Contingency and Plasticity in Everyday Technologies

Technology is a host of social, material, and epistemic transformation techniques, tools, and methods, and this volume suggests a different view: the digital is indeterminate. It situates digital indeterminacy within the wider context of material and immaterial processes, causations, triggerings, and their performative working. The books tripartite structure reflects technologys inherent capacity to transform knowledges, practices, and time.

Format: Hardback
Length: 336 pages
Publication date: 23 November 2022
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing Plc

Technology encompasses a wide range of techniques, tools, and methods that facilitate social, material, and epistemic transformations. While the prevailing perception of digital technology today is that it is predetermined or overdetermined, this volume challenges this notion by proposing a different perspective: the digital is inherently indeterminate. By drawing insights from philosophy, art, architecture theory, mathematics, computer science, and anthropology, the book situates digital indeterminacy within the broader context of material and immaterial processes, causations, triggerings, and their performative working.

The book's tripartite structure reflects the inherent capacity of technology to transform knowledge, practices, and time. Part I: Social-Digital Technologies explores arguments for machinic indeterminacy and overdetermination in blockchain, cognitive augmentation, and digital ideology. Part II: Spatial, Temporal, Aural, and Visual Technologies delves deeper into established ideas about technologies for constructing spatial structures, manufacturing instruments, and shaping the visual space. Part III: Epistemic Technologies examines the use of plasticity in cognitive science, contingency in thinking habits, ontogenesis in experimental computing, and divination techniques with an inherent margin of indeterminacy.

The book features contributions from a diverse range of scholars, including Franco "Bifo" Berardi, Iain Campbell, Stephen Darren Dougherty, Aden Evens, Oswaldo Emiddio Vasquez Hadjilyra, Stavros Kousoulas, Natasha Lushetich, Peteer Müürsepp, Luciana Parisi, Andrej Radman, Alesha Serada, Dominic Smith, Sha Xin Wei, Joel White, Ashley Woodward, and David Zeitlyn. Their insights and perspectives contribute to a comprehensive understanding of the transformative potential of technology across various domains.

In conclusion, Technology: Indeterminate Transformations offers a fresh and thought-provoking perspective on the digital realm, challenging the prevailing notion of determinacy and highlighting the inherent indeterminacy of digital technologies. By drawing insights from multiple disciplines, the book provides a valuable resource for scholars, practitioners, and anyone interested in exploring the complex and multifaceted nature of technology and its impact on society.

Weight: 644g
Dimension: 160 x 235 x 30 (mm)
ISBN-13: 9781538171578