336 Matching Annotations
  1. Jun 2020
  2. May 2020
  3. Apr 2020
    1. Wynants, L., Van Calster, B., Bonten, M. M. J., Collins, G. S., Debray, T. P. A., De Vos, M., Haller, M. C., Heinze, G., Moons, K. G. M., Riley, R. D., Schuit, E., Smits, L. J. M., Snell, K. I. E., Steyerberg, E. W., Wallisch, C., & van Smeden, M. (2020). Prediction models for diagnosis and prognosis of covid-19 infection: Systematic review and critical appraisal. BMJ, m1328. https://doi.org/10.1136/bmj.m1328

    1. There are good preprints and bad preprints, just like there are with journal articles. Overall, do not be afraid to be scooped or plagiarized! Preprints also actually protect against scooping [21,22]. Preprints establish the priority of discovery as a formally published item. Therefore, a preprint acts as proof of provenance for research ideas, data, code, models, and results—all outputs and discoveries.
      • Salah satu alasan untuk tidak mengunggah preprint adalah takut idenya dicuri,

      • Ini adalah faktor budaya yang lain. Ketakutan yang tidak beralasan. Justru dengan mengunggah preprint, peneliti dapat mengklaim ide lebih awal.

      • Preprint ada yang bagus dan ada yang buruk, peninjauan akan ada di tangan pembaca. Ini adalah hambatan budaya berikutnya, ketika mayoritas pembaca ingin melimpahkan tanggungjawab untuk memverifikasi, memeriksa, dan menjamin kualitas suatu makalah kepada para peninjau.

      • Pengalihan tanggungjawab ini sulit dilakukan ketika dokumen PR sendiri tertutup, dan tidak lepas dari bias.

      • Selain itu, dosen akan menyalahi prinsip yang disebarluaskan kepada para mahasiswa, untuk membaca secara kritis.

    1. Now that he had no work to hold, he laid the knuckles of the right hand in the hollow of the left, and then the knuckles of the left hand in the hollow of the right, and then passed a hand across his bearded chin, and so on in regular changes, without a moment's intermission. The task of recalling him from the vagrancy into which he always sank when he had spoken, was like recalling some very weak person from a swoon, or endeavouring, in the hope of some disclosure, to stay the spirit of a fast-dying man. “Did you ask me for my name?” “Assuredly I did.” “One Hundred and Five, North Tower.” “Is that all?” “One Hundred and Five, North Tower.”

      Maybe the shoemaker had forgotten his name from prison?

  4. Jan 2020
  5. Dec 2019
  6. Nov 2019
    1. 11,000 students from 321 sites across the UnitedStates

      The national center for education statistics shows for fall 2016, approximately 76,238,500 students enrolled in the US. Can we say that the voice of 11000 is enough to generalize? Maybe there are some other issues in the field of education that can no reflect in this study.

  7. Aug 2019
    1. Its aim is producing students who can think critically, be considerate of others, take risks, think dangerously and imagine a future that extends and deepens what it means to be an engaged citizen capable of living in a substantive democracy.

      What does Giroux's "be considerate of others" look and feel like in practice? How is it related to the problematic calls for civility?

  8. Jul 2019
  9. educatorinnovator.org educatorinnovator.org
    1. for lack of a better term

      I'm not really satisfied using the term "critical theory" either, given that it could include works that aren't really "PoMo" (eg, Marxism or historical materialism). I'd use "post-structuralism", but I don't think that many folks know what it means and it's not totally accurate either. So I decided to just leave it as "critical theory" as in the original rant.

    1. The current trial aims at evaluating the efficacyof a stand-alone, unguided, Internet-based mindfulnesstreatment program for anxiety

      The purpose of the trial was to study the effectiveness of a stand-alone, unguided, internet-based mindfulness treatment programme for anxiety

    2. The fundingbody was not involved in the study design, in thecollection, analysis and interpretation of data, in thewriting of the report, or in the decision to submit thearticle for publication.

      Suggests that the funding body had no role to play in the outcomes of this study

  10. Mar 2019
  11. Feb 2019
  12. Jan 2019
    1. By examining information as a product of people’s contingent choices, rather than as an impartial recording of unchanging truths, the critically information-literate student develops an outlook toward information characterized by a robust sense of agency and a heightened concern for justice.

      It seems like there's still a transfer problem here, though. There seems to be an assertion that criticality will be inherently cross-domain, but I'm not clear why that should be true. Why would the critical outlook not remain domain-specific. (To say "if it does, then it isn't critical", seems like a tautology.)

    1. posthuman times, and the posthuman subjects ofknowledge constituted within them, are producing new fields of transdis-ciplinary knowledge, which I call the critical posthumanitie

      At least she laid it out front and center. If this piece is anything like the Barad essay, then we can at least walk away with this sentence.

    1. I proposed three new dimensions to considerin conceptualizations of Big Data, which are intendedto nuance and temper some of the grand claims of BigData’s affordances.Key principles from critical and feminist GIS havehere been leveraged to understand the limitations andimpacts of Big Data. Further integration of principlesfrom critical information technologies research willideally seek to show how technologies shape andreproduce uneven social and political relations. Thissort of research can have practical influence on howtechnologies are leveraged, working to ameliorate thepotentially harmful implications of new technologies.More broadly, research critiquing and situating thegeographies of humanitarianism can be integrated intostudies of Big Data digital humanitarianism. Conver-sations around technologies for development andhumanitarianism overwhelmingly bring Western ide-als into non-Western contexts, without considering theimplications of this power relation. Critiquing theserelations should be central to theories of informationtechnologies, with the goal of rectifying and

      Burns' contributions:

      • Incorporate critical and feminist critiques in humanitarian-Big Data research

      • Integrate critical scholarship into the development of technical tools

      • Consider Western contexts and political/social power relations in research and practice with vulnerable individuals and communities

    2. are certainly not limited to, continued struggles aroundknowledge politics and legitimacy (Burns2014;Elwood and Leszczynski2013), shifting understand-ings of scientific knowledge production (Dalton andThatcher2014; Crampton et al.2013), and increasedneoliberalization of humanitarian aid (Adams2013;Hyndman2009; Polman2010). In other words, theseprocesses take a form specific to Big Data digitalhumanitarianism, and exploring this case sheds greaterlight on these larger-scale processes.

      overarching critique of digital humanitarian crowd work and the artifacts it produces.

    3. Not only does the convergence of BigData and humanitarianism depend on a particularsocial shaping of technologies and data, but Big Dataitself embodies particular values, social relations, andepistemologies

      This premise feels over-stated, as seems to be evidenced in the footnotes -- presumably responses to reviewer questions/critiques.

      I don't disagree with social, methodological, and ethical concerns about "Big Data" (scare quotes, intended) but DHN groups are certainly not there (nor are they likely to be) using large data sets. The overly-enthusiastic/optimistic hype about using large, unstructured data, lacking critical examination of its many downsides, seems to be motivating this paper in ways that are unfortunate. Critique of DH work is needed but this approach seems to be chasing imaginary monsters.

    4. Digital humanitarianism can be con-ceptualized as ‘‘the enacting of social and institutionalnetworks, technologies, and practices that enable large,unrestricted numbers of remote and on-the-groundindividuals to collaborate on humanitarian managementthrough digital technologies’’ (Burns2014).

      Burns' definition of digital humanitarianism.

      I'm not convinced that DHN groups actually work with Big Data (excepting QRCI's MicroMappers algorithm training project with SBTF). I'm not aware of any group collecting large amounts of data and quantitatively analyzing it.

    5. However, discussions of the relationship between BigData and digital humanitarianism tend to be cautiouslyoptimistic. Letouze ́(2012) the challenges facingdigital humanitarianism as falling into five broadcategories: (1) privacy, (2) access/sharing, (3) extract-ing meaning from qualitative text, (4) apophenia, (5)detecting anomalies.

      Citing Letouzé, Burns raises challenge of "extracting meaning from qualitative text."

      Get Letouzé paper.

    1. CTP is a key method for reflective design, since it offers strategies to bring unconscious values to the fore by creating technical alternatives. In our work, we extend CTP in several ways that make it particularly appropriate for HCI and critical computing.

      Ways in which Senger, et al., describe how to extend CTP for HCI needs:

      • incorporate both designer/user reflection on technology use and its design

      • integrate reflection into design even when there is no specific "technical impasse" or metaphor breakdown

      • driven by critical concerns, not simply technical problems

    2. CTP synthesizes critical reflection with technology production as a way of highlighting and altering unconsciously-held assumptions that are hindering progress in a technical field.

      Definition of critical technical practice.

      This approach is grounded in AI rather than HCI

      (verbatim from the paper) "CTP consists of the following moves:

      • identifying the core metaphors of the field

      • noticing what, when working with those metaphors, remains marginalized

      • inverting the dominant metaphors to bring that margin to the center

      • embodying the alternative as a new technology

    3. goal is to push design research beyond an agenda of reinforcing values of consumer culture and to instead embody cultural critique in designed artifacts. A critical designer designs objects not to do what users want and value, but to introduce both designers and users to new ways of looking at the world and the role that designed objects can play for them in it.

      Definition of critical design.

      This approach tends to be more art-based and intentionally provocative than a practical design method to inculcate a certain sensibility into the technology design process.

    4. We define 'reflection' as referring tocritical reflection, orbringing unconscious aspects of experience to conscious awareness, thereby making them available for conscious choice. This critical reflection is crucial to both individual freedom and our quality of life in society as a whole, since without it, we unthinkingly adopt attitudes, practices, values, and identities we might not consciously espouse. Additionally, reflection is not a purely cognitive activity, but is folded into all our ways of seeing and experiencing the world.

      Definition of critical reflection

  13. Nov 2018
  14. Oct 2018
    1. About a third of 18- to 49-year-olds (32%) correctly identified all five of the factual statements as factual, compared with two-in-ten among those ages 50 and older. A similar pattern emerges for the opinion statements. Among 18- to 49-year-olds, 44% correctly identified all five opinion statements as opinions, compared with 26% among those ages 50 and older.
    2. In a survey conducted Feb. 22 to March 4, 2018, the Center asked U.S. adults to categorize five factual statements and five opinion statements. As a previous report revealed, about a quarter of Americans overall could accurately classify all five factual statements (26%) and about a third could classify all five opinion statements (35%).
    1. Critical Instructional Design is new, and as such is grounded in the work of a very few people.

      I'm interested if the conception 'Critical Instructional Design' is truly new or mere interpolation of a native concept. As far as my understanding of critical theory, from lit crit readings and study, a theory can be molded to fit any necessary unnamed reality-from the nature of the TV War... Baudrillard's 'The Gulf War Did Not Take Place' to Freudian psychoanalysis "Neuroticisms of Computer A.I." This is an excellent article to discuss critical theory in the light of a new, online iteration of the learning space meriting further research.

    1. During the visit Angela fed Paolo Spaghetti-Os and applesauce while sitting on her lap in the living room. Over the next several years, Angela missed many of Paolo’s clinic visits.

      Todo el cuadro de salud delicado de Paolo, indica un efecto directo en su salud por las condiciones de su madre. Ademas de eso, el hecho de que no recibiera el tratamiento adecuado ya que su madre no era responsable con sus citas medicas y lo alimentaba inadecuadamente es un ejemplo de ciertos procesos tanto biológicos y como psicológicos que si no ocurren en el contexto adecuado, nunca ocurrirán pues en este caso, el daño a la salud de Paolo es irreversible.

    1. For those of us on the frontline of K-12 teaching, “education as the practice of freedom” requires forthright discussion and action regarding subjects that are messy (at least in terms of their challenge to the agreed narrative and the cultural status quo) and this messiness can potentially make people uncomfortable, confused, upset, angry, and even potentially confrontational or worse, violent. Administrators and teachers and colleagues generally do not want to embrace the concept of education as the practice of freedom if it means rocking the boat too much.
    2. Dissimilarly, in Teaching to Transgress, bell hooks urges teachers to contemplate “Education as the practice of freedom” as their point of departure for praxis. A phrase originating from the work of Paulo Freire, hooks writes that “education as the practice of freedom” will come easiest “to those of us…who believe that our work is not merely to share information, but to share in the intellectual and spiritual growth of our students. To teach in a manner that respects and cares for the souls of our students is essential if we are to provide the necessary conditions where learning can most deeply and intimately begin.” Transgressive education and disruptive thinking therefore begin with the soul, and not the prospective career opportunities, of students.
    1. It would allow lawyers to concentrate on higher-order tasks such as crafting legal strategies, interpreting and applying the relevant parts of the law to complex situations and perhaps most importantly, maintaining the human connection for a profession which is critically about relationships.

      What are the assumptions in the writer's argument?

    2. While machines and algorithms are indeed coming for tasks currently being performed by lawyers, these tasks tend to be labour-intensive and/or low-value and/or process driven.

      Is this the first time that such a transformation has taken place? Can you think of other historical cases where labour-intensive, low-value, or process-driven work has been automated?

    1. Until 2005, the Civil Service provided medical benefits to the families of male civil servants, but not female civil servants. Under the Women’s Charter, only wives can get maintenance from their spouses, not husbands. Paternity leave was only instituted in 2013.

      What assumptions do each o these policies reveal? Do you agree with these policies? Why or why not?

  15. Sep 2018
    1. Until 2005, the Civil Service provided medical benefits to the families of male civil servants, but not female civil servants. •Under the Women’s Charter, only wives can get maintenance from their spouses, not husbands.•Paternity leave was only instituted in 2

      What assumptions do each of these policies reveal?

    1. These authors argue for methodological pluralism, which the originator of critical realism, Roy Bhaskar, critiqued as relativist (he argued instead for methodological specificity, in which the nature of the research subject suggests the type of methodology used, rather than a pluralistic situation in which one can choose a methodology at one's whim).
    2. what is less often noticed is the manner in which values are often “fact”-laden. For better or worse, values have a “factual” element to them which is grounded in certain ontological accounts about the nature of social world, such as an account of persons or social relations. This means that, in principle, values are open to empirical investigation and critique.
    3. Critical realists hold that is possible for social science to refine and improve its knowledge about the real world over time, and to make claims about reality  which are relatively justified, while still being historical, contingent, and changing.
    1. End-Users

      Because Grafoscopio was used in critical digital literacy workshops, dealing with data activism and journalism, the intended users are people who don't know how to program necessarily, but are not afraid of learning to code to express their concerns (as activists, journalists and citizens in general) and if fact are wiling to do so.

      Tool adaptation was "natural" of the workshops, because the idea was to extend the tool so it can deal with authentic problems at hand (as reported extensively in the PhD thesis) and digital citizenship curriculum was build in the events as a memory of how we deal with the problems. But critical digital literacy is a long process, so coding as a non-programmers knowledge in service of wider populations able to express in code, data and visualizations citizen concerns is a long time process.

      Visibility, scalability and sustainablitiy of such critical digital literacy endeavors where communities and digital tools change each other mutually is still an open problem, even more considering their location in the Global South (despite addressing contextualized global problems).

  16. Aug 2018
    1. And when sites like DC Gazette share stories about people who allegedly investigated the Clinton family being found dead, the stories go viral and some people believe them. Again, these stories are not true in any way.

      The first think I thought about while reading this is the Petress article, and how this is an example of individuals not using critical thinking. Often times people believe wrong information without even fully understanding it in the first place.

    1. But it’s step three, according to Dr. Brewer, that is most important if you want to make the shift sustainable in the long term: Make a deliberate, conscious effort to recognize the difference between how you feel when caught up in self-criticism, and how you feel when you can let go of it.“That’s where you start to hack the reward-based learning system,” Dr. Brewer said.
  17. Jul 2018
    1. For one, much of the new research centers on U.S. politics and, specifically, elections. But social networks drive conversations about many other topics such as business, education, health, and personal relationships. To battle bad online information, it would be helpful to know whether people respond to these sorts of topics differently than they respond to information about political candidates and elections. It also would be useful to know whether myths about certain subjects — for instance, a business product or education trend — are trickier to correct than others.
  18. Jun 2018
    1. Critical Digital Literacies

      I am more and more drawn to the work of Damon Centola on the spread of 'behaviors' through networks. I would like to substitute "behaviors' for literacy and begin to apply Centola's work in the classroom. He has a new book coming out on Monday and I have put a talk of his on Vialogues so that we can annotate that: https://vialogues.com/vialogues/play/44449

      Aside: When an annotated space reaches a critical mass I think we need summary behaviors or further highlighting and notification procedures. Kevin has already done so in one post. We might call these emergent writing or emergent behaviors.

  19. May 2018
    1. They can enable individuals to reflect on the personal and social impact of new technologies, and provide a provocative, speculative, and rich vision of our technological future that avoids the clichés of consumerist-oriented industrial design.

      Although this article emphasized the difference between critical design and critical making, the later being more process oriented and involving information systems than only physical objects I wish the author could have illustrated that with an example. How to make a digital object critically? How to think of UI design patterns critically? All the tacit knowledge a UI and UXer is expected to have in order to get hired and that they use everyday. If the aim of critical making of information systems concern is to uncover the embedded values in software and the process of designing of software than it also needs to question the industry jargon and process which forms the lived experience of designers everyday.

    2. Critically engaged language can do detailed surgery on a topic, but critical objects can hit like an emotional sledgehammer if thoughtfully implemented.

      Also they give an opportunity to create work, professsions, hobbies. Entire groups of people can organize their time and energies around the creation and maintenance of that object. Communities could willingly decrease the complexity of their needs by negotiation of values in objects in order to create lower thresholds to economic participation

  20. Mar 2018
    1. Critical realism is not an empirical program; it is not a methodology; it is not even truly a theory, because it explains nothing. It is, rather, a meta-theoretical position: a reflexive philosophical stance concerned with providing a philosophically informed account of science and social science which can in turn inform our empirical investigations. We might think of this in terms of three layers: our empirical data, the theories that we draw upon to explain our empirical data, and our metatheories—the theory and the philosophy behind our theories.While critical realism may be a heterogeneous series of positions, there is one loose genetic feature which unites it as a metatheory: a commitment to formulating a properly post-positivist philosophy. This commitment is often cast in the terms of a normative agenda for science and social science: ontological realism, epistemic relativism, judgmental rationality, and a cautious ethical naturalism.
  21. Feb 2018
    1. Unlike The Waste Land, Moulin Rouge!’s allusions are only rarely critical; the closest it comes to social commentary is in the use of Nirvana’s dark hymn to the ennui of consumerism, ‘Smells Like Teen Spirit,’ as the Moulin Rouge’s rich male customers enter the club.

      What are the functions allusion besides layering? I think there is something important about the critical function that occurs in this use of allusion. Fitzgerald was a moralist describing the evils of capitalism and American society, so the use of Trimalchio as Gatsby is a critical allusion.

  22. Jan 2018
  23. Nov 2017
  24. Oct 2017

    Tags

    Annotators

    1. Looking at statistics on course management site (e.g., CourseSpaces or Moodle)

      The only LMS that are present at UVic is (arguably) Moodle. Thus, I recommend rephrasing this to read 'Looking at statistics on CourseSpaces (see this page for more details)' And hyperlink to the Moodle.org resource about Quiz result statistics.

    1. Critical thinking is the intellectually disciplined process of actively and skillfully conceptualizing, applying, analyzing, synthesizing, and/or evaluating information gathered from, or generated by, observation, experience, reflection, reasoning, or communication, as a guide to belief and action.

      According to this definition of critical thinking, we can infer that critical thinking requires a deep thought process, and it forces one to intensely elaborate on whatever is being asked to think about/write about/discuss

  25. Sep 2017
    1. Matt Ratto (2011) defines "critical making" as a combination of critical thinking and material production. His contribution for the current discussion is: if critical makers can "reintegrate technical and social work and thereby innovate both" (p. 258). Design appears a fertile inroad for thinking about empowerment and politics, as particular genres of technology are created through complex social, economic, and cultural processes, leading to literacies that can be drawn on and reconfigured (Balsamo, 2011 ). DiSalvo's (2009) notion of critical making involves users in the design process through practices such as tracing and projection, resulting in the creation of new publics. This was later developed into "adversarial design" (DiSalvo, 2012), which confronts the politics of technologies of objects with an intent to encourage participation. Rafi Santo's (2011, 2013) "hacker literacies" similarly positions hacking as enabling critical thinking within a framework of media literacies.

      Rafi Santo's (2011, 2013) "hacker literacies" similarly positions hacking as enabling critical thinking within a framework of media literacies.

    1. While technology has loomed large in these accounts, several scholars argue that this shift toward participation extends important possibilities for posi-tively influencing daily life (Jenkins, 1992, 2006; Shirky, 2010). Others question the ability for a universal “participation” within new media cultures, suggesting people require adequate social and psychological resources, including time, for engagement (Irani, 2015; Turner, 2009).

    Tags

    Annotators

    1. Organizations such as Code for America (CfA) rallied support by positioning civic hacking as a mode of direct partici-pation in improving structures of governance. However, critics objected to the involve-ment of corporations in civic hacking as well as their dubious political alignment and non-grassroots origins. Critical historian Evgeny Morozov (2013a) suggested that “civic hacker” is an apolitical category imposed by ideologies of “scientism” emanating from Silicon Valley. Tom Slee (2012) similarly described the open data movement as co-opted and neoliberalist.
  26. Jul 2017
    1. Finally, and perhaps most importantly, online reading may require even greater amounts of higher-level thinking than offline reading. In a context in which anyone may publish anything, higher-level thinking skills such as critical evaluation of source material become especially important online.

      Yes this is a big one. Even otherwise intelligent adults take online writing at face value without reading laterally.

    1. elop a multi- dimensional analysis of modern society; one which would not just describe the ways things appear to be but would penetrate beneath accepted views and offer a decisive challenge to the most powerful beliefs and values of early capitalist socie

      With the goal of uncovering the power structures in society and the true meanings of "common knowledge", Marx did a historical analysis of the society with consideration of the physical, social, political and economic environments in that society.

  27. Jun 2017
    1. Critical pedagogy is organized around the struggle over agency, values and social relations within diverse contexts, resources and histories. Its aim is producing students who can think critically, be considerate of others, take risks, think dangerously and imagine a future that extends and deepens what it means to be an engaged citizen capable of living in a substantive democracy.
  28. Mar 2017
  29. oup.silverchair-cdn.com oup.silverchair-cdn.com
  30. oup.silverchair-cdn.com oup.silverchair-cdn.com
  31. Feb 2017
    1. As an ethical and political practice, a public pedagogy of wakefulness rejects modes of education removed from political or social concerns, divorced from history and matters of injury and injustice. Said’s notion of a pedagogy of wakefulness includes “lifting complex ideas into the public space,” recognizing human injury inside and outside of the academy, and using theory as a form of criticism to change things.[xxv] This is a pedagogy in which academics are neither afraid of controversy or the willingness to make connections that are otherwise hidden, nor are they afraid of making clear the connection between private issues and broader elements of society’s problems.
  32. Jan 2017
    1. A new form of information manipulation is unfolding in front of our eyes. It is political. It is global. And it is populist in nature. The news media is being played like a fiddle, while decentralized networks of people are leveraging the ever-evolving networked tools around them to hack the attention economy.
    2. The techniques that are unfolding are hard to manage and combat. Some of them look like harassment, prompting people to self-censor out of fear. Others look like “fake news”, highlighting the messiness surrounding bias, misinformation, disinformation, and propaganda. There is hate speech that is explicit, but there’s also suggestive content that prompts people to frame the world in particular ways. Dog whistle politics have emerged in a new form of encoded content, where you have to be in the know to understand what’s happening. Companies who built tools to help people communicate are finding it hard to combat the ways their tools are being used by networks looking to skirt the edges of the law and content policies. Institutions and legal instruments designed to stop abuse are finding themselves ill-equipped to function in light of networked dynamics.
    1. Children are indoctrinated into this cultural logic early, even as their parents restrict their mobility and limit their access to social situations. But when it comes to information, they are taught that they are the sole proprietors of knowledge. All they have to do is “do the research” for themselves and they will know better than anyone what is real. Combine this with a deep distrust of media sources. If the media is reporting on something, and you don’t trust the media, then it is your responsibility to question their authority, to doubt the information you are being given. If they expend tremendous effort bringing on “experts” to argue that something is false, there must be something there to investigate.
  33. Oct 2016
    1. Develop proficiency and fluency with the tools of technology;

      Every institution around the UE is trying to develop in a critical sense the main goals of the different subjects. In fact it doesn't makes too many differences between all this goals we have already read there: proficency and fluency, cross-cultural connections, managing information, etc. So the main point of this read is, in our opinion, to show the proper features to have as a complete citizen of the 21st century along literacy as a part of a common project.

    1. This bold claim has led design and critical scholars to hotly debate if participants have a technological ideology imposed on them, or if thinking with technologies enable new civic perspectives.

      Pueden estar ocurriendo ambas. La pregunta sería cuándo ocurre cuál. Unas pistas pueden estar del lado de la alfabetización crítica (Freire, Data Pop).

  34. Sep 2016
    1. Effective altruism is not a replacement for movements through which marginalized peoples seek their own liberationAnd you have to do meta-charity well — and the more EA grows obsessed with AI, the harder it is to do that. The movement has a very real demographic problem, which contributes to very real intellectual blinders of the kind that give rise to the AI obsession. And it's hard to imagine that yoking EA to one of the whitest and most male fields (tech) and academic subjects (computer science) will do much to bring more people from diverse backgrounds into the fold.
  35. Jul 2016
    1. Critical making, as envisioned by Ratto in 2011, was much more focused on the constructive process of making as opposed to building an artifact. While critical design is focused on building refined objects to generate critique of traditional industrial design, critical making was initially conceived as a workshop framework with the final prototypes existing only as a remnant of the process [19]. Critical design, on the other hand, tends to be focused on building objects that document well, with the artifacts themselves challenging concepts like optimization, efficiency, social norms, and utopianism. Critical design is object-oriented; critical making is process-oriented and scholarship-oriented: “Critical making emphasizes the shared acts of making rather than the evocative object. The final prototypes are not intended to be displayed and to speak for themselves” [19]. Ratto’s emphasis is on using hands-on techniques to augment the process of critical thinking about information systems, while Dunne and Raby’s critical design is primarily focused on building photo and video props for the construction of a speculative narrative to help us rethink designed objects and consumer culture.
  36. May 2016
  37. Apr 2016
  38. Mar 2016
    1. and I must always let that stirring call me to critical practice in my teaching.

      Being stirred, being called - these require being open, permeable and thus, vulnerable. This is where we lay aside our armor of credibility and create space for the unknown, unanticipated to enter. This is emotional work and for many of us, scary work. There are many reasons for academia to cloak itself in layer upon layer of credibility, rigor and firm hierarchies. To suggest that love inspires you to be in fact more critical in your practice, defies the logic of the academy. This is part of what I find so compelling here: turning established assumptions on their heads. I have more to say about callings but will save for another space & occasion. (But Gregg Levoy, Callings. 1999.)

  39. Feb 2016
    1. In Silicon Valley, this divide is often explicit: As Kate Losse has noted, coders get high salary, prestige, and stock options. The people who do community management—on which the success of many tech companies is based—get none of those. It’s unsurprising that coding has been folded into "making." Consider the instant gratification of seeing "hello, world" on the screen; it’s nearly the easiest possible way to "make" things, and certainly one where failure has a very low cost. Code is "making" because we've figured out how to package it up into discrete units and sell it, and because it is widely perceived to be done by men.
  40. Jan 2016
  41. Jul 2015
    1. If you think everybody answers the same way, you may be an advocate of critical theory.

      I do not think a single person I know who has read any amount of critical theory or even agreed with it would really think that people would ascribe universal values onto words and not understand that value systems are historically and socially inflected. They might, as do Adorno and Horkheimer, consider the holocaust to be an absolute moral evil, but if that's something that Lyotard is here supposed to free us from, I don't quite know what we gain.

    2. So how can you be beyond critical theory, given that it generally aims “to explain and transform all the circumstances that enslave human beings?“

      I think the definition that you give of critical theory here, from the Stanford encyclopedia, is just wrong. Adorno's /Negative Dialectics/ begins, for example, with an epigraph that rejects the totalities that you here ascribe to Critical Theory: "The whole is the false", thereby countering Hegel's Absolute.

  42. Mar 2015
    1. What does it mean to be an “item” or “computational object” within this collection? What is such a collection?

      This is a great example of the type of critical thinking involved in scholarly digital building—often such projects include hard thinking about the exact nature of scholarly objects. Patrick Murray-John has a fantastic article that further discusses “where the theory is” when scholars design and build (Theory, Digital Humanities, and Noticing). The penultimate paragraph in particular lists some of the critical questions that arise out of designing for an “item” in a digital archives platform.