It argues that information—contrary to the claims of technology enthusiasts at the time—should not be perceived as a causal factor in the shaping of society. Rather, Roszak states that progress is “grounded in the mind's astonishing capacity to create beyond what it intends, beyond what it can foresee.” While the book does not provide the degree of philosophical depth offered by some critics of information, it serves as a stout forewarning of informational myopia.
It argues that information—contrary to the claims of technology enthusiasts at the time—should not be perceived as a causal factor in the shaping of society. Rather, Roszak states that progress is “grounded in the mind's astonishing capacity to create beyond what it intends, beyond what it can foresee.” While the book does not provide the degree of philosophical depth offered by some critics of information, it serves as a stout forewarning of informational myopia.The Cult of Information’s early critique of information and communication technology (ICT) and emphasis on the social dimension of ICTs foreshadowed the trenchant critiques of technology that were to come in the next decade. It also showed, avant la lettre, that something called “the social construction of technology” (SCOT) as an academic theory was on the horizon (a quick Google Ngram search shows use of the term skyrocketing in the late 80s and 90s).
That same year, Langdon Winner published his monumental The Whale and the Reactor (1986), which collected many of the celebrated philosopher’s essays on technology and politics. A year later saw the publication of what would become one of the key surveys of this emerging field— The Social Construction of Technological Systems: New Directions in the Sociology and History of Technology (1987), along with a deluge of social constructivist texts on technology in the intervening years. Roszak’s book about information fits squarely into this SCOT tradition.
about information fits squarely into this SCOT tradition.The main underlying assumption of SCOT is that technology is socially embedded and thus that it follows the path of human decisions. A classic example of SCOT can be found in Wiebe Bijker’s research on the bicycle and the variety of socially related uses it has had throughout history (the penny-farthing was used by young, rich men to display physical prowess and provide a thrill).
SCOT, in turn, grew as a reaction to something called “technological determinism” (TD), a reductionist view of technology that sees technology as shaping the path of human beliefs and culture. A good example of TD can be found in Lynne White’s famously controversial claim, in Medieval Technology and Social Change (1966), that the invention of the stirrup effectively “caused” feudalism.
Similar TD claims can be found in James Beniger’s detailed account of how information spurred a new technology revolution in the twentieth century (1989) and Robert Friedel’s history of technology as cultural improvement (2007).
Both the SCOT and TD theories are available in “strong” and “weak” varieties, and both have their critics. In their essay “The Social Shaping of Technology,” Robin Williams and David Edge state that many researchers “are united by an insistence that the ‘black-box’ of technology must be opened, to allow the socio-economic patterns embedded in both the content of technologies and the processes of innovation to be exposed and analyzed.” Conversely, critics of this tradition have included Winner, who has stated that technologies have their own “politics” and “forms of life.”
Both the SCOT and TD theories are available in “strong” and “weak” varieties, and both have their critics. In their essay “The Social Shaping of Technology,” Robin Williams and David Edge state that many researchers “are united by an insistence that the ‘black-box’ of technology must be opened, to allow the socio-economic patterns embedded in both the content of technologies and the processes of innovation to be exposed and analyzed.” Conversely, critics of this tradition have included Winner, who has stated that technologies have their own “politics” and “forms of life.”He has also criticized the fact that SCOT offers “no judgment on what it all means, other than to notice that some technological projects succeed and others fail, that new forms of power arise and other forms decline.” Books have been published about information in both the TD and SCOT traditions. Yet, a question remains. How social media ICTs are to be situated in the debate remains less clear, especially when compounded by the question of politics. Social media are essentially social technologies. How, then, do they fit into contemporary TD/SCOT debates?
David Nye has offered one unique perspective from the SCOT viewpoint. In his book The American Technological Sublime (1994), Nye analyses a long list of American technical accomplishments, from the bridges and railroads of the early nineteenth century to the atom bombs and space expeditions of the twentieth. On Nye’s theory, each of the aforementioned structures and events represents a new conception of the sublime. By the “technological sublime” he means the great feeling of amazement and stupefaction that individuals experiences in the presence of large structures or enormous machines around which society congregates.
David Nye has offered one unique perspective from the SCOT viewpoint. In his book The American Technological Sublime (1994), Nye analyses a long list of American technical accomplishments, from the bridges and railroads of the early nineteenth century to the atom bombs and space expeditions of the twentieth. On Nye’s theory, each of the aforementioned structures and events represents a new conception of the sublime. By the “technological sublime” he means the great feeling of amazement and stupefaction that individuals experiences in the presence of large structures or enormous machines around which society congregates.He builds on the work of others who looked for a pastoral, literary, or mental understanding of technology, including Perry Miller (1939), Leo Marx (1964), Roderick Nash (1967), and John Kasson (1976), as well as his own earlier work (1990). “Sublimity,” Nye shows, began as an aesthetic and psychological category. It then changed into a democratic or “popular sublime” in America, transforming private moments into public spectacles.
The sublime also has a philosophical history. In Observations on the Feeling of the Beautiful and Sublime (1764) and the Critique of Judgment (1790), Immanuel Kant described its unique character: “The sublime must always be large […] The sublime must be simple.” He stated that “the sublime […] is to be found in a formless object insofar as limitlessness is represented in it, or at its instance, and yet it is also thought as a totality […] the sublime as that of a similar concept of reason. Thus the satisfaction is connected […] with that of quantity” (my emphasis). If one were to move beyond Nye’s twentieth century technological sublime of large objects and events, information presents a unique twenty-first century conception of the sublime as defined by Kant.
The sublime also has a philosophical history. In Observations on the Feeling of the Beautiful and Sublime (1764) and the Critique of Judgment (1790), Immanuel Kant described its unique character: “The sublime must always be large […] The sublime must be simple.” He stated that “the sublime […] is to be found in a formless object insofar as limitlessness is represented in it, or at its instance, and yet it is also thought as a totality […] the sublime as that of a similar concept of reason. Thus the satisfaction is connected […] with that of quantity” (my emphasis). If one were to move beyond Nye’s twentieth century technological sublime of large objects and events, information presents a unique twenty-first century conception of the sublime as defined by Kant.What better way to think of today’s version of the sublime—the informational sublime—than as something formless, limitless yet also a totality and connected to the notion of quantity? The thought makes sense when one considers the vigor and passion with which so many lend their approving voices to the notion of “Big Data.”
The sublime shifts in Nye’s book from an immutable inner experience that was never-changing to one that is contingent upon history and that can be affected by public shaping and taste. Applied today, the sublime can be a way to question what information (as Big Data) means in our present time. Where the technological sublime concerned large structures and events in the twentieth century the informational sublime concerns the large and invisible structures and events of the twenty first. It is something invisible but that still inspires awe, signaling that we are in the stage of another revolution of the sublime, an informational one that spurs the popular democratic imagination.
The sublime shifts in Nye’s book from an immutable inner experience that was never-changing to one that is contingent upon history and that can be affected by public shaping and taste. Applied today, the sublime can be a way to question what information (as Big Data) means in our present time. Where the technological sublime concerned large structures and events in the twentieth century the informational sublime concerns the large and invisible structures and events of the twenty first. It is something invisible but that still inspires awe, signaling that we are in the stage of another revolution of the sublime, an informational one that spurs the popular democratic imagination.For evidence, one merely has to look to the White House. This year, President Obama ordered a team to study Big Data and issue a report on their findings. It begins, “We are living in the midst of a social, economic, and technological revolution.” On the government’s website, they state that the US will “harness the benefits of the big data revolution and encourage the free flow of information.”
Among other platitudes in the report, it states that Big Dada “strengthens democracy, drives economic opportunity, and improves citizens’ quality of life.” Yet, it is unclear in the report just how the relationship between social media and society—especially in the ability of ICTs to foster democracy—is explained.
If he were alive today, Roszak would have undoubtedly taken aim at this greatest of informational catchalls used by researchers and pundits today. Big Data has become the go-to term for when one is confronted with an almost impossible to imagine amount of information—often online—and it is viewed by many as a new skeleton key with which humans might uncover hidden structures in reality or further democracy, as evidenced by the White House report.
Does social media really foster or hinder democracy? Are they, as Roszak put it, an example of humans creating beyond what they intend, beyond what they foresee—as in the so-called Facebook and Twitter “revolutions” so often associated with the Arab Spring? Will they inevitably change social beliefs and customs?
Does social media really foster or hinder democracy? Are they, as Roszak put it, an example of humans creating beyond what they intend, beyond what they foresee—as in the so-called Facebook and Twitter “revolutions” so often associated with the Arab Spring? Will they inevitably change social beliefs and customs?Is social media representative of the type of stupefaction one encounters when confronted by something impossibly large and unknowable—something sublime? Pundits toss around claim that social media is inherently democratic and researches often write about social media and its capacity for social change. Yet, as some commentators have pointed out, there is also the palpable sense that no one really knows what it means. Do Big Data and social media represent a shift to a new sublime that fosters a popular democratic imagination? Rather than thinking of information as the emperor’s clothes, should we be speaking of an informational sublime?
Whether or not social media suits a TD or SCOT view of the world is likely a pointless and futile exercise. Since ICTs are social technologies, the TD/SCOT views are perhaps ill-equipped to parse through the changes that such technologies bring to the table. If anything, online technologies are surely not self-propagating entities; they need us—the social—to grow. On the other hand, online technologies are developing at an exponential rate, and everything seems to be “plugging in” to the “Internet of things.”
Technologies bend and are shaped by human choices and decisions that are made every day, yet Aristotle's distinction between epistêmê (knowledge) and technê (craft) might not be as clear as it seems in Book VI of his Nicomachean Ethics. They are two sides of the same coin. Perhaps, the important question we should be asking is not a causal one about whether ICTs are technologically deterministic or socially shaped but rather a pragmatic one about whether or not the changes that are produced by ICTs are positive or negative ones. The general consensus today seems to be that they are inherently positive technologies that foster popular democracy—a new type of informational sublime. But it is not at all clear that this is the case. One contemporary researcher is finding that perhaps the exact opposite is true.
Technologies bend and are shaped by human choices and decisions that are made every day, yet Aristotle's distinction between epistêmê (knowledge) and technê (craft) might not be as clear as it seems in Book VI of his Nicomachean Ethics. They are two sides of the same coin. Perhaps, the important question we should be asking is not a causal one about whether ICTs are technologically deterministic or socially shaped but rather a pragmatic one about whether or not the changes that are produced by ICTs are positive or negative ones. The general consensus today seems to be that they are inherently positive technologies that foster popular democracy—a new type of informational sublime. But it is not at all clear that this is the case. One contemporary researcher is finding that perhaps the exact opposite is true.Today, very interesting work on communication and conflict is being carried out by the political scientist Navid Hassanpour. Hassanpour studies the relation between communication and political conflict. He asks specific questions about ICTs and their role during political events. Using his knowledge of network information theory gained over the course of his first Ph.D at Stanford (he is currently completing a second doctorate in Political Science at Yale) Hassanpour applies complex equations to help understand the dispersion of political revolutions.
What Hassanpour discovered was that information disruption exacerbates revolutionary unrest—not the other way around. As such, his work runs counter to many of the social media narratives about democracy that surround the new informational sublime. Hassanpour shows that “sudden and ubiquitous interruption of mass communication can facilitate revolutionary mobilization and proliferate decentralized contention.”
In a very technical and convincing paper on the inability of ICTs to foster democracy—“Dynamics of Mobilization in Political Networks” (forthcoming) —a research team led by Hassanpour et al. found that the inverse to a commonly held opinion was true. The existence of ICTs in political events does not amplify political mobilization. Specifically, they write that “the existence of long local bridges, often provided via electronic media, can eradicate action cores and decrease radius of diffusion.” The basic idea is that people are not protesting when they are tweeting or posting on Facebook. This idea has been presented elsewhere, and has been tempered by the introduction notions like Ethan Zuckerman’s distinction between “thick” and “thin” protesting.
In a very technical and convincing paper on the inability of ICTs to foster democracy—“Dynamics of Mobilization in Political Networks” (forthcoming) —a research team led by Hassanpour et al. found that the inverse to a commonly held opinion was true. The existence of ICTs in political events does not amplify political mobilization. Specifically, they write that “the existence of long local bridges, often provided via electronic media, can eradicate action cores and decrease radius of diffusion.” The basic idea is that people are not protesting when they are tweeting or posting on Facebook. This idea has been presented elsewhere, and has been tempered by the introduction notions like Ethan Zuckerman’s distinction between “thick” and “thin” protesting.In ““Localization of the News and Urban Unrest: A Media Usage and Protest Location Survey in Cairo” (forthcoming), Hassanpour surveyed 740 Cairo residents who responded to questions about their individual “news media consumption behavior in relation to their protest activity during the protests.” After gathering this data, Hassanpour shows, almost amazingly, that “local processes of exchanging news were highly correlated with participation in protests while centralized media, even those with an anti-regime stance, were not significantly linked to protest activity during the short period of mass mobilization in Cairo.”
In simple terms, local news sharing such as by word of mouth correlated with an individual’s high level of engagement with the protests while centralized media (ICTs), even those against Mubarak, did not. Additionally, while “the nonparticipants mostly used centralized news outlets, including satellite television, the most ardent protesters relied heavily on their local social network for receiving updates on the events.” Local social networks, not those abetted by ICTs, added to the democratic uprising.
Hassanpour’s research shows that anyone who believes in the simple notion that social media foster democracy is suffering from a special case of informational myopia. While not entirely in line with the SCOT approach to technological development, social media do not determine the structure of society and are often used according to the will of powerful individuals who control them, as in the case of Mubarak. On the other hand, one important thing to consider as the world moves forward with ICT development will be to pay attention to how ICTs engender more or less political attitudes among the population that uses them.
Hassanpour’s research shows that anyone who believes in the simple notion that social media foster democracy is suffering from a special case of informational myopia. While not entirely in line with the SCOT approach to technological development, social media do not determine the structure of society and are often used according to the will of powerful individuals who control them, as in the case of Mubarak. On the other hand, one important thing to consider as the world moves forward with ICT development will be to pay attention to how ICTs engender more or less political attitudes among the population that uses them.The informational sublime is not about Big Data, ICTs, the Internet, or social media. It is about the way individuals allow themselves to be barreled over by the promise of information and the unique fascination it holds over them at the expense of critical forms of inquiry.
Information is not only a unique theoretical object with which we can furnish new understandings of unforeseen parts of our universe; it can open profound philosophical problems and questions that deserve to be asked. Yet, the informational sublime, like other sublimes before it, can be something that co-opts an individual’s fundamental sense of political engagement and critical reflection so that the import of scientific discovery carries greater significance than that of political justice. In short, “information” should not be about progress over people.
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