How norms in technology ought to be interpreted

This paper defends the claim that there are — at least — two kinds of normativity in technological practice. The first concerns what engineers ought to do and the second concerns normative statements about artifacts. The claim is controversial, since the standard approach to normativity, namely normative realism, actually denies artifacts any kind of normativity; according to the normative realist, normativity applies exclusively to human agents. In other words, normative realists hold that only “human agent normativity” is a genuine form of normativity.I will argue that normative realism is mistaken on this point. I will mainly draw on material of Daniel Dennett and Philip Pettit to show that it makes sense to talk about artifactual normativity. We claim that this approach can also make sense of human agent normativity — or more specifically “engineer normativity”. Moreover, it avoids some of the problems formulated by opponents of normative realism. Thus I will develop a strategy which: (i) makes sense of artifactual normativity; and (ii) makes sense of “human agent normativity”, specifically “engineer normativity

Robust! -- Handle with care

Michael Weisberg has argued that robustness analysis is useful in evaluating both scientific models and their implications and that robustness analysis comes in three types that share their form and aim. We argue for three cautionary claims regarding Weisberg's reconstruction: robustness analysis may be of limited or no value in evaluating models and their implications; the unificatory reconstruction conceals that the three types of robustness differ in form and role; there is no confluence of types of robustness. We illustrate our central first claim with a case study: the application of Lotka-Volterra models to technology diffusion

How much would each researcher receive if competitive government research funding were distributed equally among researchers?

Scientists are increasingly dissatisfied with funding systems that rely on peer assessment and, accordingly, have suggested several proposals for reform. One of these proposals is to distribute available funds equally among all qualified researchers, with no interference from peer review. Despite its numerous benefits, such egalitarian sharing faces the objection, among others, that it would lead to an unacceptable dilution of resources. The aim of the present paper is to assess this particular objection. We estimate (for the Netherlands, the U.S. and the U.K.) how much researchers would receive were they to get an equal share of the government budgets that are currently allocated through competitive peer assessment. For the Netherlands, we furthermore estimate what researchers would receive were we to differentiate between researchers working in low-cost, intermediate-cost and high-cost disciplines. Given these estimates, we then determine what researchers could afford in terms of PhD students, Postdocs, travel and equipment. According to our results, researchers could, on average, maintain current PhD student and Postdoc employment levels, and still have at their disposal a moderate (the U.K.) to considerable (the Netherlands, U.S.) budget for travel and equipment. This suggests that the worry that egalitarian sharing leads to unacceptable dilution of resources is unjustified. Indeed, our results strongly suggest that there is room for far more egalitarian distribution of funds than happens in the highly competitive funding schemes so prevalent today.</p

The functional bias of the dual nature of technical artefacts program

In 2006, in a special issue of this journal, several authors explored what they called the dual nature of artefacts. The core idea is simple, but attractive: to make sense of an artefact, one needs to consider both its physical nature—its being a material object—and its intentional nature—its being an entity designed to further human ends and needs. The authors construe the intentional component quite narrowly, though: it just refers to the artefact’s function, its being a means to realize a certain practical end. Although such strong focus on functions is quite natural (and quite common in the analytic literature on artefacts), I argue in this paper that an artefact’s intentional nature is not exhausted by functional considerations. Many non-functional properties of artefacts—such as their marketability and ease of manufacture—testify to the intentions of their users/designers; and I show that if these sorts of considerations are included, one gets much more satisfactory explanations of artefacts, their design, and normativity

The acheulean handaxe: More like a bird's song than a beatles' tune?

The goal of this paper is to provoke debate about the nature of an iconic artifact— the Acheulean handaxe. Specifically, we want to initiate a conversation about whether or not they are cultural objects. The vast majority of archeologists assume that the behaviors involved in the production of handaxes were acquired by social learning and that handaxes are therefore cultural. We will argue that this assumption is not warranted on the basis of the available evidence and that an alternative hypothesis should be given serious consideration. This alternative hypothesis is that the form of Acheulean handaxes was at least partly under genetic control

Population size does not explain past changes in cultural complexity

Acknowledgments We thank three anonymous reviewers and our PNAS editor, James O'Connell, for their generous feedback on earlier versions of this manuscript. K.V. acknowledges support from The Netherlands Organisation for Scientific Research (VIDI Grant 016.144312). M.C. is supported by the Social Sciences and Humanities Research of Canada, the Canada Research Chairs Program, the Canada Foundation for Innovation, the British Columbia Knowledge Development Fund, and Simon Fraser University. R.C. and W.R. acknowledge support from the Australian Research Council (Discovery Grant DP120100580).Peer reviewedPublisher PD

Roger Nols: een (on)aantastbare burgemeester?

Faut-il déboulonner le buste de Roger Nols ? La question fait aujourd’hui débat. Interrogeant les raisons pour lesquelles la représentation et le souvenir de l’ancien bourgmestre de Schaerbeek paraissent si encombrants dans l’espace public, cet article souligne la nécessité́ de replacer les évènements contestés dans un contexte historique plus large. Il met en garde contre une critique centrée sur la seule personne de Roger Nols qui pourrait exonérer à bon compte celles et ceux qui ont soutenu ouvertement ou dans le secret des urnes, des discours et politiques racistes et xénophobes, tant à Schaerbeek que dans d’autres communes de la capitale. Cette réflexion permet de discuter les risques du « présentisme », c’est-à-dire l’utilisation du passé en fonction d’objectifs politiques actuels sans tenir compte de la réalité́ historique. Elle montre qu’il ne revient pas aux historiens de prendre une décision sur l’avenir d’un tel buste mais qu’ils ont par contre un rôle essentiel à jouer pour documenter le contexte dans lequel l’action de la personne contestée s’est inscrite.Moet het borstbeeld van Roger Nols worden weggehaald? Die vraag vormt momenteel het voorwerp van debat. In dit artikel onderzoeken de auteurs waarom de voorstelling van en de gedachtenis aan de vroegere burgemeester van Schaarbeek voor zoveel wrevel lijken te zorgen in de openbare ruimte, en maken ze duidelijk dat de omstreden gebeurtenissen in een bredere historische context moeten worden geplaatst. Ze waarschuwen ervoor dat door de kritiek te focussen op Roger Nols alleen, al diegenen die – openlijk of in het geheim via de stembussen – racistische en xenofobe standpunten en politici hebben gesteund er goedkoop van af zouden kunnen komen, zowel in Schaarbeek als in andere Brusselse gemeenten. Hun analyse doet de vraag rijzen naar de risico’s van het “presentisme”, met andere woorden het gebruik van het verleden in functie van de huidige politieke doelstellingen zonder rekening te houden met de historische realiteit. Ze toont aan dat het niet aan historici is om te beslissen over de toekomst van zo'n borstbeeld, maar dat zij wel een belangrijke rol vervullen bij het documenteren van de context waarop de actie van de betwiste figuur indertijd aansloot.Should the bust of Roger Nols be removed? The question is now being debated. This article questions the reasons why the representation and memory of the former mayor of Schaerbeek seem so obtrusive in the public space, and emphasises the need́ to place the controversial events in a broader historical context. It cautions against focusing the criticism only on him, which could exonerate those who supported racist and xenophobic discourses and policies openly or in the secrecy of the ballot box, both in Schaerbeek and in other municipalities of the capital. This reflection allows a discussion of the risks of “presentism”, i.e. the use of the past according to current political objectives without taking historical reality into account. It shows that it is not the role of historians to make a decision about the future of this bust, but that they do have an essential role to play in documenting the context surrounding this controversial figure