Humanist Discussion Group, Vol. 36, No. 116.
        Department of Digital Humanities, University of Cologne
                      Hosted by DH-Cologne
                       www.dhhumanist.org
                Submit to: humanist@dhhumanist.org


    [1]    From: Ioana Galleron <ioana.galleron@gmail.com>
           Subject: Re: [Humanist] 36.115: ways of talking about human-machine relations? (61)

    [2]    From: David Zeitlyn <david.zeitlyn@anthro.ox.ac.uk>
           Subject: Re: [Humanist] 36.115: ways of talking about human-machine relations? (24)


--[1]------------------------------------------------------------------------
        Date: 2022-08-02 07:44:18+00:00
        From: Ioana Galleron <ioana.galleron@gmail.com>
        Subject: Re: [Humanist] 36.115: ways of talking about human-machine relations?

Dear Willard,

Not sure this is what you are looking for, but I’d like to remind here the
metaphor prof. Henri Behar used for describing a computer, and which applies,
IMHO, to artificial intelligence too: it is a Golem. Interaction with machines
is like creating, then using a Golem: exalting and dangerous, allowed and
illicit, etc.

Best regards,
Ioana Galleron

> Le 2 août 2022 à 08:16, Humanist <humanist@dhhumanist.org> a écrit :
>
>
>              Humanist Discussion Group, Vol. 36, No. 115.
>        Department of Digital Humanities, University of Cologne
>                      Hosted by DH-Cologne
>                       www.dhhumanist.org
>                Submit to: humanist@dhhumanist.org
>
>
>
>
>        Date: 2022-08-02 05:49:59+00:00
>        From: Willard McCarty <willard.mccarty@mccarty.org.uk>
>        Subject: human-machine relations
>
> This is at least equally a question for the uninitiated as for any
> experts in human-computer interaction: what figures of thought (a.k.a.
> metaphors) get us further in understanding our relation with computing
> machinery? Bill Buxton (computer science) and Alessandro Duranti
> (linguistics), for example, have talked about musical performance,
> improvisational jazz in particular. This appeals to me because it opens
> up a connection with the arts. What others are there, and what promise
> do they offer?
>
> It's essential to remember, I think, that (to paraphrase Dr Johnson)
> metaphor yokes two things by violence together. In other words, two very
> different things, bringing the friction of the interplay between
> identity and difference into focus. My doctoral mentor used to quote
> the biblical "Joseph is a fruitful bough" as an example that makes
> difference hard to ignore--Joseph clearly isn't a fruitful bough--while
> inviting us to consider that in another sense he is.
>
> This suggests to me that for computing machinery difference from the
> human is the better, more rewarding goal, but that at the same time we
> need ever better likenesses.
>
> So, how do we think about our machines in order to make the most sense
> of them? More than 'just a machine' in Minsky's 'precomputational'
> sense, I'd think.
>
> Comments?
>
> Yours,
> WM
> --
> Willard McCarty,
> Professor emeritus, King's College London;
> Editor, Interdisciplinary Science Reviews;  Humanist
> www.mccarty.org.uk

--[2]------------------------------------------------------------------------
        Date: 2022-08-02 08:18:07+00:00
        From: David Zeitlyn <david.zeitlyn@anthro.ox.ac.uk>
        Subject: Re: [Humanist] 36.115: ways of talking about human-machine relations?

Skeumorphic legacies in metaphorical thinking?

Skeuomorphs (skiamorph is also used) are objects in one medium with features of
another. Think of early pottery with surface texture referring to wicker
weaving: an artefact of construction becomes a decorative feature.

Maybe there are elements of this when we indulge in "XX is a machine" talk? We
cant help but look for the cogs even though at one level we know that xx is not
clockwork.

And more generally when using metaphors to think our way into unfamiliar,
perplexing cases there's a danger that we are creating skeuomorphs that can
mislead, or of confusing parts of the metaphor for its target.

david

ps is there a terminology in metaphor studies parallel to explicanda and
explicandum in explanation?

--
Professor David Zeitlyn  ORCID: 0000-0001-5853-7351
Institute of Social and Cultural Anthropology (ISCA), University of Oxford, 51
Banbury Road, Oxford, OX2 6PF, UK.
https://linktr.ee/mambila


_______________________________________________
Unsubscribe at: http://dhhumanist.org/Restricted
List posts to: humanist@dhhumanist.org
List info and archives at at: http://dhhumanist.org
Listmember interface at: http://dhhumanist.org/Restricted/
Subscribe at: http://dhhumanist.org/membership_form.php