Today the phenomenological concept of the lived body figures centrally in several philosophical and special scientific debates. In these wide and widening fields, the concept is used with multiple different meanings. In order to clarify and delineate the debates, this paper provides an explication of the phenomenological-transcendental methods. It argues that these methods help us remove the most fundamental ambiguities of the concept of embodiment by distinguishing between the main constituents of the lived body and by illuminating their mutual relations.

In this article I propose that a postphenomenological approach to science and technology can open new analytical understandings of how material artifacts, embodiment and social agency co-produce learned perceptions of objects. In particle physics, physicists work in huge groups of scientists from many cultural backgrounds. Communication to some extent depends on material hermeneutics of flowcharts, models and other visual presentations. As it appears in an examination of physicists’ scrutiny of visual renderings of different parts of a detector, perceptions vary in (...) relation to social and bodily experiences. Vision in physics has seemingly allowed an objective perception at a convenient distance of the body. This article challenges this view and proposes that the variations can be analysed as cultural at two echelons with the help of a postphenomenological approach combined with cultural psychological theory of artifacts. A third echelon presumably constitutes the phenomenological limit to culture in science. Even this last resort of subjectivity can be embraced by a postphenomenological approach. The process of culturalization in physics can be defined as a process of situating knowledge in a body whose continuous learning of micro-and macro perceptions makes scientific renderings unstable. Taken together postphenomenology, following the distinctions between body one and body two, and combined with cultural psychological learning theory, enables new insight into what constitutes culture in science. (shrink)

An emerging philosophical perspective called “postphenomenology,” which offers reflection upon human relations to technology, has the potential to increase our understanding of the functions performed by imaging technologies in scientific practice. In what follows, I review some relevant insights and expand them for use in the concrete analysis of practices of image interpretation in science. As a guiding example, I explore how these insights bear upon a contemporary debate in space science over images of the fossilized remains of a river (...) delta on the surface of Mars. These considerations include an analysis of the ways that the objects of study are transformed by the mediating imaging technologies, such as the Mars Orbiter Camera. (shrink)

Many philosophers of science and technology who see themselves as coming “after” Husserl also claim that their phenomenology is hermeneutical. Yet they neither practice the same sort of phenomenology, nor do they all have the same understanding of hermeneutics. Moreover, their differences often seem to be more a function of different pre-selected substantive commitments—say, to take a “material” turn or to be resolutely “empirical”—than the product of any serious effort to clarify what it is be hermeneutical. In this essay, after (...) some discussion of Dilthey’s reception among post-Husserlians (especially Patrick Heelan and Don Ihde), I consider how aspiring hermeneuts might make their own pre-possession of substantive and methodological commitments a hermeneutical topic. This is, of course, is not just a scholarly question of how post-Husserlian phenomenologists might make themselves more phenomenological. Without thoughtful self-awareness of these commitments, one’s assumptions about the use of technology, design, the place of science in the larger culture and in relation to conceptions of human flourishing—all of these assumptions are likely to pass through into technoscientific practice with insufficient critical consideration. (shrink)

In this commentary on Evan Selinger’s book Postphenomenology: A Critical Companion to Ihde, I begin with Carl Mitcham’s claim that with respect to Don Ihde’s “postphenomenology” there are “challenges both to and from pragmatism.” I discuss four points on which postphenomenology and pragmatism seem to be in agreement, and then two points on which I believe pragmatism offers a program that socially thicker.

The quickening pace of technological development on a global scale and its increasing impact on the relation between human beings and their lifeworld has led to a surge in philosophical discussions concerning technology. Philosophy of technology after the “empirical turn” has been dominated by three approaches: actor-network theory, critical theory of technology and postphenomenology. Recently, scholars have started to question the philosophical roots of these approaches. This paper critically questions Ihde’s early adoption of Heidegger’s philosophy of technology in postphenomenology. First, (...) the paper clarifies the central contributions of Heidegger’s philosophy of technology to postphenomenology. It then uses Heidegger’s early work on Aristotle to argue that Ihde’s notion of “use context” is based on a distorted account of Heidegger’s notion of the “totality of relevance”. Correspondingly, it contends that this has led to a misinterpretation of Heidegger’s technology critique. Second, an alternative reading of Heidegger’s ideas concerning technology is offered. This reading traces Heidegger’s use of the concept of telos in the totality of relevance to his discussion of Aristotelian virtue. It is subsequently shown how the question of the temporality of the mode of being of virtue is related to the notion of authenticity, which lies at the heart of Heidegger’s philosophy. Finally, the paper argues that postphenomenology could gain from philosophers who targeted Heidegger’s central notion of authenticity, notably Arendt and Ricoeur. (shrink)

Students often multitask with technologies such as computers, laptops, tablets and smartphones during class. Unfortunately, numerous empirical studies firmly establish a significant drop in academic performance caused by this media multitasking. In this paper it is argued that cognitive studies may have clarified the negative consequences of this activity, yet they struggle to address the processes involved in it. A cognitive characterization of attention as a mental phenomenon neglects the interaction between bodies and technologies, and it is suggested that a (...) postphenomenological understanding is necessary to account for the materiality of practice. Notions of embodied habits and technical mediation are introduced, and an example of a postphenomenological account of media multitasking is introduced. It is argued that this approach enables researchers to investigate media multitasking as it occurs in everyday educational practice. (shrink)

Motility impairments resulting from spinal cord injuries and cerebrovascular accidents are increasingly prevalent in society, leading to the growing development of rehabilitative robotic technologies, among them exoskeletons. This article outlines how bodies with neurological conditions such as spinal cord injury and stroke engage in processes of re-appropriation while using exoskeletons and some of the challenges they face. The main task of exoskeletons in rehabilitative environments is either to rehabilitate or ameliorate anatomic functions of impaired bodies. In these complex processes, they (...) also play a crucial role in recasting specific corporeal phenomenologies. For the accomplishment of these forms of corporeal re-appropriation, the role of experts is crucial. This article explores how categories such as bodily resistance, techno-inter-corporeal co-production of bodies and machines, as well as body work mark the landscape of these contemporary forms of impaired corporeality. While defending corporeal extension rather than incorporation, I argue against the figure of the ‘cyborg’ and posit the idea of ‘residual subjectivity’. (shrink)

Military drones combine surveillance technology with missile equipment in a far-reaching way. In this article, I argue that military drones could and should be object for a philosophical investigation, referring in particular on Chamayou’s theory of the drone, who also coined the term “an eye turned into a weapon.” Focusing on issues of human self-understanding, agency, and alterity, I examine the intricate human-technology relations in the context of designing and deploying military drones. For that purpose, I am drawing on the (...) postphenomenological approach developed by Don Ihde in order to systematize the manifold aspects of human-technology relations in a four-level model. This inquiry also includes a critical reflection on the normative implications of this technology. In doing so, I do not intent to offer an exhaustive relational ontology of military drones. I rather aim at providing a framework that is able to capture the core dimensions of this technology and their complex interrelations in a systematic way that has been missing in the philosophical debate so far. (shrink)

The existence of a French philosophy of technology is a matter of debate. Technology has long remained invisible in French philosophy, due to cultural circumstances and linguistic specificities. Even though a number of French philosophers have developed views and concepts about technology during the twentieth century, “philosophy of technology” has never been established as a legitimate branch of philosophy in the French academic landscape so far. This book, however, demonstrates that a community of philosophers dealing with various issues related to (...) technology and built up on the legacy of the previous generations has emerged. In gathering scholars with quite diverse theoretical backgrounds and matters of concern, this volume outlines a coherent, albeit heterogeneous, philosophical trend. Five chief characteristics are identified in this introduction: a close connection between history and philosophy, with a focus on the temporalities of technology, the prevalence of the anthropological approach to technology whether it be social anthropology or paleoanthropology, a focus on technological objects that we characterize as a “thing turn” à la française, the dignification of technoscience as a philosophical category, and a pervading concern with ethical issues based on the anthropological interpretation of technology and quite distinct from current trends in applied ethics. (shrink)

Modern health care is inextricably bound up with technologically mediated knowledge and practice. It is vital to investigate its use and role in different clinical contexts characterized, on one hand, by face to face practitioner and patient encounters (where technology may be conceptualised as hindering therapeutic relations) and, on the other hand, by practitioners’ encounter with bodily parts in laboratories (where conceiving of patients may be thought of as confounding objectivity). To contribute to the latter, I offer an ethnographic analysis (...) of cytology laboratory practitioners’ work and microscopic assessment of normal and abnormal cells. First, I discuss the biomedical literature on cytology and the quest for a non-variational bodiless vision. Second, I discuss the concept of multistability, first developed by philosopher of technology Don Ihde, here used to analyse technologically mediated perception and how practitioners interact with technology. Combined with long term ethnographic fieldwork it enables access to, and analysis and articulation of the implicit multifaceted practitioner–technology–cell interface embedded in clinical practice and diagnostic processes. I will also address some implications of my analysis for clinical cytology. (shrink)

The title of this paper might evoke claustrophobic associations. In other words, architecture in a very immediate sense can affect our behavior and feelings. In more mediated ways, architecture is also capable of influencing humans and putting their environment into perspective. Consider, for example, how a penthouse apartment can literally elevate people’s emotions and unfold a new perspective on city life, which some people are willing to pay millions of dollars to attain. In this paper I will explore how architecture (...) frames human experience from a philosophical point of view. My aim is to offer key elements of a new typology of architecture. For that purpose I am going to reflect and expand on key insights into technology of one of the funding fathers of contemporary philosophy of technology, Don Ihde. Through a life time, Ihde has been probing and investigating the relation between humans and their world as it is mediated through technology. In doing so he has concentrated on examining and understanding the role of scientific instruments. This paper is dedicated to showing how Ihde’s significant postphenomenological concepts not only can be translated to another domain and serve a better understanding of architecture, but also how his work can help us to relate to architecture in multiple constructive ways. The succeeding experimental translations of Ihde’s understanding of technology to architecture are also meant as a guide to design more adequate and fascinating built environments. I will begin with a broad overview of Ihde’s postphenomenological project; subsequently I shall endeavor to translate this work onto architecture through a number of case-studies, some of which are detailed and others less so. (shrink)

In the aftermath of a normalized Foucaultian world with an all encompassing web of biopower, one remaining hope is to cultivate nimbleness. Nimbleness is an embodied aesthetic sensitivity to the material presence. Cultivating nimbleness is a particular style of cultivation; it is to willfully gather together one’s self in the wake of a formative force far richer than the derivative web of living power relationships of human embeddness within a horizon of social, economical, political and historical subjectivating power relations; which (...) are chronicled and labeled by Michel Foucault as the normalizing practices of biopower. In other words to have freedom, one must start by rejecting the categories and labels normally internalized in order to relearn to learn from the material presence. Such a style of cultivation is a means of resisting normalizing power relations which co-opt cultivating practices to engross their own dominance which has had the by-product of an impotence to negate the gross material injustices present. This normalizing style of cultivation is a prevalent, corrupted, semblance which denies the importance of beauty for that of efficiency, rejects non-human purposiveness, and limits its measure of ethics to short term economical pragmatism. The thesis acknowledges that something is awry with the world and that giving care to beauty might help. The aim is to examine the event of Beauty as depicted by the philosopher Immanuel Kant and to apply this characterization to elective architectural spaces such that it may motivate individuals to cultivate their own nimbleness in relation to a formative force of nature. However given the revealed need for sensitivity to the particular material presence, the thesis can not be a rule book or catalog for beautiful design. Rather it is a rehabilitation for architects who are already heterospatially curious, with the desired outcome of architects cultivating their own nimbleness to reflectively judge as a ground up, multi-node, rhizomatic means of resistance to normalizing power practices as manifest in bad architecture. (shrink)