标签：phenomenology

Photography and Science

History of Science & Scholarship2013.03.23
Photography and Science
This is a simple metaphor that I have used before, though I never wrote it up as a special topic. Today, when I was eating with Teacher Zhang and the others, I brought it up again, and I think this metaphor is still fairly illuminating, so I’ll talk about it here in some detail. The metaphor is mainly meant to express our attitude toward science and how to understand the relation between science and the “world”: science is like photography, offering an image of the world. We point at a photograph and identify it, saying, “This is Zhang San.” Is this Zhang San? Yes, this is indeed Zhang San, not…
technology science media phenomenology
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2013年3月23日
Travel Notes from the Guangzhou Conference

History of Science & Scholarship2012.12.16
Travel Notes from the Guangzhou Conference
In Guangzhou I caught a cold, and after coming back I spent several days recuperating, so the task of writing up the trip was delayed by several days as well; I only began writing on December 8…… First, a bit of emotion: how time flies. In a daze, the annual conference on phenomenology and philosophy of technology has already been held six times, and this was the fourth conference I have attended. I took part in the Nanning conference as a master’s student, and in the blink of an eye I am almost done with my doctorate. As for these conference “takedowns” of “I love my teacher,” this is already…
philosophy China technology philosophy of science
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2012年12月16日
On the Discussion of Intentional History and Actual History

Culture & Public Commentary2012.11.10
On the Discussion of Intentional History and Actual History
Recently the blog update has come almost to a standstill, mainly because three mountains are weighing on me: first, the discussion-group paper (which also doubles as a submission for the phenomenology and philosophy of technology conference, as well as part of the introduction to the doctoral dissertation); second, the plan to turn the blog posts into a book (*A History of Science and Culture*); and third, using WordPress to build the soon-to-be-relaunched website of the Center for History and Philosophy of Science. These things will probably all be finished within a week. Years of not updating have already caused my blog’s PR rating to drop…… Today, to celebrate my birthday,…
technology history of science media history
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2012年11月10日
A Philosophy of Cinema, Not a Philosophy About Cinema—Reading Technics and Time 3: The Problem of Cinema’s Time and the Pain of Existence

Phenomenology & Heidegger2012.09.17
A Philosophy of Cinema, Not a Philosophy About Cinema—Reading Technics and Time 3: The Problem of Cinema’s Time and the Pain of Existence
From robber to Pompidou director, the legendary Bernard Stiegler is also the hottest figure in French philosophy today after Derrida. All three volumes of his magnum opus Technics and Time have already been introduced into China by Yilin Press. Although this third volume was written after the first two, it can also be read independently; the author himself notes that, in a certain sense, this volume can serve as the “best introduction” to the first two. Compared with the subtitles of the first two volumes — The Fault of Epimetheus and Disorientation — the subtitle of the newly published third volume, The Time of Cinema and the Problem of the…
book reading technology media Heidegger
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2012年9月17日
Recommended Introductory Reading on Phenomenology: “Studies in Lived Experience”

Philosophy & Thought2012.05.27
Recommended Introductory Reading on Phenomenology: “Studies in Lived Experience”
[+] Max van Manen: “Lived Experience Research: Pedagogy in the Perspective of the Human Sciences,” trans. Song Guangwen et al., ed. Li Shuying, Educational Science Press, 2003 Lately I have been paying attention to the phenomenology of education, and I came across this book. But rather than a work on pedagogy, this book is really more like an introduction to (applied) phenomenology; the whole book is trying to describe a human-scientific mode of inquiry—phenomenology. The author, Van Manen, is a Canadian scholar and one of the founders of “phenomenological pedagogy.” He edits the journal *Phenomenology + Pedagogy*. But he is originally from the Netherlands, and his native language is Dutch;…
book reading notes education phenomenology
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2012年5月27日
Nature as Raw Meat or Bacon

History of Science & Scholarship2012.05.24
Nature as Raw Meat or Bacon
Today in discussion class, Liu Ping’s paper, which he will be presenting next week, came up. He wants to write on “wilderness and flesh,” attempting an environmental-philosophical reading of Merleau-Ponty’s later philosophy. It sounds very interesting. This important concept in Merleau-Ponty’s later philosophy is usually translated as “flesh,” but Liu Ping said this translation is not good, because it misses a great deal of meaning. But don’t be like Liu Zhe: since we are using Chinese to do phenomenological thinking, rather than working as mere scholars of texts—and foreign scholars of texts at that—to do philological research, of course we should still ultimately translate these concepts. Even if some meaning…
science phenomenology environment nature
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2012年5月24日
The Distanting and Severing of “This”

Philosophy & Thought2012.04.19
The Distanting and Severing of “This”
Today in the discussion session, Ban Jingqi gave a presentation, and I could clearly feel that Jingqi was in high spirits—especially at the very end, when he hoisted up the blackboard to discuss Heidegger, he looked full of swagger and dash, seeming even more spirited than before he fell ill. Congratulations, congratulations~ After the classroom discussion, Jingqi also sent emails and posted on Weibo to continue the discussion, and I wrote a long response as well. Since he is also happy to publish it publicly, I might as well repost it on the blog too~ As for Jingqi’s original text, I have directly pasted his long Weibo post here (see…
philosophy Heidegger phenomenology discussion
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2012年4月19日
The Multiple Layers of Technological Embodiment (embodiment, incarnation, manifestation)

AI & the Future of Technology2012.04.12
The Multiple Layers of Technological Embodiment (embodiment, incarnation, manifestation)
Today in the discussion seminar, Wu Ningning criticized Dreyfus’s view that “the internet is not embodied.” Dreyfus’s understanding of “embodiment” is monotonous and one-sided: he clings too rigidly to the human body as already at hand, and emphasizes the binary opposition between embodiment and disembodiment in an overly schematic way. For him, embodiment at most has only a monotonous difference of degree, such as the seven stages of learning. But in my view, embodiment not only differs in degree, but also in kind and dimension. In some respects the internet is indeed less embodied—for example, chatting online is in some ways not as full as face-to-face conversation—but such differences cannot…
technology media education Heidegger
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2012年4月12日
Technical Intentionality and the Unconscious

AI & the Future of Technology2012.04.09
Technical Intentionality and the Unconscious
Yesterday, Senior Brother Han Lianqing gave a lecture at Beihang for the Beijing Philosophy of Technology Forum, “Intermediation and Constitution — The Meaning and Function of Artificial-Object Intentionality.” Teacher Wu sent us a text message in the morning, but lately my rhinitis has been acting up badly, and I stayed home unwilling to go out; as a result, I didn’t go. Although this rhinitis comes and goes, even though it is there every day, it still flares in bouts, and by that afternoon I was already feeling quite a bit better. In the evening I asked Wu Ningning for the recording and asked Senior Brother Han for the paper, and…
technology media Peking University phenomenology
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2012年4月9日
The Mediality of “Natural Seeing”

AI & the Future of Technology2012.03.21
The Mediality of “Natural Seeing”
Originally, I had planned to put up this article after the proposal defense, but while writing it I realized that in fact it was nothing more than citing some things I had written before, so I shelved it. But today a troll came by my Theses on Media Ontology, which just happens to give me a good occasion to post this article as a response. In fact, this troll’s objection was similar to the question Professor Sun raised back then. Of course, Professor Sun always poses his questions haughtily but without losing decorum, whereas internet trolls are different. I very much welcome criticism and questioning, especially the sort Professor Sun…
technology media phenomenology nature
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2012年3月21日