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elena esposito

University of Bielefeld, Fakultät für Soziologie, Faculty Member

Università degli studi di Modena e Reggio Emilia, Comunicazione ed Economia, Faculty Member

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Andreas Folkers

Justus-Liebig-University Giessen

Krzysztof C. Matuszek

Jesuit University Ignatianum in Kraków

Jaap den Hollander

University of Groningen

Copenhagen Business School, CBS

Professor Daniel Chernilo

Loughborough University

Rodrigo Cordero

Universidad Diego Portales

Hannes Bergthaller

National Taiwan Normal University

Aldo Mascareño

Universidad Adolfo Ibáñez

Gabriele De Angelis

Universidade Nova de Lisboa

Chih-Chieh Tang （湯志傑）

Academia Sinica

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Papers by elena esposito

Critique without crisis: Systems theory as a critical sociology

This paper proposes an extended idea of critique, bypassing the paradox of a critique of critique... more This paper proposes an extended idea of critique, bypassing the paradox of a critique of critique. It reconstructs the semantics of critique from ancient commentary to autonomous interpretation, identifying the blindness of critical theory in the claim to detect crises and to indicate how to overcome them. The critique of critique is achieved not by rejecting critique but by moving to second-order observation. In this understanding, critique does not refuse what is normal but observes it as improbable. Critical observation is understood as reflection on normality, its opposite, and its alternatives. The debate on risk society is presented and commented on as an example. Critical theory and critical sociology What does it mean today to do critical sociology? Does critical theory have the monopoly of the notion of critique, and with what prerogatives? Or can one develop a critical approach using other tools, such as those of systems theory? This article seeks to contribute to the debate between systems theory and critical theory 1 – a debate that may seem exhausted after a heated discussion in the 1970s and 80s. Referring to the curious exchange between Habermas and Luhmann (Luhmann and Habermas, 1971), in which each one presented his own arguments without assuming the perspective of the coun-terparty, the discussion developed as a contrast between an idea of social emancipation based on discursive rationality and the study of the self-referential complexity of modern

Organizing without Understanding. Lists in Ancient and in Digital Cultures

The papers focuses on the practice of using lists in the digitized society, where we do not only ... more The papers focuses on the practice of using lists in the digitized society, where we do not only deal with lists on the web, but since a few decades tend to observe objects and services in general in the form of evaluative orderings like ratings and rankings. The difference and the relationship between lists, ratings and rankings are illustrated and discussed in historical perspective.
In a second step, the paper specifically addresses the web and digital data processing, asking why lists are spreading right now, especially in the last three decades. It analyses the relationship of the form of the list with the web and with algorithms, which are its central tools of information processing.

Artificial Communication? The Production of Contingency by Algorithms Artifizielle Kommunikation? Die Produktion von Kontingenz durch Algorithmen

Discourse about smart algorithms and digital social agents still refers primarily to the construc... more Discourse about smart algorithms and digital social agents still refers primarily to the construction of artificial intelligence that reproduces the faculties of individuals. Recent developments, however, show that algorithms are more efficient when they abandon this goal and try instead to reproduce the ability to communicate. Algorithms that do not " think " like people can affect the ability to obtain and process information in society. Referring to the concept of communication in Niklas Luhmann's theory of social systems, this paper critically reconstructs the debate on the computational turn of big data as the artificial reproduction not of intelligence but of communication. Self-learning algorithms parasitically take advantage – be it consciously or unaware – of the contribution of web users to a " virtual double contingency. " This provides society with information that is not part of the thoughts of anyone, but, nevertheless, enters the communication circuit and raises its complexity. The concept of communication should be reconsidered to take account of these developments, including (or not) the possibility of communicating with algorithms.

An Ecology of Differences. Communication, the web and the question of borders Environments of systems

The debate about ecology, as we understand it here, has a specific history that separates it from... more The debate about ecology, as we understand it here, has a specific history that separates it from the rather organicist discourse concerning the relationship of living beings with their environments (since the second half of the nineteenth century). Ecology deals with the environment, but here we look to a generalization and an abstraction of the concept that have been emerging more recently (since the fifties). We speak of general ecology. And we look for a sharper problematization of the idea of environment—not as a " given, " to which an organism or system must adapt, but as a multifaceted and flexible reference, which changes with the way it is observed and with the perspective of the observer. In this sense, the environment is not an assumption, it is a problem. It is not the environment in itself (a notion which doesn't make much sense), but the environment of someone or something. There are many environments, and one has to specify to which one is referring. In our discourse on general ecology the environment is a multiplicity of environments that are intertwined and complement each other, where you look for reliable (although presumably neither final nor stable) references—not only the natural environment, but also the social environment, the psychological environment (or the billions of environments of the different minds), the environment of machines and the machines in the environment, the media environment, and so on. Which environment includes all these environments, and from what vantage point can we observe it?

Die Frivolität des Engagements und das Dilemma der ethnischen und frommen Mode. Frankfurter Allgemeine Quarterly, 2017 (3): 82-85

Was passiert letztlich mit der Mode, Mallarmés „déesse des apparences“ und Triumph der Leichtigke... more Was passiert letztlich mit der Mode, Mallarmés „déesse des apparences“ und Triumph der Leichtigkeit und Oberflächlichkeit? In einer Zeit, wo es der Politik vorgeworfen wird, den Bezug auf stabile Werte zu verlieren und kurzfristige Oberflächeneffekte zu jagen, taucht auf den Laufstegen und in den Mode-Shootings eine Ästhetik des Engagements auf, bezogen explizit auf die großen offenen Probleme unserer Zeit.

The fascination of contingency: Fashion and modern society. Pp.175-190 in Giovanni Matteucci and Stefano Marino (Eds.), Philosophical perspectives on fashion. London/New York: Bloomsbury, 2017.

I. Modernity as " âge de mode " Fashion is a typically modern phenomenon-‐ in the sense that it ... more I. Modernity as " âge de mode " Fashion is a typically modern phenomenon-‐ in the sense that it only exists in modern society, and in the sense that it expresses in a concentrated way the essence of modernity. This is the assumption underlying the present article, which I will try to illustrate and comment in the following pages. This approach can be surprising, because we often think that fashion existed in all societies, and also because we tend to define modernity on the basis of more "serious" phenomena, like the emergence of scientific rationality or of national states. But fashion, in its apparent frivolity, involves crucial aspects of modern semantics, as the forms of individuality and the relationship with time. The key issue, as we shall see, is the concept of contingency, which in modern times acquires a new significance and unprecedented significance, illustrated by fashion and its forms. Why modernity leads to these changes is an enigmatic question, although the concept continues to attract the attention of scholars, especially in the fields of sociology and history of ideas. What we can observe, however, is the gradual dissolution of the ordered setting of traditional semantics and the transition to a different form of order-‐ vastly more flexible, contingent, compatible with components of disorder. The univocal order of the cosmos, as it was reflected in metaphysics and theology, but also in the systems of rhetoric and of various disciplines, gives way to a plurality of orders not always coordinated, with criteria, methods and priorities that are different and independent from each other.

Algorithmic memory and the right to be forgotten on the web

The debate on the right to be forgotten on Google involves the relationship between human informa... more The debate on the right to be forgotten on Google involves the relationship between human information processing and digital processing by algorithms. The specificity of digital memory is not so much its often discussed inability to forget. What distinguishes digital memory is, instead, its ability to process information without understanding. Algorithms only work with data (i.e. with differences) without remembering or forgetting. Merely calculating, algorithms manage to produce significant results not because they operate in an intelligent way, but because they ''parasitically'' exploit the intelligence, the memory, and the attribution of meaning by human actors. The specificity of algorithmic processing makes it possible to bypass the paradox of remembering to forget, which up to now blocked any human-based forgetting technique. If you decide to forget some memory, the most immediate effect is drawing attention to it, thereby activating remembering. Working differently from human intelligence, however, algorithms can implement, for the first time, the classical insight that it might be possible to reinforce forgetting not by erasing memories but by multiplying them. After discussing several projects on the web which implicitly adopt this approach, the article concludes by raising some deeper problems posed when algorithms use data and metadata to produce information that cannot be attributed to any human being.

Tools to Remember an Ever-changing Past. Pp.335-344 in Alberto Cevolini (Ed.), Forgetting Machines: Knowledge Management Evolution in Early Modern Europe. Leiden/Boston: Brill, 2016.

The texts in this volume concern a very interesting transition that occurred during early modern ... more The texts in this volume concern a very interesting transition that occurred during early modern time, a period that is often the subject of sociological research. In particular, the spread of printing was notoriously related to ars excerpendi. In this regard, many contributions in this volume explore the relationship between ars excerpendi and the traditional system of loci, which can be observed as the symbol (or one of the symbols) of the ongoing transition. The title of this book, Forgetting Machines, appropriately refers to the mnemonic component of the study. In the period under consideration, we observe a use of memory and a configuration of social memory that differed from those of previous times, with an unprecedented active role of forgetting. However, the emphasis on forgetting must be interpreted flexibly. We cannot assume that simply shifting from a focus on remembering (in ars memoriae and the related system of loci) led to an opposite focus on forgetting (with forgetting machines). Ars excerpendi is not a version of ars oblivionalis, which is always problematic. Rather, it signals a much more complex transformation of memory as a whole, involving both of its components, remembering and forgetting, and modifying their relationships to each other. This book contributes valuable insights for the study of this

Temporal Markets Money, the Future and Political Action

Elena Esposito is Professor of Sociology of Communication at the University Bielefeld (D) and at ... more Elena Esposito is Professor of Sociology of Communication at the University Bielefeld (D) and at the University of Modena-Reggio Emilia (I). She works with the theory of social systems especially on issues related with the social management of time, including memory and forgetting, fashion and transience, probability calculus, fiction and the use the time in finance. Her current research projects focus on the possibility and forms of forgetting on the web, on a sociology of algorithms and on the proliferation of rankings and ratings for the management of information. E-Mail: elena.esposito@unimore.it Abstract: Following Keynes and Shackle, money can be defined by its temporal nature , as a tool for managing and using the uncertainty of the future – as a problem and as an opportunity. Finance, which relies on money, can be described as a large apparatus that relates to the future while operating in the present, or the present intervention in the construction and structuring of the future. The financial crisis, in this context, can be brought into connection with an inadequate management of the future in terms of risks and its actual conceptualisation. The reference to time also allows one to interpret the approach and the effectiveness of public policies on finance This paper examines the measures of Quantitative Easing, describing it as " injection " of time into markets, in the hope of encouraging the use and construction of the future.

CV inglese ottobre 2016

Blinde Flecken der Medientheorie

Studien zur Anatomie medienkultureller Praktiken, 2007

Öffnung für das Vorläufige. Die Mode im 17. und 18 . Jahrhundert

Zwischen Öffnung und neuerlicher Schließung, 2000

Was man von den unsichtbaren Medien sehen kann

Soziale Systeme, 2006

Die Konstruktion der Zeit in der zeitlosen Gegenwart

Rechtsgeschichte - Legal History, 2007

Die Beobachtung der Kybernetik

Schlüsselwerke der Systemtheorie, 2016

Dal modello alla moda. Media e forme dell'imitazione

Societa Degli Individui, 2004

Originality through Imitation: The Rationality of Fashion

Fashion, apparently irrational and whimsical, presents on the contrary a non-random way of managi... more Fashion, apparently irrational and whimsical, presents on the contrary a non-random way of managing the limits of rationality in the relations between individuals. Fashion is an inherently paradoxical phenomenon, as was observed at the beginning of its diffusion in the 17th century, a time that discovered, like the recent theory of organization, the necessity and the strategic role of disorder. Fashion relies on the stability of transition (everything changes, and this is the only thing we can rely on) and on the conformity with deviance (everyone wants to be original, and in this desire is like everyone else). Fashion works combining these paradoxes and neutralizing them in the form of banality. What can the theory of organization learn from the trivial mystery of fashion, that prevails on everyone just because nobody takes it seriously?

„Die Paradoxie, Neues zu beobachten“

Zirkuläre Positionen 2, 1998

Ontologien der Moderne

Circularidades económicas y observación de segundo orden: La realidad de las calificaciones crediticias

Revista Mad Revista Del Magister En Analisis Sistemico Aplicado a La Sociedad, Apr 29, 2014

RESUMEN ¿Pueden los observadores observar la economía desde el exterior? Desarrollos recientes en... more RESUMEN ¿Pueden los observadores observar la economía desde el exterior? Desarrollos recientes en la sociología económica tienden a desdibujar la clásica distinción y combinación entre economía y sociedad, y a avanzar hacia un modelo en el que el observador se encuentra necesariamente dentro de la sociedad que él describe. El comportamiento de los agentes financieros se puede analizar mediante la combinación de dos conceptos: el concurso de belleza y el riesgo moral -una combinación que permite una traducción de su comportamiento en los términos y tradición de la teoría de la observación. El concurso de belleza de Keynes puede ser interpretado como un reconocimiento sistemático de la observación de segundo orden: los operadores financieros observan principalmente a otros observadores y lo que estos observan. Esta observación produce circularidades peculiares -incluyendo el insoluble problema del riesgo moral, el cual reproduce el famoso modelo de Merton de las profecías autocumplidas y autofrustradas en el campo de las finanzas. Sin embargo, si las finanzas consisten en observaciones de segundo orden, entonces sus movimientos no pueden ser explicados más con referencia al mundo, sino con referencia a la observación y sus estructuras: la referencia a la realidad de las finanzas es proporcionada crecientemente por calificaciones crediticias que solo pueden ofrecer información respecto de lo que los demás observan. La expansión de las calificaciones crediticias en las últimas décadas y las dudas sobre su fiabilidad están relacionadas con el movimiento generalizado de la sociedad moderna hacia la observación de segundo orden, lo cual produce problemas y enigmas específicos, así como estructuras y restricciones.

Critique without crisis: Systems theory as a critical sociology

This paper proposes an extended idea of critique, bypassing the paradox of a critique of critique... more This paper proposes an extended idea of critique, bypassing the paradox of a critique of critique. It reconstructs the semantics of critique from ancient commentary to autonomous interpretation, identifying the blindness of critical theory in the claim to detect crises and to indicate how to overcome them. The critique of critique is achieved not by rejecting critique but by moving to second-order observation. In this understanding, critique does not refuse what is normal but observes it as improbable. Critical observation is understood as reflection on normality, its opposite, and its alternatives. The debate on risk society is presented and commented on as an example. Critical theory and critical sociology What does it mean today to do critical sociology? Does critical theory have the monopoly of the notion of critique, and with what prerogatives? Or can one develop a critical approach using other tools, such as those of systems theory? This article seeks to contribute to the debate between systems theory and critical theory 1 – a debate that may seem exhausted after a heated discussion in the 1970s and 80s. Referring to the curious exchange between Habermas and Luhmann (Luhmann and Habermas, 1971), in which each one presented his own arguments without assuming the perspective of the coun-terparty, the discussion developed as a contrast between an idea of social emancipation based on discursive rationality and the study of the self-referential complexity of modern

Organizing without Understanding. Lists in Ancient and in Digital Cultures

The papers focuses on the practice of using lists in the digitized society, where we do not only ... more The papers focuses on the practice of using lists in the digitized society, where we do not only deal with lists on the web, but since a few decades tend to observe objects and services in general in the form of evaluative orderings like ratings and rankings. The difference and the relationship between lists, ratings and rankings are illustrated and discussed in historical perspective.
In a second step, the paper specifically addresses the web and digital data processing, asking why lists are spreading right now, especially in the last three decades. It analyses the relationship of the form of the list with the web and with algorithms, which are its central tools of information processing.

Artificial Communication? The Production of Contingency by Algorithms Artifizielle Kommunikation? Die Produktion von Kontingenz durch Algorithmen

Discourse about smart algorithms and digital social agents still refers primarily to the construc... more Discourse about smart algorithms and digital social agents still refers primarily to the construction of artificial intelligence that reproduces the faculties of individuals. Recent developments, however, show that algorithms are more efficient when they abandon this goal and try instead to reproduce the ability to communicate. Algorithms that do not " think " like people can affect the ability to obtain and process information in society. Referring to the concept of communication in Niklas Luhmann's theory of social systems, this paper critically reconstructs the debate on the computational turn of big data as the artificial reproduction not of intelligence but of communication. Self-learning algorithms parasitically take advantage – be it consciously or unaware – of the contribution of web users to a " virtual double contingency. " This provides society with information that is not part of the thoughts of anyone, but, nevertheless, enters the communication circuit and raises its complexity. The concept of communication should be reconsidered to take account of these developments, including (or not) the possibility of communicating with algorithms.

An Ecology of Differences. Communication, the web and the question of borders Environments of systems

The debate about ecology, as we understand it here, has a specific history that separates it from... more The debate about ecology, as we understand it here, has a specific history that separates it from the rather organicist discourse concerning the relationship of living beings with their environments (since the second half of the nineteenth century). Ecology deals with the environment, but here we look to a generalization and an abstraction of the concept that have been emerging more recently (since the fifties). We speak of general ecology. And we look for a sharper problematization of the idea of environment—not as a " given, " to which an organism or system must adapt, but as a multifaceted and flexible reference, which changes with the way it is observed and with the perspective of the observer. In this sense, the environment is not an assumption, it is a problem. It is not the environment in itself (a notion which doesn't make much sense), but the environment of someone or something. There are many environments, and one has to specify to which one is referring. In our discourse on general ecology the environment is a multiplicity of environments that are intertwined and complement each other, where you look for reliable (although presumably neither final nor stable) references—not only the natural environment, but also the social environment, the psychological environment (or the billions of environments of the different minds), the environment of machines and the machines in the environment, the media environment, and so on. Which environment includes all these environments, and from what vantage point can we observe it?

Die Frivolität des Engagements und das Dilemma der ethnischen und frommen Mode. Frankfurter Allgemeine Quarterly, 2017 (3): 82-85

Was passiert letztlich mit der Mode, Mallarmés „déesse des apparences“ und Triumph der Leichtigke... more Was passiert letztlich mit der Mode, Mallarmés „déesse des apparences“ und Triumph der Leichtigkeit und Oberflächlichkeit? In einer Zeit, wo es der Politik vorgeworfen wird, den Bezug auf stabile Werte zu verlieren und kurzfristige Oberflächeneffekte zu jagen, taucht auf den Laufstegen und in den Mode-Shootings eine Ästhetik des Engagements auf, bezogen explizit auf die großen offenen Probleme unserer Zeit.

The fascination of contingency: Fashion and modern society. Pp.175-190 in Giovanni Matteucci and Stefano Marino (Eds.), Philosophical perspectives on fashion. London/New York: Bloomsbury, 2017.

I. Modernity as " âge de mode " Fashion is a typically modern phenomenon-‐ in the sense that it ... more I. Modernity as " âge de mode " Fashion is a typically modern phenomenon-‐ in the sense that it only exists in modern society, and in the sense that it expresses in a concentrated way the essence of modernity. This is the assumption underlying the present article, which I will try to illustrate and comment in the following pages. This approach can be surprising, because we often think that fashion existed in all societies, and also because we tend to define modernity on the basis of more "serious" phenomena, like the emergence of scientific rationality or of national states. But fashion, in its apparent frivolity, involves crucial aspects of modern semantics, as the forms of individuality and the relationship with time. The key issue, as we shall see, is the concept of contingency, which in modern times acquires a new significance and unprecedented significance, illustrated by fashion and its forms. Why modernity leads to these changes is an enigmatic question, although the concept continues to attract the attention of scholars, especially in the fields of sociology and history of ideas. What we can observe, however, is the gradual dissolution of the ordered setting of traditional semantics and the transition to a different form of order-‐ vastly more flexible, contingent, compatible with components of disorder. The univocal order of the cosmos, as it was reflected in metaphysics and theology, but also in the systems of rhetoric and of various disciplines, gives way to a plurality of orders not always coordinated, with criteria, methods and priorities that are different and independent from each other.

Algorithmic memory and the right to be forgotten on the web

The debate on the right to be forgotten on Google involves the relationship between human informa... more The debate on the right to be forgotten on Google involves the relationship between human information processing and digital processing by algorithms. The specificity of digital memory is not so much its often discussed inability to forget. What distinguishes digital memory is, instead, its ability to process information without understanding. Algorithms only work with data (i.e. with differences) without remembering or forgetting. Merely calculating, algorithms manage to produce significant results not because they operate in an intelligent way, but because they ''parasitically'' exploit the intelligence, the memory, and the attribution of meaning by human actors. The specificity of algorithmic processing makes it possible to bypass the paradox of remembering to forget, which up to now blocked any human-based forgetting technique. If you decide to forget some memory, the most immediate effect is drawing attention to it, thereby activating remembering. Working differently from human intelligence, however, algorithms can implement, for the first time, the classical insight that it might be possible to reinforce forgetting not by erasing memories but by multiplying them. After discussing several projects on the web which implicitly adopt this approach, the article concludes by raising some deeper problems posed when algorithms use data and metadata to produce information that cannot be attributed to any human being.

Tools to Remember an Ever-changing Past. Pp.335-344 in Alberto Cevolini (Ed.), Forgetting Machines: Knowledge Management Evolution in Early Modern Europe. Leiden/Boston: Brill, 2016.

The texts in this volume concern a very interesting transition that occurred during early modern ... more The texts in this volume concern a very interesting transition that occurred during early modern time, a period that is often the subject of sociological research. In particular, the spread of printing was notoriously related to ars excerpendi. In this regard, many contributions in this volume explore the relationship between ars excerpendi and the traditional system of loci, which can be observed as the symbol (or one of the symbols) of the ongoing transition. The title of this book, Forgetting Machines, appropriately refers to the mnemonic component of the study. In the period under consideration, we observe a use of memory and a configuration of social memory that differed from those of previous times, with an unprecedented active role of forgetting. However, the emphasis on forgetting must be interpreted flexibly. We cannot assume that simply shifting from a focus on remembering (in ars memoriae and the related system of loci) led to an opposite focus on forgetting (with forgetting machines). Ars excerpendi is not a version of ars oblivionalis, which is always problematic. Rather, it signals a much more complex transformation of memory as a whole, involving both of its components, remembering and forgetting, and modifying their relationships to each other. This book contributes valuable insights for the study of this

Temporal Markets Money, the Future and Political Action

Elena Esposito is Professor of Sociology of Communication at the University Bielefeld (D) and at ... more Elena Esposito is Professor of Sociology of Communication at the University Bielefeld (D) and at the University of Modena-Reggio Emilia (I). She works with the theory of social systems especially on issues related with the social management of time, including memory and forgetting, fashion and transience, probability calculus, fiction and the use the time in finance. Her current research projects focus on the possibility and forms of forgetting on the web, on a sociology of algorithms and on the proliferation of rankings and ratings for the management of information. E-Mail: elena.esposito@unimore.it Abstract: Following Keynes and Shackle, money can be defined by its temporal nature , as a tool for managing and using the uncertainty of the future – as a problem and as an opportunity. Finance, which relies on money, can be described as a large apparatus that relates to the future while operating in the present, or the present intervention in the construction and structuring of the future. The financial crisis, in this context, can be brought into connection with an inadequate management of the future in terms of risks and its actual conceptualisation. The reference to time also allows one to interpret the approach and the effectiveness of public policies on finance This paper examines the measures of Quantitative Easing, describing it as " injection " of time into markets, in the hope of encouraging the use and construction of the future.

CV inglese ottobre 2016

Blinde Flecken der Medientheorie

Studien zur Anatomie medienkultureller Praktiken, 2007

Öffnung für das Vorläufige. Die Mode im 17. und 18 . Jahrhundert

Zwischen Öffnung und neuerlicher Schließung, 2000

Was man von den unsichtbaren Medien sehen kann

Soziale Systeme, 2006

Die Konstruktion der Zeit in der zeitlosen Gegenwart

Rechtsgeschichte - Legal History, 2007

Die Beobachtung der Kybernetik

Schlüsselwerke der Systemtheorie, 2016

Dal modello alla moda. Media e forme dell'imitazione

Societa Degli Individui, 2004

Originality through Imitation: The Rationality of Fashion

Fashion, apparently irrational and whimsical, presents on the contrary a non-random way of managi... more Fashion, apparently irrational and whimsical, presents on the contrary a non-random way of managing the limits of rationality in the relations between individuals. Fashion is an inherently paradoxical phenomenon, as was observed at the beginning of its diffusion in the 17th century, a time that discovered, like the recent theory of organization, the necessity and the strategic role of disorder. Fashion relies on the stability of transition (everything changes, and this is the only thing we can rely on) and on the conformity with deviance (everyone wants to be original, and in this desire is like everyone else). Fashion works combining these paradoxes and neutralizing them in the form of banality. What can the theory of organization learn from the trivial mystery of fashion, that prevails on everyone just because nobody takes it seriously?

„Die Paradoxie, Neues zu beobachten“

Zirkuläre Positionen 2, 1998

Ontologien der Moderne

Circularidades económicas y observación de segundo orden: La realidad de las calificaciones crediticias

Revista Mad Revista Del Magister En Analisis Sistemico Aplicado a La Sociedad, Apr 29, 2014

RESUMEN ¿Pueden los observadores observar la economía desde el exterior? Desarrollos recientes en... more RESUMEN ¿Pueden los observadores observar la economía desde el exterior? Desarrollos recientes en la sociología económica tienden a desdibujar la clásica distinción y combinación entre economía y sociedad, y a avanzar hacia un modelo en el que el observador se encuentra necesariamente dentro de la sociedad que él describe. El comportamiento de los agentes financieros se puede analizar mediante la combinación de dos conceptos: el concurso de belleza y el riesgo moral -una combinación que permite una traducción de su comportamiento en los términos y tradición de la teoría de la observación. El concurso de belleza de Keynes puede ser interpretado como un reconocimiento sistemático de la observación de segundo orden: los operadores financieros observan principalmente a otros observadores y lo que estos observan. Esta observación produce circularidades peculiares -incluyendo el insoluble problema del riesgo moral, el cual reproduce el famoso modelo de Merton de las profecías autocumplidas y autofrustradas en el campo de las finanzas. Sin embargo, si las finanzas consisten en observaciones de segundo orden, entonces sus movimientos no pueden ser explicados más con referencia al mundo, sino con referencia a la observación y sus estructuras: la referencia a la realidad de las finanzas es proporcionada crecientemente por calificaciones crediticias que solo pueden ofrecer información respecto de lo que los demás observan. La expansión de las calificaciones crediticias en las últimas décadas y las dudas sobre su fiabilidad están relacionadas con el movimiento generalizado de la sociedad moderna hacia la observación de segundo orden, lo cual produce problemas y enigmas específicos, así como estructuras y restricciones.

Philosophical Perspectives on Fashion, ed. by G. Matteucci and S. Marino. Bloomsbury, London-New York 2017.

by Stefano Marino, Richard Shusterman, and elena esposito

Philosophical Perspectives on Fashion, ed. by G. Matteucci and S. Marino, Bloomsbury, London-New York 2017, 2017

ABSTRACT "Philosophical Perspectives on Fashion" places philosophical approaches at the heart of... more ABSTRACT
"Philosophical Perspectives on Fashion" places philosophical approaches at the heart of contemporary fashion studies. Considering the mutual relationships between aesthetics, modern society and culture, fashion and the fine arts, and the way these relationships have influenced and shaped our views on identity and taste, this ground-breaking book also explores the various intellectual and cultural movements that inform how people dress. The leading fashion and philosophy scholars contributing to this volume refer to and apply theories posed by key thinkers of the modern and contemporary age, from Darwin and Wittgenstein to Husserl and Goodman, in order to answer questions such as: What is the essence of fashion and the reasons behind its fascination? What is 'anti-fashion'? What or who do we imitate when we 'follow' fashion? What is fashion criticism and what should it be? Anyone studying or interested in fashion or philosophy will find this book a rich source of ideas, insight and information. "Philosophical Perspectives on Fashion" is a valuable contribution to contemporary fashion theory, one that revitalises the way we look at the form, purpose and meaning of fashion.

TABLE OF CONTENTS.

Introduction: Philosophical Perspectives on Fashion,
Giovanni Matteucci and Stefano Marino

- 1 Philosophical Accounts of Fashion in the Nineteenth and Twentieth Century,
Stefano Marino

- 2 Fashion: A Conceptual Constellation,
Giovanni Matteucci

- 3 Anti-Fashion: If Not Fashion, Then What?,
Nickolas Pappas

- 4 Fits of Fashion: THe Somaesthetics of Style,
Richard Shusterman

- 5 On Fashion Criticism,
Lars Svendsen

- 6 Thought Without Concept: Carol Christian Poel's Paradoxical Aesthetics,
Christian Michel

- 7 Caprices of Fashion in Culture and Biology: Charles Darwin's Aesthetics of 'Ornament',
Winifried Menninghaus

- 8 Fashionable Proteus: The Euphoria of FAshion for Fashion's Sake,
Cesar Moreno-Marquez

- 9 The Fascination of Contingency: Fashion and Modern Society,
Elena Esposito

Index

REVIEWS.

“This edited volume is likely to provoke much-needed debate about the relationship between philosophy and fashion. Using a philosophical lens, the authors address and push questions with which fashion theorists have been grappling: is anti-fashion a useful concept in fashion criticism? Is there, or can there be, an essence of fashion? To what extent can fashion be understood as a dialectic between imitation and differentiation? To what extent does fashion rely on ambivalence and ambiguity? Philosophical Perspectives on Fashion will be a welcome addition to the literatures on fashion and philosophy alike.” – Susan B. Kaiser, University of California, Davis, USA,

“A timely and thought-provoking collection of contributions, which explore fashion from a specifically philosophical perspective and reflect on the complex and dynamic nature of fashion itself. This book, much needed in philosophy, will open the field to further debates and lines of inquiry.” – Flavia Loscialpo, Southampton Solent University, UK.

Die Ordnung des Kontingenten. Beiträge zur zahlenmäßigen Selbstbeschreibung der modernen Gesellschaft

by Alberto Cevolini and elena esposito

Forgetting Machines: Knowledge Management Evolution in Early Modern Europe

by Alberto Cevolini, elena esposito, Koji Kuwakino, Tiziano Dorandi, José Aragüés, and Markus Krajewski

We are so accustomed to use digital memories as data storage devices, that we are oblivious to th... more We are so accustomed to use digital memories as data storage devices, that we are oblivious to the improbability of such a practice. Habit hides what we habitually use. To understand the worldwide success of archives and card indexing systems that allow to remember more because they allow to forget more than before, the evolution of scholarly practices and the transformation of cognitive habits in the early modern age must be investigated. This volume contains contributions by nearly every distinguished scholar in the field of early modern knowledge management and filing systems, and offers a remarkable synthesis of the present state of scholarship. A final section explores some current issues in record-keeping and note-taking systems, and provides valuable cues for future research.

Elena Esposito - Circularidades económicas y observación de segundo orden: la realidad de las calificaciones crediticias

by elena esposito and Hugo Cadenas

MAD, 2014

¿Pueden los observadores observar la economía desde el exterior? Desarrollos recientes en la soci... more ¿Pueden los observadores observar la economía desde el exterior? Desarrollos recientes en la sociología económica tienden a desdibujar la clásica distinción y combinación entre economía y sociedad, y a avanzar hacia un modelo en el que el observador se encuentra necesariamente dentro de la sociedad que él describe. El comportamiento de los agentes financieros se puede analizar mediante la combinación de dos conceptos: el concurso de belleza y el riesgo moral –una combinación que permite una traducción de su comportamiento en los términos y tradición de la teoría de la observación. El concurso de belleza de Keynes puede ser interpretado como un reconocimiento sistemático de la observación de segundo orden: los operadores financieros observan principalmente a otros observadores y lo que estos observan. Esta observación produce circularidades peculiares –incluyendo el insoluble problema del riesgo moral, el cual reproduce el famoso modelo de Merton de las profecías autocumplidas y autofrustradas en el campo de las finanzas. Sin embargo, si las finanzas consisten en observaciones de segundo orden, entonces sus movimientos no pueden ser explicados más con referencia al mundo, sino con referencia a la observación y sus estructuras: la referencia a la realidad de las finanzas es proporcionada crecientemente por calificaciones crediticias que solo pueden ofrecer información respecto de lo que los demás observan. La expansión de las calificaciones crediticias en las últimas décadas y las dudas sobre su fiabilidad están relacionadas con el movimiento generalizado de la sociedad moderna hacia la observación de segundo orden, lo cual produce problemas y enigmas específicos, así como estructuras y restricciones.