We are happy to invite you to our 6th talk of the Vienna STS Talk Series in 2024W
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FutureSpace Talk by Eleanor Armstrong & Réka Gál
Department of Physics & Astronomy, University of Leicester & STS, TU Munich
December 11, 2024 04:00 PM-05:00 PM
The Playboy Bunny and the Astronaut Wife: Constructing Femininities and the United States Space Program.
You can register for the talk here<https://futurespace-project.eu/futurespace-talk-registration/>
Abstract
Inspired by Ahmed (2010), we follow the figures of the 'playboy bunny' and the 'astronaut wife' through the cultural legacies of (north american) space flight. Following from our work on what feminist interventions can offer to social studies of outer space (2023), in this talk we work through how femininities of the Other of the hegemonic masculinities of outer space are constructed. Our work asks how these figures reverberate in popular cultures to shape present and futures conceptions of femininity in outer space, and offer pathways that intervene in normative gendered futurities. In following these figures, we think about what illuminating them might do also for directing pathways of feminist scholarship on outer space in the future.
We consider the Playboy Bunny: a construct of the pornotopic 1950s, and the discursive counterpoint to the womanizing young man. Appearing off-handedly in archival interviews about life at Johnson Space Center during the early space programmes of the 1950s and 60s, making her way secretly into lunar checklists worn by astronauts on the Moon, and continuing to draw media attention into the 2000s, we draw on Preciado's biopolitical theorising (2019) to think through the sexual relations and gender politics of the space programme. Contrastingly on the mother-whore axis, stands the media construct of the "astronaut wife." Using perspectives from Feminist Communication Studies, we explore how the assigned duties of the astronaut wife upheld the figure of the hypermasculine astronaut. We argue that the caretaking duties assigned to the figure of the "astronaut wife" extended beyond the confines of her homeboundness and homemaking into outer space: she was rendered part of the communication technologies available to take care of the hypermasculine astronaut's mental health. We conclude by considering how these examples help us pluralise and (re)make future femininities in relation to outer space.
Biography
Eleanor S Armstrong is a Space Research Fellow at the University of Leicester, UK, where she leads the Constellations Lab (on Outer Space & Feminism). She was awarded her PhD at University College London, UK, in 2020; and since then has held positions at the University of Delaware and Stockholm University, and visiting positions at, among others, the University of Cambridge, Ingenium Canada's Museums of Science and Innovation, New York University, and University of Vienna.
Réka P Gál is a Postdoctoral Researcher at the Department of Science, Technology and Society at Technische Universität München. She completed her doctorate at University of Toronto's Faculty of Information. She is the co-editor of Earth and Beyond in Tumultuous Times: A Critical Atlas of the Anthropocene, published by meson press.
Organiser
Nina Klimburg-Witjes, Assist. Prof. STS Dep Vienna / PI "FutureSpace" & Joseph Popper (Postdoc Researcher, STS Dep Vienna / FutureSpace)
FutureSpace (ERC Starting Grant Project), Department of Science and Technology Studies
Location
online via zoom<https://univienna.zoom.us/j/63251489007?pwd=FBTgiIoQbHPTvmHhnjFwObba9mAGqZ.6>
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Best wishes,
Katrin Hackl
__________
Mag. Katrin Hackl
Research Support & Communication
Department of Science and Technology Studies
University of Vienna
Universitätsstraße 7 /II/ 6th floor (NIG)
1010 Vienna / Austria
Tel.: 0043-1-4277-496007
[cid:image002.jpg@01DB40AD.59CFEBC0]<https://sts.univie.ac.at/>
Dear students,
The ERC-STG project SCARCE [1] (Sustained Concerns: Administration of
Mineral Resource Extraction in Central Europe, 1550-1850) is looking for
a reliable and committed person to take on a variety of project-related
tasks as a study assistant in a dynamic team and a pleasant working
atmosphere. The position is based at the Institute of History at the
University of Vienna and the field of work is in the area of history.
As I am a research assistant on this project myself, I can highly
recommend it. :) If you are interested, have a look at the
specifications below.
All best,
Dolores Šurlina
---
Scope of employment:
· Working hours: 8-10 hours per week (negotiable)
· Start: from begin of February
· Duration of employment: limited to 12 months, extension possible by
mutual agreement
Job profile:
· Project-related organisation and administration
· Support with research tasks, e.g. literature review and bibliography
· Archive research, (machine-aided) preparation of transcriptions
· Maintenance of websites and blogs, possibly also social media channels
Requirements profile:
Required:
· Current studies at the University of Vienna (BA, BEd, MA or MEd), no
completed subject-related master's or diploma programme
· Good knowledge of German and/or English
· Organisational experience (within or outside the university)
Of advantage:
· Knowledge of other languages (especially Hungarian, Slavic languages,
Dutch, French)
· Experience in managing websites, blogs, social media
· Knowledge of early modern history (1400-1800 CE) and experience in
dealing with early modern sources
· Good communication skills (written, oral, teamwork)
· Time flexibility
Form and content of the application:
· CV incl. the following contact details: Name, email address, telephone
number, matriculation number, study reference number
· Letter of motivation considering your own interests (max. 1 page)
· References or contact details of reference persons (if available)
Deadline & addressee:
· Please send applications exclusively as a PDF (1 document) to:
scarce.geschichte(a)univie.ac.at
If you have any questions, please contact Dolores Šurlina at
dolores.surlina(a)univie.ac.at
· Application deadline: 15. December 2024
· Submissions by post will not be considered
Selection process:
* Review of applications by project staff
* Interviews are planned to take place 8-17 January
* An acceptance or rejection will be made by the end of January 2025
General conditions for study assistants:
According to § 30 of the collective agreement (KV) for university
employees, study assistants belong to the group of student employees.
This includes part-time employees who have not yet completed a master's
(diploma) degree programme for the intended use when the employment
contract is concluded.
The employment relationship of a student employee ends, without the need
for a termination declaration, at the end of the semester in which the
Master's (diploma) programme is completed, but at the latest after a
total period of two years.
Like tutors, study assistants are student employees and are subject to
salary group C:
https://personalwesen.univie.ac.at/jobs-recruiting/job-center/gehaltsschema
Links:
------
[1] https://scarce.univie.ac.at/
Hey all,
I'm sorry for the short-term change of plans. Unfortunately there has
been an issue with our reservation at SpielBar. So our new location is:
Today, 19:00
The Long Hall Bar Vienna
https://maps.app.goo.gl/SaMJWQdqcDhhCzkg9
It is very close to the SpielBar, so the time it takes to get there
should be very similar.
Looking forward to tonight!
Vinzenz
Dear all,
we want to invite you to come have a Punsch or Glühwein (mulled wine)
together at the Christmas Market at Altes AKH! The goal is to update
each other on what we have been up to, and to make some new plans for
providing support to underrepresented groups in philosophy.
Bring your best ideas, your warmest socks and maybe an extra pair of
tights - it's supposed to be fairly cold that day!
UPSalon are a group of BA, MA, doctoral and post-doctoral researchers;
the initiative aims at creating a space and community in Vienna where
underrepresented philosophers – such as women, trans*, inter and
non-binary persons, BIPoC, socioeconomically disadvantaged people, queer
people, and people with disabilities – can connect on a regular basis.
For more information, check out our website: upsalon.univie.ac.at
People from all stages in their philosophical studies are welcome, and
we are especially excited to meet new people!
We will meet on Tuesday, 3rd of December, at 18:30 in front of NIG and
then walk to the Christmas Market together.
We are very much looking forward to meeting all of you, and to reconnect
with those who already joined for the last regular's table :)
Do not hesitate to get in touch with any questions you may have.
Best regards,
UPsalon
Mail: upsalon.philosophy(a)univie.ac.at
Web: https://upsalon.univie.ac.at
Liebe EST-ler,
wir haben eine Einladung und eine gute Nachricht:
Durch das große Engagement von Dietlind Hüchtker ist es gelungen, eine
TT-Fast Track Professur *„Wissensgeschichte und politische
Epistemologien von Biowissenschaften und Medizin im 20. Jahrhundert” für
Prof. Birgit Nemec* am Fakultätszentrum für transdisziplinäre
historisch-kulturwissenschaftliche Studien einzurichten. Der Wechsel vom
Institut für Medizingeschichte an der Charité Berlin wird bereits am
1.12.2024 erfolgen. Ein Forschungsschwerpunkt wird Rahmen eines ERC
Forschungsprojektes gefördert und gilt dem Engagement von Patient:innen
mit arzneimittelbedingten Behinderungen sowie dem Wandel im Umgang mit
Risiken seit der Contergan-Katastrophe. https://fakzen-thks.univie.ac.at/
Zudem wird Donnerstag und Freitag die*Tagung "Automated Order"*
stattfinden, die Markus Ramsauer und ich mit Kolleg:innen veranstalten.
Es geht um die Frage der Gesellschaftsbeschreibung durch neue
statistische Verfahren, insbesondere Clusteringverfahren. Wer in letzter
Zeit über die Frage von Algorithmen im US Wahlkampf diskutiert hat, über
die Sicherung von Privatheit in Zeiten von AI nachdenkt oder mehr über
die Geschiche der Sentiment Analysis erfahren will, ist ganz herzlich
willkommen: Teilnahme ist unangemeldet möglich über Zoom (links auf der
Homepage) oder Ihr kommt auf einen Kaffee im ifk vorbei
(Reichratsstrasse 17, das Gebäude zwischen NIG und Hauptgebäude)
https://automated-order.univie.ac.at/
Mit bestem Gruß
Anna Echterhölter
Clustering: Automated Order in the Social Sciences
International Workshop, organized by Anna Echterhölter
<https://ifg.univie.ac.at/ueber-uns/mitarbeiterinnen/wissenschaftliche-mitar…> and
Markus Ramsauer
<https://ifg.univie.ac.at/ueber-uns/mitarbeiterinnen/projektmitarbeiterinnen…> in
cooperation with the working group “How is AI Changing Science
<https://howisaichangingscience.eu/projektbeschreibung/>”, University of
Vienna <https://fsp-wissenschaftsgeschichte.univie.ac.at/>, and the
International Research Center for Cultural Studies (ifk).
Date: November 28-29, 2024
Venue: International Research Center for Cultural Studies
(Internationales Forschungszentrum Kulturwissenschaften
<https://www.ifk.ac.at/>), Reichsratsstraße 17, 1010 Vienna (ground floor)
Online audience: Please use the following Zoom links:
Donnerstag, 28.11.
<https://us06web.zoom.us/j/87831389185?pwd=hPBpZ9CTmXdNqOj8M0dTeJ9MSJMQcn.1>us06web.zoom.us/j/87831389185
<https://us06web.zoom.us/j/87831389185?pwd=hPBpZ9CTmXdNqOj8M0dTeJ9MSJMQcn.1>
Meeting-ID: 878 3138 9185
Kenncode: mcX7T5
Freitag, 29.11.
<https://us06web.zoom.us/j/87613835276?pwd=xoYRKgybbq6HACrqcCpZ3Eme3F4EDn.1>us06web.zoom.us/j/87613835276
<https://us06web.zoom.us/j/87613835276?pwd=xoYRKgybbq6HACrqcCpZ3Eme3F4EDn.1>
Meeting-ID: 876 1383 5276
Kenncode: ZwhF8y
Download the poster:here
<https://automated-order.univie.ac.at/fileadmin/user_upload/i_geschichte/Ueb…>
The workshop is part of the research project HiACS, funded by one of
Europes largest research funding institutions, the Volkswagen Foundation
Hannover. Members are Jens Schröter and Andreas Sudmann, University of
Bonn, Alexander Waibel and Fabian Retkowski KIT/Carnegie Mellon, as well
as Anna Echterhölter and Markus Elias Ramsauer, University of Vienna:
howisaichangingscience.eu/projektbeschreibung/
<https://howisaichangingscience.eu/projektbeschreibung/>
Programme
Thursday, November 28, 2024
13.00 CET / Opening remarks / 7 am EST /
Julia Boog-Kaminski
<https://www.ifk.ac.at/kontakt-team/dr-in-julia-boog-kaminski.html>andAndreas
Gehrlach
<https://www.ifk.ac.at/kontakt-team/dr-andreas-gehrlach.html>(IFK):
Welcome to the IFK
Anna Echterhölter
<https://ifg.univie.ac.at/ueber-uns/mitarbeiterinnen/wissenschaftliche-mitar…>andMarkus
Ramsauer
<https://ifg.univie.ac.at/ueber-uns/mitarbeiterinnen/projektmitarbeiterinnen…>(University
of Vienna): Introduction
13.20 CET / Keynote I / 7.20 am EST /
Evangelos Pournaras
<https://eps.leeds.ac.uk/computing/staff/6446/professor-evangelos-pournaras>(University
of Leeds):
Privacy as a Collective Value and how to Protect it in the Era of AI
14.20 CET coffee break
14.30 CET / Panel I – Perspectives from Media Ethnography and
Archaeology / 8.30 am EST /
Chair:Jens Schröter
<https://www.medienkulturwissenschaft-bonn.de/mitarbeiter_prof_dr_jens_schro…>(University
of Bonn)
14.30-15.00 Fabian Retkowski
<https://isl.anthropomatik.kit.edu/english/21_9385.php> (Karlsruhe
Institute of Technology) and Andreas Sudmann
<https://www.medienwissenschaft.uni-bonn.de/personen/abteilung-personenverze…> (University
of Bonn): Automated Coding: Multilabel-Classification in Ethnography
15.00-15.30 CETAndreas Sudmann
<https://www.medienwissenschaft.uni-bonn.de/personen/abteilung-personenverze…>andJens
Schröter
<https://www.medienkulturwissenschaft-bonn.de/mitarbeiter_prof_dr_jens_schro…>(University
of Bonn):
AI in Science and Epistemic Media
15.30 CET coffee break
16.00 CET / Panel II – Clustering and Detecting Tensions within the
Social Order / 10 am EST /
Chair:Clemens Apprich
<https://medientheorie.uni-ak.ac.at/en/project/univ-prof-mmag-dr-clemens-app…>(University
of Applied Arts, Vienna)
16.00-16.30 CET Fenwick McKelvey
<https://www.concordia.ca/faculty/fenwick-mckelvey.html>(Concordia
University, Montreal):
US Elections and the Electric Cluster Making Machine
16.30-17.00 CET Orit Halpern
<https://tu-dresden.de/gsw/slk/germanistik/digitalcultures/die-professur/inh…>(Dresden
University of Technology):
Mirror Worlds: Clustering, AI, and the Management of Catastrophe
17.00-17.30 CET Aaron Gluck-Thaler
<https://histsci.fas.harvard.edu/people/aaron-gluck-thaler>(Harvard
University):
Identification through Pattern Recognition in Cold War America
17.30 CET coffee break
18.00 CET / Keynote II / 12.00 am EST /
Rebecca Lemov
<https://histsci.fas.harvard.edu/people/rebecca-lemov>(Harvard
University): History of Sentiment Analysis
Chair:Markus Ramsauer
<https://ifg.univie.ac.at/ueber-uns/mitarbeiterinnen/projektmitarbeiterinnen…>(University
of Vienna)
20.00 CET dinner (ASPIC, Garnisongasse 10)
Friday, November 29, 2024
09.00 CET / Panel III – Automated Social Order / 3 am EST /
Chair:Sarah Davies
<https://sts.univie.ac.at/en/about-us/scientific-staff/wissenschaftliche-ma/…>(University
of Vienna)
09.00-09.30 CET Dinah Pfau
<https://www.deutsches-museum.de/forschung/person/dinah-pfau-2>(Deutsches
Museum, Munich):
Epistemology of a Matrix, or How Communication Technology Invented the Human
09.30-10.00 CET Eva-Maria Gillich
<https://ekvv.uni-bielefeld.de/pers_publ/publ/PersonDetail.jsp?personId=1626…>(Bielefeld
University): Norms out of Patterns
10.00-10.30 CET Tobias Matzner
<https://www.uni-paderborn.de/en/person/65695>(Paderborn University):
On some Similarities between Clustering and Embeddings
10.30 CET coffee break
11.00 CET / Panel IV – Clustering: Work and Health / 5 EST /
Chair:Christian Dayé
<https://www.tugraz.at/arbeitsgruppen/sts/publikationen/christian-daye>(Graz
University of Technology)
11.00-11.30 CET Phoebe Moore <https://phoebevmoore.wordpress.com/>:
(University of Essex):
Affective Computing at Work: Policy Provocations and Rights for the Left
11.30-12.00 CET Rudolf Seising
<https://www.deutsches-museum.de/forschung/person/rudolf-seising-2>(Deutsches
Museum, Munich): Fuzzy Sets and Systems: An Alternative Approach to Blur
and Inaccuracy for AI in the 20th Century
12.00-12.30 CET Wrap Up
13.00 CET lunch (Gastwirtschaft Blauensteiner, Lenaugasse 1)
The research project and workshop are made possible by the Volkswagen
Foundation.
Visit MiniSeg, the new benchmark video segmentation model, or a database
of European research projects using AI. Also more on the working group
HIACS: https://howisaichangingscience.eu/
The venue is provided by ifk: https://www.ifk.ac.at/
For more in formation on the history of science working group in Vienna:
https://fsp-wissenschaftsgeschichte.univie.ac.at/
Conference Abstract
Clustering -- Automated Order in the Social Sciences
ai\research\explorations workshop IV
Organized by the Viennese working group of the project “How is AI
Changing Science” in cooperation with the International Research Center
for Cultural Studies (IFK) Vienna
28.-29. November 2024
One of the key elements in unsupervised learning is clustering. Thus,
this particular data practice sits at the core of modern Artificial
Intelligence, which is based on artificial neuronal networks. Whereas
classification operates by organizing labeled data into specific
categories, clustering relies on cheaper, unlabeled data for deciphering
similarities inside a given set.
While many scientific disciplines might be interested in this new
element of technical progress, the social sciences should be. The
workshop poses the open question if unsupervised data clustering has the
potential of identifying and generating new patterns of the social. This
idea is not new. As Orit Halpern has remarked, attempts to break free
from stable categories like race, identity, territory, or ethnicity with
the help of pattern recognition can be found e.g. in the works of
political scientist Karl Deutsch already in the 1960s (Halpern 2014, p.
191). Can clustering come up with entirely new orders of the social,
such as tribes of movements identifiable from telephone data, do they
detect political party affiliation, friendship or kinship-patterns that
are not blood-related, and thus resemble totemistic orders? Or does
automatization in the analysis of social data reproduce older
hierarchies and familiar stratifications with necessity? While it is
crucial not to fall prey to techno-utopian fantasies of non-situated
(AI) technologies ‘overcoming’ race, class or gender, the transformative
potential of clustering practices for analysis and reorganization of
society and resource management in crisis should not be dismissed entirely.
While the history of quantification has made great strides to trace
centers of calculation (Didier 2021; Wiggins and Jones 2023), while the
cold war genealogy of AI is being established (Seising 2018; Dick 2021;
Babintseva 2023), the history of data has developed additional
perspectives. The focus lies with the practical handling of digital
information as element of scientific or bureaucratic practices (Suchman
2006; Aronova 2017; Rheinberger 2018; De Chadarevian and Porter 2018;
Dommann and Stadler 2020; Schlicht et al. 2021). The workshop singles
out one particular episode from such a data journey (Leonelli and
Tempini 2020). There are general discussions of classification and
clustering (Arabie, Lawrence and de Soete 1996; Brunton and Kutz 2019;
Bowker 2001), some already with respect to data practices within
specific methods, and even fewer in the social sciences and humanities
(Boumans and Leonelli 2020).
Clustering practices are typical for automated learning across the
disciplines, which relies on large amounts of data, thereby introducing
an element of noise and ambiguity. They do seemingly replace human
cognition as source of social order. Thus, automated ordering can be
said to introduce a novel element of ambiguity to the representation of
society. From this position we ask, if clustering algorithms like
K-means introduce elements of irrationality into planning processes or
sociological methods. The automated social order comes with a new level
of imprecision. The history of rationality is thus faced with a new
ambiguity, after the probabilistic revolution of the 19th century did
already alter the accepted forms of evidence (Krüger et al. 1987). When
during the cold war, “reason almost lost its mind” (Erickson et al.
2013), the mind now seems to prevail over rational forms of conclusion.
We are particularly interested in this new mechanism that seemingly
replaces conscious order with an automated process of matchmaking. As
Sabina Leonelli has emphasized for the case of biology, clustering is
the very pre-condition for data to become a representation of the world
(Leonelli 2023, p. 317-318). Yet, in unsupervised learning, the outcomes
seem to be uncontrollable. It stands to reason, which kind of tradeoff
between rational planning and seemingly irrational ordering the new
branch of computational sociology may soon come up with. Are we close to
accepting a new age of similarities and epistemologies of similitudes
which abandons factual evidence in exchange for patterns and noisy data
clouds?
Following the suggestions of the history of data this conference
approaches AI in social sciences from the perspective of one key
practice. The workshop invites media archaeologists, historians of
science and quantification as well as computational sociologists and
data curators to reflect on the history, promise a potential of
clustering. For this we want to establish both, the analogue and digital
histories of clustering.
The Project: How is AI Changing science
The workshop is funded by the Volkswagen Foundation and part of a larger
research project. We ask how artificial intelligence (AI) technologies
do affect research and science? By following this perspective, the
project is less concerned with research on AI per se than with how
different disciplines use AI as a tool and as an epistemic entity within
larger (post)digital infrastructures. The central focus lies on how
heterogeneous concepts and operations of the social sciences and
humanities, on the one hand, and the natural and technical sciences, on
the other, are integrated into applications of AI. Research on the
latter will also explore the extent to which critical perspectives
inform and accompany the use of AI. The project concentrates on
artificial neural networks (ANN) because of their dominant status among
current AI approaches. Hence, the project not only explores the
similarities and differences between the various areas of application of
AI, but also sheds light on the cultural and national specificities
inherent to these processes in an international context, particularly in
Europe and the USA.
howisaichangingscience.eu/projektbeschreibung/
<https://howisaichangingscience.eu/projektbeschreibung/>
Members: Anna Echterhölter, Markus Elias Ramsauer University of Vienna,
Jens Schröter and Andreas Sudmann, University of Bonn and Alexander
Waibel and Fabian Retkowski KIT/Carnegie Mellon
Literature:
Arabie, Phipps, Lawrence J. Hubert, and Geert De Soete. Clustering and
Classification. Singapore: World Scientific 1996.
Aronova, Elena, von Oertzen, Christine und Sepkoski, David:
Introduction: Historicizing Big Data. In: Osiris 32/2017, S. 1–17.
Babintseva, Ekaterina: Rules of Creative Thinking: Algorithms,
Heuristics, and Soviet Cybernetic Psychology. In: BJHS Themes, Volume 8:
Histories of Artificial Intelligence: A Geneology of Power 2023, S. 81-95.
Boumans, Marcel, and Sabina Leonelli: From Dirty Data to Tidy Facts:
Clustering Practices in Plant Phenomics and Business Cycle Analysis. In:
Data Journeys in the Sciences, edited by Sabina Leonelli and Niccolò
Tempini. Heidelberg: Springer 2020, S. 79–101.
Bowker, Geoffrey C.: Biodiversity Datadiversity. In: Social Studies of
Science 30:5/2001, S. 643–684.
Brunton, Steven L., and J. Nathan Kutz. ‘Classification and Clustering’.
In: Data-Driven Science and Engineering: Machine Learning, Dynamical
Systems, and Control. Cambridge, MA: Cambridge University Press 2019, S.
154–194.
De Chadarevian, Soraya and Porter, Theodore: Introduction: Scrutinizing
the Data World. In: Historical Studies in the Natural
Sciences 48:5/2018, S. 549–556.
Dick, Stephanie: Of Models and Machines: Implementing Bounded
Rationality. In: ISIS 106: 3/ 2015, S. 623-634.
Didier, Emmanuel: Quantitative Marbling, New Conceptual Tools for the
Socio-history of Quantification (=Anton Wilhelm Amo Lectures
n°7) Martin-Luther-Universitat, Halle-Wittenberg press 2021.
Dommann, Monika, and Max Stadler: Introduction. In: Data Centers: Edges
of a Wired Nation, hg. von Monika Dommann, Hannes Rickli und Max
Stadler. Zürich: Lars Müller Publishers 2020, S. 8–29.
Erickson, Paul, Judy L Klein, Lorraine Daston, Rebecca M. Lemov, Thomas
Sturm and Michael D. Gordin: How Reason Almost Lost Its Mind : The
Strange Career of Cold War Rationality. Chicago: University of Chicago
Press 2013.
Halpern, Orit: Beautiful Data: A History of Vision and Reason since
1945. Durham, N.C.: Duke University Press 2014.
Krüger, Lorenz et al. (Hg.): The Probabilistic Revolution. 2 Bde.
Cambridge: MIT 1987.
Leonelli, Sabina: Classificatory Theory in Data-Intensive Science: The
Case of Open Biomedical Ontologies. In: International Studies in the
Philosophy of Science 26:1/2012, S. 47–65.
Laubichler, Manfred D.; Maienschein, Jane; Renn, Jürgen: Computational
Perspectives in the History of Science: To the Memory of Peter Damerow.
In: Isis 104/2013, S. 119–130.
Rheinberger, Hans-Jörg: Infra-Experimentality: From Traces to Data, from
Data to Patterning Facts. In: History of Science 49:3/2011, S. 337–348.
Schlicht, Laurens; Ledebur, Sophie; Echterhölter, Anna (Hg.): Data at
the Doorstep. Intimacy and Formalization. In: Science in Context
34:4/2021 (topical issue).
Seising, Rudolph: The Emergence of Fuzzy Sets in the Decade of the
Perceptron—Lotfi A. Zadeh’s and Frank Rosenblatt’s Research Work on
Pattern Classification. In: Mathematics/Fuzzy Mathematics 6:7/2018, S.
227–246.sei
Suchman, Lucy: Human-Machine Reconfigurations: Plans and
Situated Actions. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press 2006.
Wiggins, Chris; Jones, Matthew L.: How Data Happened. A History from the
Age of Reason to the Age of Algorithms. New York: Norton 2023.
Hey all!
This is a Reminder for the next Get-together on tuesday, 26.11. at 19:00
in the SpielBar.
Here is a link to the Google Maps Site:
https://maps.app.goo.gl/GHknyPbedXYnMpAK8
Best,
Vinzenz
Das Institut Wiener Kreis und die Wiener Kreis Gesellschaft laden sehr
herzlich zur
32. Wiener Kreis Vorlesung
Massimo Ferrari (University of Turin)
Moritz Schlick und sein Zirkel. Nach 100 Jahren
Donnerstag, 28. November 2024
17 Uhr
Aula am Campus
Universität Wien
Hof 1, Eingang 1.11
Spitalgasse 2-4
1090 Wien
ACHTUNG: Die Veranstaltung wird zusätzlich für diejenigen, die nicht in Wien
sind, bei YouTube gestreamt: Link zum Stream
<https://www.youtube.com/live/tdXVJmb8RSY>
Wir laden außerdem sehr herzlich zu einem Workshop am Vormittag:
Neue Forschung über Moritz Schlick - Zwei Buchprojekte:
Julia Franke-Reddig (Universität Siegen)
Zur Kontinuität und Eigenständigkeit der Wissenschaftsphilosophie von Moritz
Schlick (2025)
Friedrich Stadler (Universität Wien)
Moritz Schlick, Philosophie der Natur, Kultur und Geschichte. Ausgewählte
Schriften aus dem Nachlass (2025)
28. November 2024, 10-12 Uhr
Aula am Campus
Vorträge in deutscher Sprache
Eintritt frei, um Anmeldung wird gebeten: vcs(a)univie.ac.at
<mailto:vcs@univie.ac.at>
Weitere Informationen unter:
https://vcs.univie.ac.at/SchlickWorkshop_und_WienerKreisVorlesung.pdf
Dear all,
our next speaker in the Philosophy of Science Colloquium organized by
the Institute Vienna Circle is Matteo Collodel (IVC Fellow), who will
give a talk on November 21, 4.45-6.15 pm.
All are welcome!
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Philosophy of Science Colloquium TALK: Matteo Collodel (IVC Fellow)
CRITICISM, MISREPRESENTATION, AND DECLINE: FEYERABEND AND LOGICAL
EMPIRICISM
Philosophy of Science Colloquium
The Institute Vienna Circle holds a Philosophy of Science Colloquium
with talks by our present fellows.
Date: 21/11/2024
Time: 16h45
Venue: New Institute Building (NIG), Universitätsstraße 7, 1010 Wien, HS
2G
ABSTRACT:
Feyerabend became familiar with the Vienna Circle tradition and Logical
Empiricism in his formative years in post-war Vienna. However, since his
early intellectual trajectory, he made LE one of his favorite critical
targets, articulating his criticism in personal dialogue with some of
its most distinguished representatives. This paper focuses on the second
stage of Feyerabend's sustained assault against LE, examining both
Feyerabend's reception of LE and Hempel's response to Feyerabend's
challenge.
In a series of papers published between 1962 and 1966, Feyerabend
relentlessly questioned the descriptive adequacy and the normative
desirability of the 'orthodox', logical empiricist, accounts of
reduction and explanation advanced by Hempel and Nagel. Feyerabend's
persistent criticism shook North American philosophy of science and
prompted Hempel's reaction, which appeared in print in the second half
of the 1960s. Initially, Hempel retorted that Feyerabend's
methodological analysis was 'completely mistaken' and Feyerabend could
offer 'no support' for his allegations. This raises interesting
historiographical questions about the later reception of LE as it seems
that Feyerabend, driven by his anti-authoritarian stance, substantially
misinterpreted the logical empiricist research programme, his vantage
point notwithstanding. On the other hand, Hempel also recognised that
the descriptive issues on which Feyerabend insisted, despite having been
long acknowledged by LE, could have more far-reaching consequences than
previously envisaged. In fact, by the end of the 1960s, Hempel came to
make quite radical concessions, admitting that the standard logical
empiricist model for explicating the structure of scientific theories
was essentially 'misleading', that the logical empiricist account of
reduction was 'an untenable oversimplification', and that the logical
empiricist approach as to the meaning of scientific terms was actually
'misconceived'. In this respect, there are good reasons to consider the
decline of the logical empiricist research programme in the 1970s at
least partly as the result of Feyerabend's stimulating, however
misrepresenting, insights.
Dear All,
*We are organizing a reading circle based on the topic “Philosophy of
Sex and Sexuality”!*
To start a conversation about /sex/, we need to be clear what is the
scope of the phenomenon we are talking about. For that we need to start
with /sexual desire/, which is closely linked to /sexual motivation,
arousal, and activity/.
That is already closely connected to issues within /politics of sex,
sexual orientation, and sexual identity/. When we engage in sexual acts,
we are living out our /sexual orientation/. Beyond our orientation,
understanding our /sexual identity/ is equally important as part of our
personal identity. On top of that, the cultural theory of queer sexual
identity plays a crucial role in shaping how we understand and express
ourselves in various contexts.
An interesting aspect to discuss is /normativity and permissibility of
sexual acts/ under the consideration of sexual orientation and
non-heteronomous identities. When discussing /good or bad sex/, we
usually assume that consent was given to start the encounter. Without
consent, the focus shifts to the permissibility of the act itself, with
the prevailing view being that consent is morally transformative from
impermissible to permissible. Is having the right mental state enough,
or can it be implied through certaincommunications? Additionally, to
which acts are we consenting?
Within the scope of the named phenomenon /objectification/ is a concept,
which can be viewed from different angles. The concept of /mutual
objectification/ refers to the notion when both partners may objectify
each other, which may be seen as problematic because it reduces a
person’s humanity to their body. On the other hand, objectification can
also be viewed from a /social perspective/, as feminist philosophers
argue. For instance, they claim that pornography negatively portrays
women’s sexuality, reinforcing harmful stereotypes. In contrast to that,
Thomas Nagel offers a different view on objectification as a complex,
multi-leveled awareness between two people, where both are mutually
aware of each other's desire.
*If that sounds interesting to you, don’t hesitate to send me an email –
I’d love to hear from you! We plan to start the reading circle next week.*
Best,
Kristina
We are happy to invite you to our 5th talk of the Vienna STS Talk Series in 2024W
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STS Talk by Louise Whiteley
Medical Museion & CBMR, University of Copenhagen
December 02, 2024 05:00 PM-06:30 PM
Attempting the Impossible: Communicating Microbe-Human Relations in a Research Museum.
Abstract
The idea that the microbes in our guts can affect our mental wellbeing has moved from niche interest to mainstream discourse over the last decade. Based on early-stage laboratory research with non-human animals, the proposition has nonetheless spread rapidly into popular media, commercial products, and alternative medical practices. The Microbes on the Mind project started from a curiosity about what this means for thinking about the human as an everyday, experiencing self in constant negotiation with concepts, practices, and systems of health. We investigated how microbe-mind relations are communicated, felt, and experienced, and asked whether this communication helps activate the potentially positive consequences of thinking about human wellbeing as partly-microbial. Throughout we experimented with offering new forms of communication and experience within a university museum, addressing the difficulties of communicating about relations between invisible multitudes and human subjectivity. In my talk I will share examples of our research and public engagement - from a podcast to an art-science exhibition. I will also discuss how this hybrid project was informed by an STS lens on what microbiome research means and does, and reflect on how we applied STS principles of mirroring the complexity of the world in research to our curatorial practice in the museum.
Biography
Louise Whiteley is an associate professor and curator at Medical Museion and CBMR, at the University of Copenhagen. Louise researches how biomedicine moves and shapes everyday ideas about what is to be human, through popular culture and public engagement. Within this frame, they have looked at neuroimaging, microbiome research, metabolic science, and most recently translational stem cell research. Louise also curates exhibitions, art-science collaborations, and public engagement events, in dialogue with research, and is passionate about the importance of communicating values within interdisciplinary collaboration.
Organiser
Department of Science and Technology Studies
Location
STS Seminar Room, NIG, St. II. 6th floor, Universitätsstraße 7, 1010 Vienna & online via zoom<https://univienna.zoom.us/j/63251489007?pwd=FBTgiIoQbHPTvmHhnjFwObba9mAGqZ.6>
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Best wishes,
Katrin Hackl
__________
Mag. Katrin Hackl
Research Support & Communication
Department of Science and Technology Studies
University of Vienna
Universitätsstraße 7 /II/ 6th floor (NIG)
1010 Vienna / Austria
Tel.: 0043-1-4277-496007
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