Other versions by this Author
A proposal that we think about digital technologies such as machine learning not in terms of artificial intelligence but as artificial communication.
Algorithms that work with deep learning and big data are getting so much better at doing so many things that it makes us uncomfortable. How can a device know what our favorite songs are, or what we should write in an email? Have machines become too smart? In Artificial Communication, Elena Esposito argues that drawing this sort of analogy between algorithms and human intelligence is misleading. If machines contribute to social intelligence, it will not be because they have learned how to think like us but because we have learned how to communicate with them. Esposito proposes that we think of “smart” machines not in terms of artificial intelligence but in terms of artificial communication.
To do this, we need a concept of communication that can take into account the possibility that a communication partner may be not a human being but an algorithm—which is not random and is completely controlled, although not by the processes of the human mind. Esposito investigates this by examining the use of algorithms in different areas of social life. She explores the proliferation of lists (and lists of lists) online, explaining that the web works on the basis of lists to produce further lists; the use of visualization; digital profiling and algorithmic individualization, which personalize a mass medium with playlists and recommendations; and the implications of the “right to be forgotten.” Finally, she considers how photographs today seem to be used to escape the present rather than to preserve a memory.
Artificial Communication How Algorithms Produce Social Intelligence
by Esposito, ElenaFormat: Hardcover
Pub. Date: 2022-05-24
Publisher(s): The MIT Press
List Price: $27.95
Buy New
Usually Ships in 5-7 Business Days
$27.11
Rent Book
Select for Price
Used Book
We're Sorry
Sold Out
eBook
We're Sorry
Not Available
This item is being sold by an Individual Seller and will not ship from the Online Bookstore's warehouse. The Seller must confirm the order within two business days. If the Seller refuses to sell or fails to confirm within this time frame, then the order is cancelled.
Please be sure to read the Description offered by the Seller.
Summary
Author Biography
Elena Esposito is Professor of Sociology at the University Bielefeld and the University of Bologna.
Table of Contents
Introduction IX
1 Artificial Communication? Algorithms as Interaction Partners 1
2 Organizing without Understanding: Lists in Ancient and Digital Cultures 19
3 Reading Images: Visualization and Interpretation in Digital Text Analysis 31
4 Getting Personal with Algorithms 47
5 Algorithmic Memory and the Right to be Forgotten 65
6 Forgetting Pictures 79
7 The Future of Prediction: From Statistical Uncertainty to Algorithmic Forecasts 87
Conclusion 107
Acknowledgments 113
Notes 115
Bibliography 147
Index 181
1 Artificial Communication? Algorithms as Interaction Partners 1
2 Organizing without Understanding: Lists in Ancient and Digital Cultures 19
3 Reading Images: Visualization and Interpretation in Digital Text Analysis 31
4 Getting Personal with Algorithms 47
5 Algorithmic Memory and the Right to be Forgotten 65
6 Forgetting Pictures 79
7 The Future of Prediction: From Statistical Uncertainty to Algorithmic Forecasts 87
Conclusion 107
Acknowledgments 113
Notes 115
Bibliography 147
Index 181
An electronic version of this book is available through VitalSource.
This book is viewable on PC, Mac, iPhone, iPad, iPod Touch, and most smartphones.
By purchasing, you will be able to view this book online, as well as download it, for the chosen number of days.
A downloadable version of this book is available through the eCampus Reader or compatible Adobe readers.
Applications are available on iOS, Android, PC, Mac, and Windows Mobile platforms.
Please view the compatibility matrix prior to purchase.