ABSTRACTS

AbstractThe purpose of this department is to give sufficient information about the subject matter of each publication to enable users to decide whether to read it. It is our intention to cover all books, articles, and other materials in the field.Books for abstracting and eventual review should be sent to this department. Materials should be sent to Prof. David E. Zitarelli, Department of Mathematics, Temple University, Philadelphia, PA 19122, U.S.A. (e-mail: [email protected])Readers are invited to send reprints, autoabstracts, corrections, additions, and notices of publications that have been overlooked. Be sure to include complete bibliographic information, as well as transliteration and translation for non-European languages. We need volunteers willing to cover one or more journals for this department.In order to facilitate reference and indexing, entries are given abstract numbers which appear at the end following the symbol #. A triple numbering system is used: the first number indicates the volume, the second the issue number, and the third the sequential number within that issue. For example, the abstracts for Volume 20, Number 1, are numbered: 20.1.1, 20.1.2, 20.1.3, etc.For reviews and abstracts published in Volumes 1 through 13 there are anauthor indexin Volume 13, Number 4, and asubject indexin Volume 14, Number 1.The initials in parentheses at the end of an entry indicate the abstractor. In this issue there are abstracts by Vı́ctor Albis (Bogotá), Irving Anellis (Ames, IA), Thomas L. Bartlow (Villanova, PA), David Bressoud (St. Paul, MN), Catherine Goldstein (Paris), Herbert Kasube (Peoria, IL), Albert C. Lewis (Hamilton), Laura Nurzia (Reading, GB), James V. Rauff (Decatur, IL), Paul Wolfson (West Chester), and David E. Zitarelli

Computing science and the demarcation problem in philosophy of science : an epistemological investigation

Orientadores: Silvio Seno Chibeni, Marcelo Esteban ConiglioDissertação (mestrado) - Universidade Estadual de Campinas, Instituto de Filosofia e Ciências HumanasResumo: Nesta dissertação examina-se a tese de que a ciência da computação apresenta um hibridismo epistêmico peculiar, com propriedades ora similares à matemática, ora similares às ciências naturais, dependendo do recorte disciplinar em enfoque. Tal tese é abordada pela análise da natureza epistêmica subjacente à ciência da computação e de seu estatuto atual no âmbito científico e acadêmico, sob a perspectiva da filosofia da ciência, em particular, do critério de demarcação científica de Thomas Kuhn. Com esse objetivo em mente, investigam-se duas questões fundamentais. A primeira consiste em um exame genealógico da ciência da computação em relação a outros campos de conhecimento, no contexto da filosofia da ciência. A segunda questão é examinar o próprio problema da demarcação por meio de alguns critérios da filosofia da ciência contemporânea. Compreendendo a ciência da computação como campo de conhecimento com identidade própria, autônoma, porém com intersecções simultâneas com a matemática, a física e a engenharia, debruça-se sobre essas intersecções entre domínios, que oferecem elementos para reflexões de caráter fundamentalmente filosófico acerca de importantes temas do conhecimento computacional. Finalmente, examina-se a hipótese de que o processo constitutivo da ciência da computação foi, de certa forma, um subproduto de uma crise epistêmica, de características essencialmente kuhnianas, que ocorreu no conhecimento lógico-matemático durante o período chamado de empirismo lógico. A fim de iluminar as questões acima, também apresenta-se uma análise breve e sistemática do problema da demarcação, considerando alguns dos critérios e argumentos principais já construídos na literatura contemporânea. Intersecções epistêmicas entre ciência da computação, matemática e ciências naturais são exploradas para os principais grupos de subdisciplinas da ciência da computação em função de suas peculiaridades epistêmicas, a saber: ciência da computação teórica, que abrange algoritmos, complexidade computacional e classes de problemas; engenharia de software, que abrange aspectos arquiteturais de sistemas computacionais; campos de computação heurística, como a inteligência artificial e, finalmente, alguns aspectos distintivos entre a computação quântica e a computação clássicaAbstract: This dissertation addresses the thesis that computing science has a peculiar epistemic hybridism, with properties sometimes similar to mathematics, sometimes similar to the natural sciences, depending on the selected disciplinary focus. This thesis is approached by the analysis of the epistemic nature underlying computing science and its current status in scientific and academic environments, from the perspective of the philosophy of science, particularly the scientific demarcation criterion of Thomas Kuhn. With this goal in mind, two key issues are investigated. The first one is a genealogical examination of computing science in relation to other fields of knowledge in the context of philosophy of science. The second issue is to examine the problem of demarcation itself by means of a few criteria from the contemporary philosophy of science. We understand computing science as a field of knowledge with its own autonomous identity, however with simultaneous intersections with mathematics, physics and engineering. As such, some of these intersections between domains are addressed, as they bear elements for reflections of a fundamentally philosophical character about important topics of computational knowledge. Finally, we analyse the hypothesis that the constitutive process of computing science was, in a way, a by-product of an epistemic crisis, bearing Kuhnian characteristics, that occurred in the logical-mathematical knowledge during the period known as logical empiricism. In order to illuminate the above questions, a brief and systematic analysis of the demarcation problem is provided, taking into account some of the main criteria and arguments already put forward in the contemporary literature. Epistemic intersections between computing science, mathematics and natural sciences are explored for the main groups of computing science subdisciplines due to their epistemic singularities, namely: theoretical computing science, which encompasses algorithms, computational complexity and classes of problems; software engineering, which covers architectural aspects of computational systems; heuristic computing fields such as artificial intelligence and, finally, a few distinctive aspects between quantum computing and classical computingMestradoFilosofiaMestre em Filosofi

The ingenuity of common workmen: and the invention of the computer

Since World War II, state support for scientific research has been assumed crucial to technological and economic progress. Governments accordingly spent tremendous sums to that end. Nothing epitomizes the alleged fruits of that involvement better than the electronic digital computer. The first such computer has been widely reputed to be the ENIAC, financed by the U.S. Army for the war but finished afterwards. Vastly improved computers followed, initially paid for in good share by the Federal Government of the United States, but with the private sector then dominating, both in development and use, and computers are of major significance.;Despite the supposed success of public-supported science, evidence is that computers would have evolved much the same without it but at less expense. Indeed, the foundations of modern computer theory and technology were articulated before World War II, both as a tool of applied mathematics and for information processing, and the computer was itself on the cusp of reality. Contrary to popular understanding, the ENIAC actually represented a movement backwards and a dead end.;Rather, modern computation derived more directly, for example, from the prewar work of John Vincent Atanasoff and Clifford Berry, a physics professor and graduate student, respectively, at Iowa State College (now University) in Ames, Iowa. They built the Atanasoff Berry Computer (ABC), which, although special purpose and inexpensive, heralded the efficient and elegant design of modern computers. Moreover, while no one foresaw commercialization of computers based on the ungainly and costly ENIAC, the commercial possibilities of the ABC were immediately evident, although unrealized due to war. Evidence indicates, furthermore, that the private sector was willing and able to develop computers beyond the ABC and could have done so more effectively than government, to the most sophisticated machines.;A full and inclusive history of computers suggests that Adam Smith, the eighteenth century Scottish philosopher, had it right. He believed that minimal and aloof government best served society, and that the inherent genius of citizens was itself enough to ensure the general prosperity

An institutional analysis of the formation of jobs in software work in the United States, 1945-2001

Information technology (IT) jobs are characterized by continuous change and increasing fragmentation, yet there is no explanation for why this has been the case. In this research, drawing on a historical institutional perspective, I study IT work as an instant of skilled work under capitalism that is subject to interactions among different institutions over long periods of time. In particular, I focus on the dynamics of the relationship between the institutional arrangements of skill formation in IT work, competition in the IT industry and employment relationships in the IT labor market. The main actors involved in the shaping of these institutional arrangements are the government, IT corporations and workers. Empirically, the research focuses on the history of software work in the U.S. IT industry (1945-2001). I draw on existing histories of the industry and corporations as well as a variety of publications that shed light on the industry, individual corporations, training institutions or the labor market. This includes newspapers and magazines, professional and trade journals, government and industry reports, company reports and archives, oral histories and biographies of software workers or businessmen. I study four periods of the history of the IT industry: the emergence of software work and the rise of IBM (1945-1954), IBM’s dominance before the unbundling decision (1955-1969), the dominance and decline of IBM (1969-1985), and finally, the rise of Microsoft until the burst of dotcom bubble (1985-2001). The central argument of this thesis is that, in the absence of a governmental intervention aimed at stabilizing the labor market, the strategic and tactical decisions of IT corporations involved in the dynamics of IT product competition destabilized IT jobs and effectively prevented the formation of a solid occupational collectivity which is a precondition of institutionalization of jobs