Premier
   Ministre
   - Chercheur associé chez Inria (EPI Wimmics, Sophia Antipolis)
   - Co-initiateur du projet DBpedia Francophone et SemanticPedia
   - Docteur en philosophie à Paris 1 Panthéon -Sorbonne (PHICO, EXeCO) -
   Thèse sur la philosophie du Web : disponible et annotable sur
   http://philoweb.org
   - *Co-chair* du Community Group "Philosophy of the
Web<http://www.w3.org/community/philoweb/>"
   au W3C
   - Organisateur des "Rencontres du Web de
données<http://www.meetup.com/paris-web-of-data/>
   "


http://web-and-philosophy.org/,
Twitter : @aamonnz & @PhiloWeb,
PhiloWeb on Dailymotion <http://www.dailymotion.com/PhiloWeb>,
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