Chapter 10 - Wittgenstein and Communication Technology: In Conversation with Richard Harper

Summary

Prologue

When Danièle Moyal-Sharrock had the idea that, for the British Wittgenstein Society's tenth anniversary conference, we should focus on Wittgenstein in the twenty-first century, we decided that we absolutely needed something on technology, and who better than Richard Harper on information communi-cation technology? In what follows, we discuss the in vivo use of categories in the design of communications and artificial intelligence (AI) technologies, as well as how this use needs to evolve to allow creative design to flourish. The conversation will be of interest to anyone concerned with our ever-evolving uses of technology in everyday interaction.

Why People Communicate

CS: Professor Harper has led research groups at Xerox Europarc as well as Microsoft Research in Cambridge for many years. He founded and directed the Digital World Research Centre at the University of Surrey. He is now the co-director of the Institute for Social Futures at Lancaster University. So maybe he could talk about the twenty-second century as well! He is also a partner in Social Shaping Research, which he may tell you about a little later if you ask him. You are probably all asking what this has to do with Wittgenstein (or maybe not…), and so I thought I would begin by asking Richard how he ended up here. With this kind of background, what brings you to our Wittgenstein Society? Why are you here, Richard?

RH: As an undergraduate in the late seventies, I did sociology, amongst other courses, at Manchester University, and there we were introduced to Wittgenstein. His philosophy was viewed as an integral part of understanding social science. Winch in particular was our mode of introduction to his philosophy – in his The Idea of a Social Science. There was a main course for every social scientist which was called Mind and Society, taught by Professors Wes Sharrock and John Lee; some of you here will have met them. They are sociologists and were interested in Wittgenstein and Winch for two or three reasons, one to do with the possibility that one would need to be careful about the categories used to explain things in the social sciences.