Automated killing and mediated caring

Symposium „Machine Ethics in the Context of Medical and Care Agents“, Annual con­ven­tion of the Soci­ety for the Study of Arti­fi­cial Intel­li­gence and the Sim­u­la­tion of Behav­iour. Goldsmiths College London, Apr 4, 2014 (with Kathrin Friedrich)

Robot-based intervention in clinical contexts establishes new forms of collaboration between physicians and medical agents. In particular, image-guided robotic intervention such as radiation cancer therapy relies on cooperation between human and robotic actors. This setting comprises an epistemic and a pragmatic dilemma: if the tools and devices increasingly shape, impact and govern medical decisions and actions, how do we describe this form of hybrid agency? What are the implications for medical practice if robots and non-embodied artificial operators gain authorship and autonomy from their human counterparts? The paper will discuss how the kill-chain in radiation therapy relies on black boxing its functions and politics through visual surfaces by comparing it to the mediating role of visualization technology in remote warfare. It argues that the reference to the autonomy of weapon systems could help establish ethical guidelines for the medical field that would complement the demand for an applied iconic knowledge in clinical environments.

Bildbasierte Operationsraumarchitekturen

Workshop „Imaging and Intervention“. Exzellenzcluster Bild Wissen Gestaltung, Humboldt Universität zu Berlin, Feb 7, 2014

Die räumliche Integration und Anordnung, die Architektur von Bildschirmen im Operationsraum, gliedert die Handlungsabläufe und definiert dementsprechend den ärztlichen Eingriff immer auch als medial vermittelte Bildoperation. Der Vortrag untersucht wie  Wahrnehmungssituation im OP gestaltet werden, um Bild und Handlung aufeinander abzustimmen? Dabei soll herausgearbeitet werden, ob und inwieweit sich medizinische Diagnostik und Therapie dabei strukturell verändern – und zwar sowohl in technischer Hinsicht, also bezogen auf die medialen Produktionsbedingungen, als auch bezogen auf das damit verbundene anwendungsbezogene, operative Bildwissen.

The Earth Observation Guide

I co-organised a panel about the rela­tion of sen­sors and the body at the con­fe­rence “Taking Care of Things! Archi­ves – Life-Cycles – Care” on Janu­ary 15-18 in Lüne­burg hosted by Oliver Lerone Schultz and Christina Kral of Post-Media Lab/Center for Digi­tal Cul­tures. Together with colleagues Kristian Lukic, Boaz Levin, Owen Mundy, Daniel Herleth, Adam Kaplan, Frédéric Eyl, and Oliver Lerone Schultz I worked on a 3-day speed project. We prototyped a booklet called „The Earth Observation Guide“ that explores how the forms of spatial interaction change when weapons, cameras, sensors, servers, etc. start to actually move beyond our hands, desks and pockets.
From the concept: Drones or unmanned aerial vehicles have become an omnipresent part of our daily lives, as predators on the battlefield, as quadrocopters in the nursery, in augmented reality games or as the implementation of security doctrines. From thousands of kilometers away or just within a few meters. The innovations in the field of imaging, aeronautic, network and sensor technologies as well as the increased automation and intelligence of machines have unleashed a huge potential for the civil use of drones. Remote-controlled or in autonomous swarms do they serve as counter-surveillance tools or mobile hotspots, deliver defibrillators or detect land-mines. If one takes the concept of a drone – detached from the body, remote controlled, hyper vision/access, aerial and moving – how could drones “take care of things“ and release the archive from its spatial boundaries? Servers in orbit? A cloud in the clouds? Data-mining public space? How can we shape this technology? How does the actual mobilization of mobile devices – the fact that they detach from our bodies – change social practice and cultural techniques? How do the forms of spatial interaction change when weapons, cameras, sensors, servers, etc. start to actually move beyond our hands, desks and pockets?
(Photos 1–5 by Owen Mundy)

Conference: Digital Activism #Now

Information Politics, Digital Culture and Global Protest Movements: „The so-called “web 2.0” of social network sites was invented as a business strategy to react to the first dot.com bust and, as revealed by the NSA scandal, it has been heavily used by the State as a platform of global surveillance. Yet, this space has also seen the rise of new powerful forms of digital activism, as seen in the adoption of Facebook and Twitter as means of mass mobilisation in the context of the Arab revolutions, the Spanish indignados and of Occupy Wall Street. These contradictions raise a number of burning questions for contemporary digital activists. What are the real opportunities and threats for digital activism at the time of social network sites and big data? How can protest movements make use of the power of mass diffusion and collective coordination afforded by social media without falling prey of state monitoring or cultural banalisation? And is it better to invest energy in creating alternative and non-commercial communication platforms or in occupying the digital mainstream?“

Venue at King’s College London – April 4th 2014

Cfp: Re:publica 2014

Heute letzter Tag für die Re:publica 2014 was einzureichen. Aus dem call: „Mit dem Motto „INTO THE WILD“ möchte die re:publica 2014 dazu auffordern, das Netz der Post-Snowden-Ära zu überdenken, Neues zu wagen und dazu ermutigen, Wege der Unberechenbarkeit einzuschlagen. Sicher scheint: Die digitale Gesellschaft wird sich umgestalten und wir hoffen, auch dank eurer Beiträge, vom 6. bis 8. Mai 2014 einen Blick in die Zukunft werfen zu können.“

Buch: Locative Media – Medialität und Räumlichkeit

Der Sammelband „Locative Media Medialität und Räumlichkeit – Multidisziplinäre Perspektiven zur Verortung der Medien / Multidisciplinary Perspectives on Media and Locality“ von Regine Buschauer und Katharine S. Willis herausgegeben, gibt einen guten Einblick in aktuelle Ansätze zur Geomedialität und dem Umstand, dass der Social Graph möglicherweise von einem Place Graph Konkurrenz bekommen hat. Aus dem Klappentext: „Mit der Konvergenz von Mobilfunk und Internet, GPS, digitaler Kartographie und Social Networks hat sich ein Feld »lokativer« Medien herausgebildet, denen in den heutigen Medientechniken und -praktiken eine zentrale Bedeutung zukommt. Die Beiträge des Bandes widmen sich diesem jüngsten Medienwandel und bieten Einblick in die Entwicklungen und Phänomene ortsbezogener Medien. In einem multidisziplinären Spektrum kritischer Beiträge beleuchtet der Band die Dynamik, den Hintergrund und die Formen »lokativer« Medientechniken sowie ihre Implikationen in der gegenwärtigen Mediengesellschaft und -kultur.“

Volatile Bewegungen im Netz – Unvorhergesehene Mobilisierung

Lesenswerter Artikel von Anne Wizorek auf www.bpb.de über Aktivismus zwischen Netz und auf der Straße. Mein Punkt ist, ja immer, dass diese Kluft zunehmend verschwindet – nichtsdestotrotz gibt es schon noch genuin „digitale“ Formen des Protests: „Clicktivism und Slacktivism sind die Schlagwörter mit denen vor allem Pessimisten versuchen der Euphorie um das partizipative Potential des Web 2.0 einen Dämpfer zu verpassen. Dass der Netzaktivismus aber durchaus die Kraft besitzt eine gesellschaftliche Debatte in Gang zutreten, bewies unlängst die Twitter-Aktion #aufschrei. Über die Vor- und Nachteile eines Twitteraufrufs und die Möglichkeiten und Grenzen des 140-Zeichen Mediums.“

Buch: Das Neue Spiel – Nach dem Kontrollverlust

Noch 2 Tage könnt ihr Michael Seemanns Buch über den Post-Kontrollverlust auf Startnext crowdfunden: „Wir haben die Kontrolle verloren. Daten, von denen wir nicht wussten, dass es sie gibt, finden Wege, die nicht vorgesehen waren und sagen Dinge aus, auf die wir nie gekommen wären. Wir wurden in ein neues Spiel geworfen und niemand hat uns die Regeln verraten.“ Ein englischer Essay dazu wird außerdem in der »network notebooks« Reihe des Instituts for Network Cultures von Geert Lovink erscheinen. Here you go: www.startnext.de/ctrlverlust

CFP: New Perspectives on the Problem of the Public

The Centre for the Study of Democracy is hosting a two day conference, ‚New Perspectives on the Problem of the Public‘ in the Board Room, 309 Regent Street, 15-16 May 2014.  This inter-disciplinary conference brings together researchers from communications and media, built environment, education, geography and political theory to discuss the implications of the rise of new strands of pragmatist, complexity and new materialist approaches to democracy and the public sphere.  We will examine how non-traditional conceptualisations of the ‘public’ might be relevant to various fields of practice and policy making. What roles remain for institutions of governance in a complex, fluid, more pluralist world, less amenable to modernist conceptions of power? What are the implications if representation is increasingly understood as a barrier to the emergence of the public, rather than as a means of accessing it? Does it make sense to think about ‚public goods‘ such as health and education if the public can no longer be taken for granted? Could understandings of the public in political theory and policy making be enriched and problematised by their conceptualisations in other academic fields?

The deadline for abstracts (250 words) is Friday 21 February 2014.

CFP: Sustainability, ethics and the cyberspace

Interesting CFP by the European Meetings on Cybernetics and Systems Research (EMCSR) Get the call here: „The variety of current and emerging societal challenges underlines the demand for new concepts towards sustainable ways of living. While sustainability primarily addresses environmental issues, this symposium asks for wider (ethical) perspectives. The extensive diffusion of ICT and the embodiment of cyberspace triggered a variety of societal changes that penetrate all aspects of societal life. New, easy ways of information spreading are accompanied by increasing complexity, diversity and diminishing boundaries between the public and the private sphere as well as the social relations in-between. ICT opened up a wide range of new possibilities for the realisation of human potential, but at the same time affect society in a way that challenges the common grounds of social relations and perceptions of good living in an ethical sense.“ Chairs are Stefan Strauß (Institute of Technology Assessment, Austrian Academy of Sciences) Tomas Sigmund (Department of Systems Analysis, University of Economics, Prague) Tomas Karger (Department of Sociology, Andragogy and Cultural Anthropology, Palacky University, Olomouc). The Deadline is 15 February.