Computer Sciences Are Social Sciences

Computer Sciences Are Social Sciences is the thesis I wrote for my PISE bachelor degree. I wrote it between February and June 2023. After my graduation, I also held some presentations and talks about the topic.

This repository contains all the source files and resources related to the thesis.

Workshop: Knitting Our Internet

Since I feel very strongly about the topics of this thesis, I have been thinking hard of ways to inform and involve people. Out of this effort, a workshop came out, and I am thrilled to ne hosting it in many amazing occasions, with diverse crowds of various ages.

The workshop is called Knitting Our Internet.

Feedback and corrections

I am keen to discuss about anything related to this thesis! Get in touch if you’d like!

I wrote my thesis as a young undergraduate student. Even if it is highly unlikely, there might be information that is partly or even fully incorrect. I apologise for this, and I invite you to contact me if you spot any kind of mistake!

Obsolescence

The text of the thesis is not being updated. Please, be aware that there might be information that becomes incorrect or wrong because of obsolescence.

Table of contents

1. Introduction
2. An Historical Account
   1. Paul Baran’s centrifugal network
   2. Licklider and ARPA
   3. The Web
   4. The Internet’s original sin
3. The spread of Surveillance Capitalism
   1. The Unprecedented
   2. Economy and technology: an inseparable duo
   3. The essence of technology
4. Case study: Hong Kong’s Umbrella Movement
   1. The political context: Hong Kong’s strive for democracy
   2. Puppeting emotions: social media as a political actor
   3. Becoming water: protests’ decentralization and repression
   4. An interpretation in terms Hannah Arendt’s philosophy
5. Where the current Internet fails
   1. Algorithms as Black-Boxes
   2. Proprietary software
   3. Surveillance Capitalism, once again
   4. The case of Truth Social
   5. Turning the origins upside down
6. A better Internet
   1. The method: Philosophy in Science
   2. Using technology to pursue utopias
   3. Adversarial Interoperability
   4. Algorithmic Sovereignty
   5. Decentralized social media: the Fediverse
7. Conclusion
8. Thank you
9. References

Missing things

Notes of arguments or topics that did not fully make it into the thesis.

• what is the problem with current Internet? Pinpoint why I am giving solutions. Solutions to what?
  • Technocratic degeneration of society
  • Public administration digital infrastructure subsidized to privates
• the better Internet
  • Decentralization
    • ≠ blockchain
    • forcing interoperability by design.
    • horizontal vs vertical scalability
  • Alternative thinking, alternative technology
    • Obsidian, Luhmann, Zettelkasten
    • Deleuze’s rhyzomes
  • The Fediverse as a/the solution
  • Yarmo’s point about self-hosting
• underline cypherpunks ≠ crypto-anarchism/cyberanarchism
• Panopticon
• Making ethical internet “cool”!

Insights

A list of random insights I noted down before writing the thesis.

• Bernard Stiegler
• Digital spaces ownership
• Digital anarchism
• Intersectionality, coded bias
  • Feminism
  • Racism
• social media are of critical relevance because they are not mere services, but the medium through which virtually anything is conveyed
• content responsibility, freedom, regulation
• oil industry comparison
• Wiener’s Cybernetics?
• Hayek in relation to Wikipedia?
• The opposite of move fast, break things… ?
• peer-to-peer
  • encryption
  • distribution of load and power
• Jonas’ ethics of technology

Notes from meeting with professor

Tuesday 20 September 2022

• Heidegger sul senso della tecnica. La preoccupazione fondamentale è che la tecnica da mezzo neutrale si trasformasse in fine. Non più l’uomo che
• Hans Jonas: il problema del futuro non sarà più cosa noi potremo fare con la tecnica ma cosa la tecnica potrà fare di noi: Tecnica, medicina ed etica, primi capitoli
• Günther Anders: L’uomo è antiquato

Articoli più recenti che mettono in pratica quanto scritto prima
Come lo strumento tecnico è fatto condiziona l’utente. Esempio delle chiavi delle stanze più pesanti. Lo strumento non è neutro

Il modo in cui le tecniche si presentano impone anche un certo ordine social e un certo ordine culturale

Come orientano l’azione? Chi decide come viene orientata?