•I

•What is information studies?

•What is information studies?

•information studies = what people who say they do information studies do

•What is information studies?

•

•What is information studies?

•What is information studies?

•What is information studies?

•What assumptions are made by people who do information studies?

•What assumptions are made by people who do information studies?

1.the thing they call “information” exists

2.the thing they call “information” is not the same as anything they call something else

3.doing information studies is worthwhile

•What is information?

•What is information?

•“Standard” semiotic model

•What kind of thing is information?

•particular (object, instance, token)
vs. universal (concept, class, type)

•substance vs. property

•concrete vs. abstract

•Lowe’s four-category ontology

•What do people who say they do
information studies do?

•What do people who say they do
information studies do?

•describe

•classify; count

•explain

•interpret; understand

•imagine; design

•evaluate

•change

•What do people who say they do
information studies do?

•describe – Week 2: Qualities

•classify; count – Week 4: Quantities

•explain – Week 5: Societies

•interpret; understand – Week 6: Cultures

•imagine; design – Week 7: Designs

•evaluate – Week 8: Evaluations

•change – Week 3: Communities

•What do people who say they do
information studies do?

•describe – Week 2: Qualities – history; anthropology

•classify; count – Week 4: Quantities – statistics

•explain – Week 5: Societies – sociology

•interpret; understand – Week 6: Cultures – critical/literary/cultural studies

•imagine; design – Week 7: Designs – engineering

•evaluate – Week 8: Evaluations – public policy

•change – Week 3: Communities – ethics; politics

•II

•Realism

•realism about x =
(1) the claim that: [it is a fact that] x exists and has properties a, b, c, …; and typically also
(2) objectivism about claims about x = the claim that: [it is a fact that] the truth-value of any claim that [it is a fact that] x exists and has properties a, b, c, …, is objective, i.e., is independent of anything anyone happens to say or think

•an important corollary of objectivism:

–a claim is true iff it corresponds to the facts

•rejecting realism2 does not necessarily entail rejecting realism1

•Against realism

•anti-realism about x = the rejection of realism1 about x, or the rejection of realism2 about x

•nominalism = the rejection of realism1 about abstracta, or the rejection of realism1 about universals

–i.e., the claim that: [it is a fact that] there are no abstracta (or universals) – only names (and other concreta or particulars)

•relativism about claims about x = a rejection of realism2 about x

–i.e., the claim that: [it is a fact that] the truth-value of any claim about x is dependent on something someone happens to say or think

•subjectivism about claims about x = another rejection of realism2 about x

–i.e., the claim that: [it is a fact that] there are no facts about x, and therefore there can be no claims about x that have truth-value – only beliefs (and/or expressions of beliefs or of attitudes)

•Relativism

•relativism about claims about x = the claim that: [it is a fact that] the truth-values of knowledge-claims about (the existence of, the properties of) x are relative to (i.e., are dependent on) …

–individuals’ beliefs: subjective relativism

–cultural traditions: cultural relativism

•i.e., a rejection of realism2

•Subjectivism

•subjectivism about claims about x = the claim that: [it is a fact that] utterances that purport to be knowledge-claims about (the existence of, the properties of) x are in fact only …

–expressions (which do not have truth-value) of the speaker’s beliefs about x, or

–knowledge-claims about the speaker’s beliefs about x

•i.e., another rejection of realism2

•Information

•information as object

•information as kind

•information as attribute

•information as mode

•Information as object

•e.g., an utterance; an inscription; an instance of a binary digit, value-of-a-variable, character, word, sentence, proposition, or of an aggregation of such …

•realism1 : [it is a fact that] instances of such kinds exist and have properties that identify them as such

•realism2 (objectivism) : [it is a fact that] the truth-values of claims about instances of such kinds are independent of people’s beliefs

•nominalism : [it is a fact that] instances of such kinds exist (even if the kinds don’t)

•relativism : [it is a fact that] the truth-values of claims about instances of such kinds are dependent on people’s beliefs

•subjectivism : [it is a fact that] there are no facts about instances of such kinds, just beliefs

•Information as kind

•e.g., an utterance-type; an inscription-type; a binary digit, value-of-a-variable, character, word, sentence, or an aggregation of such; a meaning, a sense, a concept, an idea, a proposition, or an aggregation of such; a work, an expression, a manifestation, or an aggregation of such …

•realism1 : [it is a fact that] such kinds exist and have properties that identify them as such

•realism2 (objectivism) : [it is a fact that] the truth-values of claims about such kinds are independent of people’s beliefs

•nominalism : [it is a fact that] there exist no such kinds

•relativism : [it is a fact that] the truth-values of claims about such kinds are dependent on people’s beliefs

•subjectivism : [it is a fact that] there are no facts about such kinds, just beliefs

•

•Information as attribute

•e.g., informativeness; evidentiariness

•realism1 : [it is a fact that] such attributes exist and have properties that identify them as such

•realism2 (objectivism) : [it is a fact that] the truth-values of claims about such attributes are independent of people’s beliefs

•nominalism : [it is a fact that] there exist no such attributes

•relativism : [it is a fact that] the truth-values of claims about such attributes are dependent on people’s beliefs

•subjectivism : [it is a fact that] there are no facts about such attributes, just beliefs

•

•Information as mode

•e.g., the informativeness of a particular; the evidentiariness of a particular

•realism1 : [it is a fact that] such instances of attributes exist and have properties that identify them as such

•realism2 (objectivism) : [it is a fact that] the truth-values of claims about such instances of attributes are independent of people’s beliefs

•nominalism : either [it is a fact that] there exist no such instances of attributes, or [it is a fact that] instances of such attributes exist (even if the attributes don’t)

•relativism : [it is a fact that] the truth-values of claims about such instances of attributes are dependent on people’s beliefs

•subjectivism : [it is a fact that] there are no facts about such instances of attributes, just beliefs

•

•Some more isms

•idealism and materialism

•a priori vs. empirical

•necessary vs. contingent

•analytic vs. synthetic

•empiricism and rationalism

•artifactual vs. natural kinds

•constructivism and constructionism

•pluralism

•Idealism and materialism

•idealism about x = the claim that: [it is a fact that] x is mental

–e.g., subjective idealism about reality: reality = minds, or in minds (ideas, mental activity, or appearances)

•one’s own mind (solipsism), minds in general, or God’s mind

–e.g., objective idealism about reality: reality is outside minds, but inaccessible to them; what we think of as reality is merely appearances

•materialism about x = the claim that: [it is a fact that] x is material (i.e., made of matter)

–e.g., materialism about minds: minds = matter

•A priori vs. empirical

•an epistemological distinction

•a priori knowledge = knowledge that can be acquired independently of experience

•empirical knowledge = knowledge that can be acquired only through experience (i.e., through perception or introspection)

•Necessary vs. contingent

•a metaphysical distinction

•a necessary proposition = a proposition that is true in all possible worlds

•a contingent proposition = a proposition that may be true in some possible worlds

•Analytic vs. synthetic

•a logical distinction

•an analytic proposition = a proposition, the negation of which is a contradiction

•a synthetic proposition = a non-analytic proposition

•Empiricism and rationalism

•empiricism about knowledge about x = the claim that: [it is a fact that] all knowledge about x is empirical

•logical positivism about propositions about x = the claim that: [it is a fact that] a proposition about x is meaningful iff it is verifiable empirically

•rationalism about knowledge about x = the claim that: [it is a fact that] at least some knowledge about x can be acquired independently of experience, i.e., through reason

•Artifactual vs. natural kinds

•individuation conditions = the individually necessary and jointly sufficient criteria under which instances of a given kind are distinguishable from instances of a different kind

•identity conditions = the individually necessary and jointly sufficient criteria under which an instance of a given kind is distinguishable from another instance of the same kind

•a kind is said to be socially constructed (i.e., is an artifactual kind rather than a natural kind) if its individuation conditions are dependent on a consensus of the members of a social group

•

•Constructivism and constructionism

•constructivism is a psychological claim about the way in which people acquire knowledge (i.e., about how they learn)

•constructivism = the claim that: [it is a fact that] people acquire knowledge by actively constructing it as they experience the world, rather than by passively receiving or absorbing information [cf. Brookes’ “fundamental equation of information science”]

•social constructivism = the claim that: [it is a fact that] people acquire shared knowledge by actively and collaboratively constructing it as they experience the world as members of social groups

•

•constructionism is a claim about the most effective way for people to acquire knowledge (i.e., to learn)

•constructionism = the claim that: [it is a fact that] people can acquire knowledge most effectively if they construct a representation or exemplification of knowledge for others to experience

•

•Pluralism

•pluralism about x = the claim that: [it is a fact that] there are simultaneously many equally real or valuable instances of x

–e.g., pluralism about research methods, approaches, paradigms, etc.: given any particular context or domain, there are simultaneously many appropriate research methods, approaches, paradigms, etc.

•

•Pragmatism

•classical pragmatism: Peirce, James, Dewey

•neo-pragmatism: Rorty, Putnam, Brandom, Kitcher, Price

•

•narrow sense: the pragmatist maxim as a rule for clarifying concepts and hypotheses

•wider sense: pragmatism as a philosophical tradition, i.e., a particular set of approaches to philosophical problems

•

•The pragmatist maxim

•the pragmatist maxim = a methodological principle:

•the meaning of a concept, proposition, thought, judgment, etc. = the practical consequences of holding/using/believing it

•concepts, etc., do not have intrinsic properties, and we can’t understand their content simply by rational thought

•we understand concepts, etc., by showing what we do with them, by showing how they are used in our practices

•Pragmatists’ concepts of truth and reality

•a belief is true to the extent that holding it has positive consequences, e.g., is useful, allows us to make accurate predictions, helps us to function well

•i.e., an instrumentalist/functionalist theory of truth
(vs., e.g., correspondence theories)

•propositions are not to be evaluated in terms of whether they accurately describe reality, but in terms of the virtues of the practices involved in our use of them

•Pragmatists’ concepts of truth and reality, cont’d

•Peirce (1878): a true belief = one “which is fated to be ultimately agreed to by all who investigate” …

•… and reality = “the object represented in this opinion”

•i.e., a naturalist theory of truth,
and a “realist” theory of reality
(vs., e.g., both objectivist and subjectivist theories)

•Pragmatism as a metamethodology

•theories ≠ “transcripts of reality”

•theories = instruments designed to achieve a particular purpose: to facilitate action or increase understanding

•theories are evaluable by how well they achieve their intended purpose

•i.e., pragmatism = the view that the most important criterion on which to evaluate a theory, explanation, hypothesis, etc., is utility (rather than correspondence with reality, coherence, etc.)

•Pragmatism as a metamethodology, cont’d

•pragmatism = an empiricist/anthropological approach to the study of inquiry

•instead of trying to identify the essence of truth, pragmatists try to describe
(a) the role of truth in our practices, and
(b) the relations between the concept of truth and the concepts of belief and inquiry

•Pragmatism as anti-skepticism

•skepticism/Cartesianism/rationalism =  we should begin by doubting all propositions, and retain only those that we are certain are true

•pragmatism = a form of anti-skepticism, i.e., epistemic conservatism:
(a) fallibilism: a desire for certainty ignores the needs of practice, which include making progress in our inquiries;
instead, we can accept propositions even if we are not certain of their truth, so long as we understand we are fallible, and we may need to revisit our beliefs in the future;
(b) we should doubt propositions only if we have reason to; and
(c) individual doubt isn’t a good enough reason, because inquiry is a community activity

•III

•Explanation

•the process or result of
(a) saying why certain things are as they are, or
(b) making something intelligible

•Evidence, hypotheses, laws, and theories

•the evidence = observed facts

•a hypothesis = a proposed explanation for the evidence that has not (yet) been either confirmed or falsified

•some hypotheses are lawlike: i.e., they are stated in the form of (scientific/empirical) laws

•a law = a generalization that is open: i.e., not limited in space or time; e.g., “All As are Bs”

•theory = a unified system of confirmed (or not-yet-falsified) hypotheses with explanatory force

•From evidence to hypothesis

•Three kinds of
reasoning / inference / argument

•abduction: the process of inferring from observed data to the “best” explanation

•deduction: the process of inferring from observed data to an explanation, the denial of which would be a contradiction

•induction: the process of inferring, from data about observed things of a given kind, to an explanation for unobserved things of the same kind

•

•Abduction

•for every possible body of evidence, there will always be a variety of possible explanations that are consistent with it [Duhem, Quine]

•abduction = a process of reasoning used to select, from among a variety of more-or-less adequate explanations, the best one [Peirce]

•aka inference/argument to the best explanation

•criteria might include:

–simplicity: Ockham’s razor

–coherence: consistent with what we already believe to be true

–testability / predictive power: allowing us to make predictions that can be confirmed or disconfirmed

–comprehensiveness in scope: leaving the least unexplained

•Deduction

•deduction = the process of inferring from observed data to an explanation, the denial of which would be a contradiction; e.g.:

•premise: “x is a datum”

•premise: “x is not material”

•conclusion: “Not all data are material”

•Induction

•induction = the process of inferring, from data about observed things of a given kind, an explanation for unobserved things of the same kind; e.g.:

•premise: “n% of observed As are Bs”

•conclusion: “n% of unobserved As are Bs”

•if n=100, “All As are Bs,” or “The next A will be a B”

•Inductivism

•inductivism = the claim that: [it is a fact that] induction is a rational process of inference/argument

•

•Anti-inductivism

•anti-inductivism = the claim that: [it is a fact that] induction is not rational, and arguments that appear to be inductive in fact work in other ways

•e.g., the view that “inductive” arguments are really hypothetico-deductive:

–construct a hypothesis as a premise (i.e., a conjecture): e.g., “All As are Bs”

–deduce conclusions (i.e., expected evidence) from that hypothesis: e.g., “x is an A and x is a B”

–test against experience (i.e., observed evidence)

–if the conclusions are false, reject (i.e., refute, deny) the hypothesis

•the hypothesis can be accepted only indirectly (i.e., corroborated, not confirmed), by its having survived all attempts to falsify it

–even if the hypothesis is corroborated, that doesn’t mean it’s any more likely (than it was) to be true

•Confirmation

•confirmation = the process by which the evidence confers on hypotheses a greater probability of being true

•confirmation theory = the study of various kinds of confirmation

•three models of confirmation:

–the abductive model: based on abduction

–the hypothetico-deductive model*: based on deduction

–the Bayesian model: based on induction

–

•Three models of confirmation

•the abductive model: to confirm a hypothesis is to argue that it is the best (i.e., simplest, most coherent, etc.) explanation for the observed evidence

•the hypothetico-deductive model: to confirm (or corroborate) a hypothesis is to observe no evidence that is not logically entailed by it

•the Bayesian model: to confirm a hypothesis h is to observe evidence e such that p(h|e) >p(h), where p(h) is our degree of belief in h

•

•

•

•Models of explanation

•models of what explanations are (or should be) like:

–covering law model

•two kinds (at least for the anti-inductivist):
deductive-nomological, and statistical/probabilistic

–causal model

–teleological model

–hermeneutic model

–… etc.

•The covering law model

•an explanation should state, as premises, general laws and initial conditions that together logically entail, as a conclusion, the evidence

•deductive-nomological: when the law is “All As are Bs”

–evidence is deduced from the premises

•statistical/probabilistic: when the law is “n% of observed As are Bs”

–evidence is “induced” from the premises

•The deductive-nomological model

•to explain a state of affairs is to deduce it from a set of premises that includes at least one empirical law

•e.g.: x has property B because …

–premise: all instances of kind A have property B (“All As are Bs”)

–premise: x is an instance of kind A

–conclusion: x has property B

•such an argument is valid because it is true that, if all As are B, and x is an A, then x is a B

•but it is sound only if all the premises (including the empirical law) are true

•Causation and interpretation

•the causal model of explanation = to explain a state of affairs is to specify its causal history

•the teleological model of explanation = to explain a state of affairs is to specify its purpose

•the hermeneutic model of explanation = to explain a state of affairs is to interpret the meaning that it has for the observer

•Questions about explanation

•How many kinds of explanation are there?

•Aren’t deductive explanations the only real explanations?

•Can the covering-law model be applied in non-scientific domains?

•Can the covering-law model account for explaining what something is, or what people are doing?

•Is there a difference between explanations of “why …” and explanations of “how …”?

•How does explanation relate to description and prediction?

•Nomothetic vs. idiographic

•Bates via Windelband

•nomothetic metatheories = those that use a covering law model of explanation, with the aim of understanding universals

•idiographic metatheories = those that use other models of explanation, with the aim of understanding particulars

•IV

•Structuralism

•[NB. beware of “rough” definitions!]

•structuralism = [the belief that] things can’t be understood in isolation; they can be understood only in the context of the larger structures they are part of

•these structures (aka sign-systems) derive from the ways we perceive the world and organize our experiences (i.e., they don’t exist in the objective, external world)

•meaning = something that is attributed to things by people, not something that is contained in things

•language doesn’t reflect the world; it shapes it

–i.e., reality does exist, but we have access to it only through language

•Structuralists

•Saussure on language

•Lévi-Strauss on myth

•early Barthes on culture, literature

•literary critics, 1970s on

–popularization in 1970s turned literary criticism on its head: suddenly close reading of “the text” in isolation from all contexts didn’t look so clever

•

•Post-structuralism

•post-structuralism = “eXtreme” structuralism

•takes seriously the ultimate corollaries of structuralist beliefs

–there are no fixed points of reference

–there are no standards by which to measure or evaluate anything

–the universe is decentered; everything is relative

•radical scepticism about possibility of objective knowledge

•the only thing we know for certain is that we can’t know anything for certain, even through language

•reality itself is textual; human beings themselves are constructed; reason itself is a chimera

•

•

•Post-structuralists

•precursors: e.g., Nietzsche

–“There are no facts, only interpretations.”

•later Barthes (e.g., The Pleasure of the Text)

•Derrida

–“There is nothing outside of the text.” (Of Grammatology)

–“No archive without outside.” (Archive Fever, p. 14)

•Deconstruction

•deconstruction = applied post-structuralism

•deconstruction = a method of reading texts: reading “against the grain”

–shows texts to be fragmented, self-divided, centerless: i.e., as emblems of the decentered universe

–it’s the event of deconstruction that constructs the text; reading can’t be reconstructive because there’s nothing to reconstruct

•a deconstructive reading may read the text as saying ...

a.many different things at the same time, and

b.things that are contradictory to what it appears to be saying

•Archive Fever (1995; 1996)

•Mal d’archive: une impression freudienne (1995)

1.“[N]othing is less clear today than the word ‘archive.’” (p. 57)

–but essentially the archive = the historical record

2.“[T]here is no political power without control of the archive, if not of memory. Effective democratization can always be measured by this essential criterion: the participation in and the access to the archive, its constitution, and its interpretation.” (p. 11, n. 1)

•Archive Fever, cont’d

3.the structure of the archive determines what can be archived, and thus what is included in the historical record

–“[T]he technical structure of the archiving archive also determines the structure of the archivable content even in its very coming into existence and in its relationship to the future.” (p. 17)

•in fact, the technical methods of “archivization” determine history and memory

–“The archivization produces as much as it records the event.” (p. 17)

•Archive Fever, cont’d

4.Freudian psychoanalysis provides a theory of the archive

•the construction of the archive is a negotiation between …

–the pleasure principle: a drive toward the immediate gratification of basic needs, wants, and urges

–the death (aka anarchivic) drive: primal urge toward “aggression … destruction … forgetfulness, amnesia, the annihilation of memory” (p. 14); le mal d’archive, archive fever

•when the death drive takes over, the present fails in its responsibility to the future

–but at the same time “[the only way] the archive is made possible [is]by the death … drive” [p. 59]

•