Deconstructive Software Studies:  Toward an Ethics of the Unforseeable in the Age of Big Data

Federica Frabetti

Deconstructive Software Studies: Toward an Ethics of the Unforseeable in the Age of Big Data

Research output: Chapter in Book/Report/Conference proceeding › Chapter › peer-review

Abstract

It is widely acknowledged that today we live in the age of digitality: software, big data, cloud computing and the Internet of Things are only a few ways in which digital technologies are deeply affecting our lives, the way we think, our relationships with others and our conception of ourselves. The extensive use of ever larger quantities of data and the growing reliance on algorithms to analyze them and to make decisions also raise urgent ethical issues, such as those concerning privacy, surveillance, the right to be forgotten, security, censorship, filtering and content control, the commodification of the so-called ‘quantified self’ and even information warfare.
In this article I take a phenomenological and deconstructive approach to the ethics of big data in order to begin tackling some of these problems. I argue that big data cannot be fully understood by remaining within the conceptual framework of instrumentality. Drawing on the philosophical tradition of ‘originary technicity’ I argue that software escapes those explanatory narratives that still oppose the social and the technical, the organic and the machinic, the natural and the artificial (often with the aim of reducing one term of the opposition to the other) and I suggest that software should be thought of as a constant, unstoppable and never entirely predictable process of material self-differentiation that involves both the technical and the human. Drawing on a number of examples I also explore in what way such a philosophical approach could contribute to answering ethical concerns regarding big data.

Original language	English
Title of host publication	Philosophy after Computation
Editors	David Berry, Beatrice Fazi
Publisher	Open Humanities
Publication status	Submitted - 10 Nov 2019

Keywords

Philosophy of Technology
Computation
Software Studies
media studies

Cite this

@inbook{f1a3f111809c4c97957f47b441640588,

title = "Deconstructive Software Studies: Toward an Ethics of the Unforseeable in the Age of Big Data ",

abstract = "It is widely acknowledged that today we live in the age of digitality: software, big data, cloud computing and the Internet of Things are only a few ways in which digital technologies are deeply affecting our lives, the way we think, our relationships with others and our conception of ourselves. The extensive use of ever larger quantities of data and the growing reliance on algorithms to analyze them and to make decisions also raise urgent ethical issues, such as those concerning privacy, surveillance, the right to be forgotten, security, censorship, filtering and content control, the commodification of the so-called {\textquoteleft}quantified self{\textquoteright} and even information warfare. In this article I take a phenomenological and deconstructive approach to the ethics of big data in order to begin tackling some of these problems. I argue that big data cannot be fully understood by remaining within the conceptual framework of instrumentality. Drawing on the philosophical tradition of {\textquoteleft}originary technicity{\textquoteright} I argue that software escapes those explanatory narratives that still oppose the social and the technical, the organic and the machinic, the natural and the artificial (often with the aim of reducing one term of the opposition to the other) and I suggest that software should be thought of as a constant, unstoppable and never entirely predictable process of material self-differentiation that involves both the technical and the human. Drawing on a number of examples I also explore in what way such a philosophical approach could contribute to answering ethical concerns regarding big data.",

keywords = "Philosophy of Technology, Computation, Software Studies, media studies",

author = "Federica Frabetti",

note = "This chapter is an invited contribution and is currently under peer-review. Publication is expected end of 2020.",

year = "2019",

month = nov,

day = "10",

language = "English",

editor = "Berry, {David } and Beatrice Fazi",

booktitle = "Philosophy after Computation",

publisher = "Open Humanities",

}

TY - CHAP

T1 - Deconstructive Software Studies

T2 - Toward an Ethics of the Unforseeable in the Age of Big Data

AU - Frabetti, Federica

N1 - This chapter is an invited contribution and is currently under peer-review. Publication is expected end of 2020.

PY - 2019/11/10

Y1 - 2019/11/10

N2 - It is widely acknowledged that today we live in the age of digitality: software, big data, cloud computing and the Internet of Things are only a few ways in which digital technologies are deeply affecting our lives, the way we think, our relationships with others and our conception of ourselves. The extensive use of ever larger quantities of data and the growing reliance on algorithms to analyze them and to make decisions also raise urgent ethical issues, such as those concerning privacy, surveillance, the right to be forgotten, security, censorship, filtering and content control, the commodification of the so-called ‘quantified self’ and even information warfare. In this article I take a phenomenological and deconstructive approach to the ethics of big data in order to begin tackling some of these problems. I argue that big data cannot be fully understood by remaining within the conceptual framework of instrumentality. Drawing on the philosophical tradition of ‘originary technicity’ I argue that software escapes those explanatory narratives that still oppose the social and the technical, the organic and the machinic, the natural and the artificial (often with the aim of reducing one term of the opposition to the other) and I suggest that software should be thought of as a constant, unstoppable and never entirely predictable process of material self-differentiation that involves both the technical and the human. Drawing on a number of examples I also explore in what way such a philosophical approach could contribute to answering ethical concerns regarding big data.

AB - It is widely acknowledged that today we live in the age of digitality: software, big data, cloud computing and the Internet of Things are only a few ways in which digital technologies are deeply affecting our lives, the way we think, our relationships with others and our conception of ourselves. The extensive use of ever larger quantities of data and the growing reliance on algorithms to analyze them and to make decisions also raise urgent ethical issues, such as those concerning privacy, surveillance, the right to be forgotten, security, censorship, filtering and content control, the commodification of the so-called ‘quantified self’ and even information warfare. In this article I take a phenomenological and deconstructive approach to the ethics of big data in order to begin tackling some of these problems. I argue that big data cannot be fully understood by remaining within the conceptual framework of instrumentality. Drawing on the philosophical tradition of ‘originary technicity’ I argue that software escapes those explanatory narratives that still oppose the social and the technical, the organic and the machinic, the natural and the artificial (often with the aim of reducing one term of the opposition to the other) and I suggest that software should be thought of as a constant, unstoppable and never entirely predictable process of material self-differentiation that involves both the technical and the human. Drawing on a number of examples I also explore in what way such a philosophical approach could contribute to answering ethical concerns regarding big data.

KW - Philosophy of Technology

KW - Computation

KW - Software Studies

KW - media studies

M3 - Chapter

BT - Philosophy after Computation

A2 - Berry, David

A2 - Fazi, Beatrice

PB - Open Humanities

ER -