Fallman, Daniel (2007). “Persuade Into What? Why Human-Computer Interaction Needs a Philosophy of Technology.” In Lecture Notes in Computer Science.” 4744/2007, pp 295-306.
2.1.1
“Ihde, who has “repeatedly insisted that the materiality of technologies be maintained” [8, p. 26], holds that if one absorbs techniques—as certain ways of practice and thought—into technology that tends to yield technology as an overly general and abstract term
p299
Advantages to “giving prominence to human-technology relations” are (1) it enables distinction between technology and technique (see above quote); (2) helps overcome “often suggested and presumed” neutrality of technologies and (3) facilitates “the possibility of preserving in one’s analysis the dynamic and actional nature of that relationship. Even though technologies are artificial, it is nevertheless important to realize that they are part of human praxis; used, designed, developed, repaired, discarded, and so on.”
p300
“…three basic kinds of relations between humans, technology, and world”:
1. embodiment relation [users embody a praxis; involves transparency or ‘seeing-through’-ness; (Human—Technology)—>World.]
2. hermeneutical relation [users’ focus is on instrument and its mediation, requires constructed meaning or interpretative skill; Human—>(Technology—World)]
3. alterity relation [quasi-otherness (less other than people, animals / more other than inanimate objs.); seeming ‘life of its own’; world is de-emphasized context or background; Human—>Technology—(—World)]
1. Embodiment relation
“First, in the discussion on the non-neutral and mediating role of optical technologies it is noticeable that eyeglasses for instance allow their users to embody their praxis through the technology,” = existential relationship.
“For a technology to hold an embodiment relation it must also be technically transparent—its material or physical characteristic must be such that it allows ‘seeing through’.” — [BLC: again, Fallman’s is a visual metaphor, but unnecessarily restricted to optics (with the nod to aurality with “hearing aids and the like”…). The magnifying capacity of audio microphones, amplifiers, and speakers, are often idealized in terms of their role of being between perceivers and perceived ‘as though not there,’ even as they magnify(/amplify). If a seemingly “non-transparent” deployment of a technology seems to be a circumvention of its idealized purpose, then embodiment is among the standard relations precipitated by the technology.]
FORMALIZATION: According to Ihde, the embodiment relation between a human user, technology, and the world can be formalized as: (Human—Technology)—>World.
2. Hermeneutical relation
Distinguish optically magnifying technologies from others: both are still mediators, appearing between human and world, however “…in the latter case, the user’s perceptual focus is not on the world but on the technological instrument itself”
“The hermeneutical relationship is hence referential, in that it places the user’s immediate perceptual focus on the technology in between the user and the world.”
p301
FORMALIZATION: The instrument is only transparent in a hermeneutical sense if the user has acquired the skills necessary to be able to read it. This relationship may thus, according to Ihde, be formalized as: Human—>(Technology—World).
3. Alterity relation
“The difference between this human–technology relation and the two previously introduced is that it is…primarily a relation to or with technology”; not mediated, or referenced; however “a form of quasi-otherness [in?] relation to technology that in at least some limited way seems to take on a life of its own:…” e.g. a spinning top, BLC: ‘the ghost in the machine,’ “there is the sense of interacting with something other than me, the technological competitor. In competition there is a kind of dialogue or exchange. It is the quasi-animation, the quasi-otherness of the technology that fascinates and challenges.”
p302
FORMALIZATION: One of the interesting characteristics of the alterity relation is however that the world remains a deemphasized context or background, as the relationship is primarily a relationship to or with technology. Ihde formalizes the alterity relation as: Human—>Technology—(—World).