Aud Sissel Hoel

Thinking “difference” differently: Cassirer versus Derrida on symbolic mediation

Cassirer’s approach to symbolic mediation differs in some important ways from currently prevailing approaches to meaning and signification such as semiology and its more recent poststructuralist varieties. Cassirer’s philosophy of symbolic forms offers a theory of symbols that does not amount to a sign theory or semiology. It sketches out, rather, a dynamic and nonrepresentational framework in which an alternative notion of difference takes centre stage. In order to make the original features of Cassirer’s approach stand out, I will compare it with the approach of the perhaps most influential differential thinker of our day, Jacques Derrida. The philosophy of symbolic forms explicitly prefigures a great many of the insights and concerns of poststructuralism. Yet, there are some critical differences. Rather than rejecting the concepts of objectivity, identity, and truth on the premises established by traditional metaphysics, Cassirer chooses to redefine these concepts through a radical conceptual reframing. The result is a doctrine that—in Derridean parlance—neither jumps beyond the oppositions of metaphysics, nor tries to resolve them in a Hegelian synthesis—a doctrine, that is, that even though it appeals to origins, cannot so easily be dismissed as yet another instantiation of the metaphysics of presence.

A-me: augmented memories

A-me is a fictitious memory-evoking apparatus at the intersection of science, art and technology. The system enables users to experience other peoples memories as well as store their own by interacting with a volumetric representation (MR) of a human brain. The user retrieves or stores memories (audio traces) by pointing and clicking at precise voxels locations. Triggered by their exploratory action, a story is slowly revealed and recomposed in the form of whispering voices revealing intimate stories. A-me its a public receptacle for private memories, thus exploring the possibility of a collective physical brain. The installation introduces an original optical see-through AR setup for neuronavigation capable of overlaying a volume rendered MR scan onto a physical dummy head. Implementing such a system also forced us to address technical questions on quality assessment of AR systems for brain visualization.

Technics of Thinking

What is thinking? An ambitious question, to be sure. Yet this precise question was tackled by Ernst Cassirer in a highly suggestive and thought-provoking way in his essay ‘Form and Technology’ from 1930. This essay, delivered as a supplement to his three-volume magnum opus on the philosophy of symbolic forms (1923–29), sets out to determine the ‘being’ of technology. Cassirer poses the question concerning technology on the grounds that the philosophical depth and significance of this question has not been sufficiently acknowledged in the existing literature on the topic. So what, then, has technology to do with thinking? Viewed through the optics of the essay under discussion: everything.

Merleau-Ponty and the Measuring Body:

In recent years a growing number of scholars in science studies and related fields are developing new ontologies to displace entrenched dualisms. These efforts often go together with a renewed interest in the roles played by symbolisms and tools in knowledge and being. This article brings Maurice Merleau-Ponty into these conversations, positioning him as a precursor of today’s innovative recastings of technoscience. While Merleau-Ponty is often invoked in relation to his early work on the body and embodiment, this article focuses on his later work, where the investigation of perception is integrated with an ontological exploration. The resulting approach revolves around the highly original idea of the body as a standard of measurement. We further develop this idea by coining the term ‘the measuring body’, which to a greater extent than did Merleau-Ponty accentuates the relative autonomy of symbolisms and tools and their capacity to decentre the perceiving body.

Quality of Alternate Reality Experience and Its QoE Influencing Factors

This paper has identified three types of alternate reality experiences, namely, spatial immersion, emotional immersion, and social immersion, by providing their definitions, application scenarios and the QoE influencing factors. These QoE influencing factors include system factors, contextual factors, design factors, experiential factors, user factors, and media factors. Finally, we conclude by briefly discussing the rationale of formulating these QoE influencing factors in alternate reality experiences.

A-me and BrainCloud: Art-Science Interrogations of Localization in Neuroscience

This article reports on two art-science collaborations, A-me: Augmented Memories and BrainCloud, that interrogate the central role of localization in neuroscience—including the use of technologies that augment sociability using localization as a central reference point. The two projects result from a series of interactions where a science/technology development fostered art, which in turn led to a science application, which potentially may lead to further artistic activity. A-me is an art installation that repurposes navigation and visualization tools normally reserved for medical clinicians and scientists, inviting reflection on the ongoing endeavor of neuroscience to explain and map cognitive functions such as memory. BrainCloud is a software prototype that provides neuroscientists with an interface for interacting with existing data and knowledge about the brain. Organized visually as a brain atlas, it forms a social network that allows neuroscientists to connect and share their ongoing research and ideas.