1.1 From Digital Humanities to Speculative Computing - UCLA ...

Electronic communication approaches assume information functions in a
transmission mode – encoded, stored, and then output. The fungibility of information and
the function of noise are certainly taken into account in theoretical discussions, even
when these are transmission-based and highly technical approaches to electronic
communication, such as those of Shannon and his collaborator, Warren Weaver. l Bit by
byte, the digital approach reinforces a mechanistic understanding of communication and
representation. Knowledge in this context becomes synonymous with information, and
information takes on the character of that which can be parameterized through an
unambiguous rule set.
This basic terminology is premised on the cultural authority of code and an
engineering sensibility grounded in problem-solving. Because it has to be used for
functionality, the “unquestionable” nature of the code base of computational activity is
full of ideological agendas. Most fundamental? The formal, logic required becomes
naturalized – not only as a part of the technical infrastructure, but as a crucial feature of
the intellectual superstructures built to function on it. I’ve reiterated this several times
because this is the crux of our motivation to differentiate SpecLab intellectually from
digital humanities.
Now of course not all digital humanists take this literal-ness without question.
Considerable self-reflexive thought about objects of study has pulled theoretical
philosophers of all stripes back into discussions of digital projects. li Calling assumptions
into question is the name of the digital epistemological game as much as it is the standard
of conference papers and publications elsewhere in the humanities. Likewise, the study of
artifacts in a digital environment is just as apt to prompt discussions of race/class/gender
1.1 History / 3/2008 /
50