Relating to Things
Design, Technology and the Artificial
Published on 14. May 2020
Book
Hardback
304 pages
978-1-350-12425-7 (ISBN)
Description
We relate to things and things relate to us. Emerging technologies do this in ways that are interesting and exciting, but often also inaccessible or invisible. In this open access book, leading design researchers and philosophers respond to issues raised by this situation - inquiring into what it means to live with and relate to things that can actively relate to us, and that relate to each other in ways that do not involve us at all.
Case studies include Amazon's Alexa, the Internet of Things, Pokemon Go and Roomba the robot vacuum cleaner. Authors explore everything from the care work undertaken by objects, reciprocal human/machine learning, technological mediation as a form of control, and what it takes to reveal things that tend to be hidden and that often (by design) conceal the ways in which they use us.
As a whole, Relating to Things is a collaborative philosophical inquiry into the nature and consequences of contemporary technological things. It is a design inquiry into the current nature of the artificial, and possibilities for how things might be otherwise.
The eBook editions of this book are available open access under a CC BY-NC-ND 4.0 licence on bloomsburycollections.com.
Case studies include Amazon's Alexa, the Internet of Things, Pokemon Go and Roomba the robot vacuum cleaner. Authors explore everything from the care work undertaken by objects, reciprocal human/machine learning, technological mediation as a form of control, and what it takes to reveal things that tend to be hidden and that often (by design) conceal the ways in which they use us.
As a whole, Relating to Things is a collaborative philosophical inquiry into the nature and consequences of contemporary technological things. It is a design inquiry into the current nature of the artificial, and possibilities for how things might be otherwise.
The eBook editions of this book are available open access under a CC BY-NC-ND 4.0 licence on bloomsburycollections.com.
Reviews / Votes
This is one of the first collections to take seriously our changing relationship with non-human actors, yet in doing so it is also a profoundly human book. As disturbing as it is enlightening, Relating to Things is full of insight and curiosity about what it means to live in an increasingly sentient material world. Essential reading for anybody trying to make sense of the politics of relationality in design and the coming world of active objects. -- Damon Taylor, School of Architecture and Design, University of Brighton, UK Relating to Things is an extraordinarily rich exploration of how humans and technologies act, depend upon, and guide one another. Emerging at the intersection of philosophy of technology and design studies, this collection helps us to see how we have come to relate to our creations and how our freedom to design and redesign these relations can open the door to very different futures. This is an essential read for those wanting to gain a deeper sense of how to live with technologies that ask more, give more, take more, and share more with us every day. -- Professor Shannon Vallor, Department of Philosophy, University of Edinburgh, UKMore details
Language
English
Place of publication
London
United Kingdom
Publishing group
Bloomsbury Publishing PLC
Target group
College/higher education
Illustrations
68 bw illus
Dimensions
Height: 238 mm
Width: 160 mm
Thickness: 22 mm
Weight
640 gr
ISBN-13
978-1-350-12425-7 (9781350124257)
Copyright in bibliographic data and cover images is held by Nielsen Book Services Limited or by the publishers or by their respective licensors: all rights reserved.
Schweitzer Classification
Other editions
Additional editions
E-Book
05/2020
1st Edition
Bloomsbury Visual Arts
€105.99
Available for download
E-Book
05/2020
1st Edition
Bloomsbury Visual Arts
€105.99
Available for download
Person
Heather Wiltse is Associate Professor of Design at Umea University, Sweden. She is the author, with Johan Redstroem, of Changing Things: The Future of Objects in a Digital World (Bloomsbury, 2018).
Content
Introduction
Heather Wiltse (Umea University, Sweden)
I: Caring for Things That Care for Us
1. Privacy as Care: An Interpersonal Model of Privacy Exemplified by Five Cases in the Internet of Things
Dylan Wittkower (Old Dominion University, USA)
2. Attachment to Things, Artifacts, Devices, Commodities: An Inconvenient Ethics of the Ordinary
Michel Puech (Paris-Sorbonne University, France)
3. The New Assisted Living: Caring for Alexa Caring for Us
Diane Michelfelder (Macalester College, USA)
II: Learning from Things That Learn from Us
4. Handling Things that Handle Us: Things Get to Know Who We Are and Tie Us Down to Who We Were
Bruno Gransche (University of Siegen, Germany)
5. Can Ethics be Learned? Videogames as an Ethical Sandbox
Fanny Verrax (independent scholar and consultant, France)
6. Casting Things as Partners in Design: Toward a More-than-Human Design Practice
Elisa Giaccardi (TU Delft, Netherlands)
III: Controlling Things That Control Us
7. Hostile Design and the Materiality of Surveillance
Robert Rosenberger (Georgia Institute of Technology, USA)
8. A Tool for the Impact and Ethics of Technology: The Case of Interactive Screens in Public Spaces
Steven Dorrestijn (Saxion University of Applied Sciences, Netherlands)
9. Postphenomenology of Augmented Reality
Galit Wellner (Tel Aviv University, Israel)
IV: Revealing Things That Reveal Us
10. Imagining Things: Unfolding the "of" in Philosophy of Technology, through Object-Oriented Ontology
Yoni Van Den Eede (Free University of Brussels, Belgium)
11. The Disappearing Acts of the Morse Things: A Design Inquiry into the Withdrawal of Things
Ron Wakkary (Simon Fraser University, Canada; TU Eindhoven, Netherlands), Sabrina Hauser (Simon Fraser University, Canada) and Doenja Oogjes (Simon Fraser University, Canada)
12. Revealing Relations of Fluid Assemblages
Heather Wiltse (Umea University, Sweden)
13. Designing Networks that Reveal Themselves
Holly Robbins (TU Delft, Netherlands)
14. Reflection and Commentary
Erik Stolterman (Indiana University, USA)
Heather Wiltse (Umea University, Sweden)
I: Caring for Things That Care for Us
1. Privacy as Care: An Interpersonal Model of Privacy Exemplified by Five Cases in the Internet of Things
Dylan Wittkower (Old Dominion University, USA)
2. Attachment to Things, Artifacts, Devices, Commodities: An Inconvenient Ethics of the Ordinary
Michel Puech (Paris-Sorbonne University, France)
3. The New Assisted Living: Caring for Alexa Caring for Us
Diane Michelfelder (Macalester College, USA)
II: Learning from Things That Learn from Us
4. Handling Things that Handle Us: Things Get to Know Who We Are and Tie Us Down to Who We Were
Bruno Gransche (University of Siegen, Germany)
5. Can Ethics be Learned? Videogames as an Ethical Sandbox
Fanny Verrax (independent scholar and consultant, France)
6. Casting Things as Partners in Design: Toward a More-than-Human Design Practice
Elisa Giaccardi (TU Delft, Netherlands)
III: Controlling Things That Control Us
7. Hostile Design and the Materiality of Surveillance
Robert Rosenberger (Georgia Institute of Technology, USA)
8. A Tool for the Impact and Ethics of Technology: The Case of Interactive Screens in Public Spaces
Steven Dorrestijn (Saxion University of Applied Sciences, Netherlands)
9. Postphenomenology of Augmented Reality
Galit Wellner (Tel Aviv University, Israel)
IV: Revealing Things That Reveal Us
10. Imagining Things: Unfolding the "of" in Philosophy of Technology, through Object-Oriented Ontology
Yoni Van Den Eede (Free University of Brussels, Belgium)
11. The Disappearing Acts of the Morse Things: A Design Inquiry into the Withdrawal of Things
Ron Wakkary (Simon Fraser University, Canada; TU Eindhoven, Netherlands), Sabrina Hauser (Simon Fraser University, Canada) and Doenja Oogjes (Simon Fraser University, Canada)
12. Revealing Relations of Fluid Assemblages
Heather Wiltse (Umea University, Sweden)
13. Designing Networks that Reveal Themselves
Holly Robbins (TU Delft, Netherlands)
14. Reflection and Commentary
Erik Stolterman (Indiana University, USA)