Technen Elements Of Recent History Of Information Technologies With Epistemological Conclusions

The book expresses the conviction that the art of creating tools – Greek techne – changes its character together with the change of civilization epochs and co-determines such changes. This does not mean that tools typical for a civilization epoch determine it completely, but they change our way of perceiving and interpreting the world. There might have been many such epochs in the history of human civilization (much more than the three waves of agricultural, industrial and information civilization). This is expressed by the title Technen of the book, where n denotes a subsequent civilization epoch. During last fifty years we observed a decomposition of the old episteme (understood as a way of creating and interpreting knowledge characteristic for a given civilization epoch) of modernism, which was an episteme typical for industrial civilization. Today, the world is differently understood by the representatives of three different cultural spheres: of strict and natural sciences; of human and social sciences (especially by their part inclined towards postmodernism) and technical sciences that have a different episteme than even that of strict and natural sciences. Thus, we observe today not two cultures, but three different episteme. The book consists of four parts. First contains basic epistemological observations, second is devoted to selected elements of recent history of information technologies, third contains more detailed epistemological and general discussions, fourth specifies conclusions. The book is written from the cognitive perspective of technical sciences, with a full awareness – and discussion – of its differences from the cognitive perspective of strict sciences or human and social sciences. The main thesis of the book is that informational revolution will probably lead to a formation of a new episteme. The book includes discussions of many issues related to such general perspective, such as what is technology proper; what is intuition from a perspective of technology and of evolutionary naturalism; what are the reasons for and how large are the delays between a fundamental invention and its broad social utilization; what is the fundamental logical error (using paradoxes that are not real, only apparent) of the tradition of sceptical philosophy; what are rational foundations and examples of emergence of order out of chaos; whether civilization development based on two positive feedbacks between science, technology and the market might lead inevitably to a self-destruction of human civilization; etc.

This book investigates the question as to whether technological developments will ultimately mean the end of work and, if so, what the consequences will be. The author addresses this question from the perspective of a technologist well versed in econometrics and game theory, and argues that it is not technology alone that could lead to the end of work, but its utilization by the capitalist system. Technology allows us to minimize the costs of work and increase profits, while the system is worsening unemployment, socio-economic inequality and stratification – which could lead to the end of capitalism in a massive global revolution. As such, the book proposes an evolutionary reform based on a seemingly minor but in fact essential correction of the corporate income tax, which he proposes should decrease in accordance with the percentage of the enterprise’s revenues expended to pay employee salaries. In this way, entrepreneurs will be motivated to implement new professions and occupations, as well as new workplaces. Only in this way, the book argues, can reforms be used to prevent the end of work, which would have catastrophic consequences.

This collection is a multidisciplinary and multicultural contribution to the current sustainability discourse. It is focused on two main dimensions of our world: complexity and diversity. Desirable and urgent transition of socio-technological systems toward a sustainability trajectory of development requires a better understanding of technological trends and social transformations. General advancement of technology does not produce identical changes in various societies, differentiated economically and culturally. Moreover, the abilities to approach sustainable development change over time and space. As a result there is a constant need for continuing research, analyses, and discussions concerning changing contexts and adequacy of strategies and policies. Authors from twelve countries and of different academic and cultural settings present their insights, analyses and recommendations. The collection is focused both on contexts and on activities leading to sustainable trajectories in various domains of economy and social life. Continuing research and discussion is needed to better understand these challenges and to prepare the appropriate strategies and solutions. Development of socio-technological systems is nowadays very complex; moreover, the world we live in is extremely diverse. Therefore, sustainability discourse must be ongoing, introducing new ideas, concepts, theories, evidence and experience by various parties—academics, professionals, and practitioners.

This book provides readers the idea of systemically synthesizing various kind of knowledge, which needs to combine analytical thinking and synthetic thinking. Systems science is expected to help in solving contemporary complex problems, utilizing interdisciplinary knowledge effectively and combining analytical thinking and synthetic thinking efficiently. However, traditional systems science has been divided into two schools: one seeks a systematic procedure to give a correct objective answer; the other develops an emergent, systemic process so that the user can continue exploratory learning. It is not an exaggeration to say that analytical thinking and synthetic thinking have been developed independently, in different schools. This book integrates approaches developed in these two schools, using ideas in knowledge science that have been emerging recently under the influence of Eastern thinking. It emphasizes the importance of utilizing intuition in systems approaches, whereas other books usually try to solve problems rationally and objectively, rejecting subjectivity. This book never denies rationality and objectivity; however, complex problems of today do not always yield to complete analysis. The novelty of this present volume is that it takes in the ideas of synthetic thinking in knowledge science to develop systems science further. The chapter contributors, who are experienced systems scientists with a profound understanding of knowledge management, discuss knowledge synthesis from the Western and Eastern cultural perspectives. The book introduces a theory on systemic knowledge synthesis in an odd chapter and then presents an application of the theory in the next chapter in order to contribute to developing translational systems science.

The International Institute of Applied Systems Analysis (IIASA), an international think tank established jointly by the United States and Soviet Union in Austria in 1972, was intended to advance scientific collaboration. Until the late 1980s, the IIASA was one of the very few permanent sites where policy scientists from both sides of the Iron Curtain could work together to articulate and solve world problems, most notably global climate change. One of the best-kept secrets of the Cold War, this think tank was a rare zone of freedom, communication, and negotiation, where leading Soviet scientists could try out their innovative ideas, benefit from access to Western literature, and develop social networks, thus paving the way for some of the key science and policy breakthroughs of the twentieth century.

This Third Edition is the first English-language edition of the award-winning Meilensteine der Rechentechnik; illustrated in full color throughout in two volumes. The Third Edition is devoted to both analog and digital computing devices, as well as the world's most magnificient historical automatons and select scientific instruments (employed in astronomy, surveying, time measurement, etc.). It also features detailed instructions for analog and digital mechanical calculating machines and instruments, and is the only such historical book with comprehensive technical glossaries of terms not found in print or in online dictionaries. The book also includes a very extensive bibliography based on the literature of numerous countries around the world. Meticulously researched, the author conducted a worldwide survey of science, technology and art museums with their main holdings of analog and digital calculating and computing machines and devices, historical automatons and selected scientific instruments in order to describe a broad range of masterful technical achievements. Also covering the history of mathematics and computer science, this work documents the cultural heritage of technology as well.

This book offers a selection of the best papers presented at the international scientific conference "Digital Transformation in Industry: Trends, Management, Strategies", held by the Institute of Economics of the Ural Branch of the Russian Academy of Sciences, Russia in November 2020. The main focus of the book is to evaluate trends and perspectives of digital transformation in industry and industrial markets through the dissemination of Industry 4.0. The aim of the topics discussed is to create an idea of introduction mechanisms for digitization processes and to specify successful strategies of digital transformation in all sectors of industrial enterprises. The experience of developed and developing economies, as well as small and large enterprises implementing IT and other technological innovations are included. Students as well as managers of industrial organizations alike can benefit from the results of the topics covered.

The primary purpose of our discussion is to explore the rationality of Humanism in light of our finite physical existence. We consider the history of being and becoming, of nihilism and nothing. We review scientific and philosophical literature and present a logical argument which suggests that the foundation of humanism is an irrational myth.