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Philosophy and computing : an introduction / Luciano Floridi.
Van Pelt Library QA76.167 .F56 1999
Available
- Format:
- Book
- Author/Creator:
- Floridi, Luciano, 1964-
- Language:
- English
- Subjects (All):
- Computer science--Philosophy.
- Computer science.
- Physical Description:
- xiv, 242 pages ; 24 cm
- Place of Publication:
- London ; New York : Routledge, 1999.
- Summary:
- This accessible book explores the development, history and future of Information and Communication Technology using examples from philosophy. Luciano Floridi offers both an introduction to these technologies and a philosophical analysis of the problems they pose. The book examines a wide range of areas of technology, including the digital revolution, the Web and Internet, Artificial Intelligence and CD-ROMS. We see how the relationship between philosophy and computing provokes many crucial philosophical questions. Ultimately, "Philosophy and Computing outlines what the future philosophy of information will need to undertake. This title available in eBook format. Click here for more information. Visit our eBookstore at: www.ebookstore.tandf.co.uk.
- Contents:
- 1 Divide et computa: philosophy and the digital environment 1
- The digital revolution 1
- The four areas of the digital revolution 4
- From the analogue to the digital: the new physics of knowledge 9
- The digitisation of the infosphere: three steps 14
- The relations between philosophy and computing 15
- 2 The digital workshop 20
- From the laboratory to the house 20
- What is a computer? 21
- Programming languages and software 47
- Types of commercial computers 50
- The personal computer 51
- 3 A revolution called Internet 56
- The Internet as a basic technological change 56
- What is the Internet? 61
- What can the Internet be used for? 67
- The future of the human encyclopaedia in the third age of IT: Frankenstein or Pygmalion? 79
- 4 The digital domain: infosphere, databases and hypertexts 88
- The Paradox of the growth of knowledge: from the chicken and the egg to the needle in a haystack 88
- "Everything must be transformed into an Encyclopaedia" (Novalis) 97
- What is a database system? 99
- Types of database systems 102
- Data, information and knowledge: an erotetic approach 106
- The hyperbolic space of the infosphere and the fifth element 108
- The aesthetic and the ontological interpretation of databases 110
- Ideometry 111
- The commodification of information and the growth of the infosphere 113
- Rich and poor in the information economy 114
- ICT practical problems and computer ethics 116
- Textual analysis: a constructionist approach 116
- Hypertext as information retrieval system 117
- Conclusion: a Renaissance mind? 130
- 5 Artificial intelligence: a light approach 132
- GOFAI 132
- Turing's Test 134
- Four limits of Turing's Test 136
- The application-areas of AI 142
- The conditions of possibility of AI and the paradox of GOFAI 146
- From GOFAI to LAI 148
- The Cartesian nature of LAI 150
- Deep Blue: a Cartesian computer 151
- The success of LAI 154
- The limits of LAI 215.
- Notes:
- Includes bibliographical references (pages [227]-237) and index.
- ISBN:
- 0415180244
- 0415180252
- OCLC:
- 40230504
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