In Search of an Integrative Vision for Technology

"This book provides a fascinating reading experience for anyone interested in an inquiring relationship between technical progress and the quality of the human condition. It manages to keep a healthier balance between these two complex topics than is found in most publications of the genre, too often they consist either of much technology and little philosophy or the converse.... The book also manages to build accessible bridges over the gulf that tends to separate the philosophical language from the 'real' concerns of technologists."

Dr. h.c. Heinz K. Klein is Associate Professor Emeritus at SUNY Binghamton, USA and Leverhulme Chaired Professor, Salford University, UK

"The last few years I have become increasingly concerned about the way interdisciplinarity is being used to create more specialized subdisciplines rather than broadening our perspectives. And the ways that interdisciplinarity often marginalizes if it does not leave out completely the humanities. I think this is a major mistake, and one this book clearly aims to address."

Carl Mitcham is Professor of Liberal Arts and International Studies at the Colorado School of Mines and faculty affiliate of the Center for Science and Technology Policy Research at the University of Colorado, USA

"This book provides a well-structured and thought-provoking collection of papers about how systems thinking can be employed to provide an integrated perspective on the development and use of technology."

Dr. Mike C. Jackson is Professor of Management Systems and Dean of Hull University Business School

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- The Editors

Sytse Strijbos lectures philosophy of technology at the Vrije Universiteit in Amsterdam and North West University (Potchefstroom Campus).

Andrew Basden is Professor of Human Factors and Philosophy in Information Systems at the University of Salford, U.K.

Résumé

In Search Of An Integrative Vision For Technology will stimulate its readers to consider the 'whole story that is information systems' within the context of an integrative vision of technology. It integrates disparate areas of debate and research while appreciating the contribution that philosophy can make to such thinking. It is deliberately broad in coverage, and designed to provide useful pointers so that researchers, students, practitioners, and developers can easily apply each point as needed. "Human issues of technology and their normative aspects" is a theme that runs throughout the entire book.

The integrative vision is centered on an understanding of human practice the twin notions of structure and direction, and the leading and the founding functions of such practice. While this understanding applies to all technologies, it is worked out in more detail for information technology. From this philosophical understanding, many interdisciplinary areas of interest are identified.

Contenu
Introduction: In Search of an Integrative Vision for Technology.- Introduction: In Search of an Integrative Vision for Technology.- Artifacts and their Development.- Aspects of Knowledge Representation.- Reflecting on the Use of the Concept of Qualifying Function in System Design.- Elicitation of Highly Interdisciplinary Knowledge.- An Appreciative Critique and Refinement of Checkland's Soft Systems Methodology.- Socio-Technical Systems.- The Systems Character of Modern Technology.- Communication Without Bounds?.- Norms of Communication and the Rise of the Network Society.- Human Practices.- Evaluation of Systems in Human Practice.- Multimodal Investigation of Technology-Aided Human Practice in Business Operations.- An Aspectual Understanding of the Human Use of Information Technology.- Directional Perspectives.- The Idea of a Systems Ethics.- Normative Sources of Systems Thinking: An Inquiry into Religious Ground-Motives of Systems Thinking Paradigms.- Towards a 'Disclosive Systems Thinking'.- Critical Reflections.- Reflections on the CPTS Model of Interdisciplinarity.- Technology and Systems but What about the Humanities?.