Software, Abstraction, and Ontology

Colburn, Timothy R.

doi:10.5840/monist19998215

Cited by 24 publications

(9 citation statements)

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“…This is to say that the properties, structures, operations, relations and the like present in each M i can be effectively implemented into the KS i without stating explicitly how such implementation is carried out (the same can be said about the integration and aggregation steps). Colburn and Shute call this form of abstraction information hiding, and to them it constitutes a novel form of abstraction introduced by computer science (Colburn 1999;Colburn and Shute 2007). Examples include abstracting from the details how the messages among computer processes are passed on, how the computer hardware represents the value of parameters, and how programming languages handle irrational numbers, among other exclusively computational related issues (Colburn and Shute 2007).…”

Section: Recastingmentioning

confidence: 99%

What is a Simulation Model?

Durán

2020

Minds & Machines

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Many philosophical accounts of scientific models fail to distinguish between a simulation model and other forms of models. This failure is unfortunate because there are important differences pertaining to their methodology and epistemology that favor their philosophical understanding. The core claim presented here is that simulation models are rich and complex units of analysis in their own right, that they depart from known forms of scientific models in significant ways, and that a proper understanding of the type of model simulations are fundamental for their philosophical assessment. I argue that simulation models can be distinguished from other forms of models by the many algorithmic structures, representation relations, and new semantic connections involved in their architecture. In this article, I reconstruct a general architecture for a simulation model, one that faithfully captures the complexities involved in most scientific research with computer simulations. Furthermore, I submit that a new methodology capable of conforming such architecture into a fully functional, computationally tractable computer simulation must be in place. I discuss this methodology-what I call recasting-and argue for its philosophical novelty. If these efforts are heading towards the right interpretation of simulation models, then one can show that computer simulations shed new light on the philosophy of science. To illustrate the potential of my interpretation of simulation models, I briefly discuss simulation-based explanations as a novel approach to questions about scientific explanation.

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Section: Recastingmentioning

confidence: 99%

What is a Simulation Model?

Durán

2020

Minds & Machines

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“…I want to analyze here only the second point, that concerning the ontological status of software. Colburn (1999) defines software by coining the expression "concrete abstraction," underlining its dual, almost contradictory nature. Abstractness and concreteness are essential properties of software.…”

Section: Kittler Writesmentioning

confidence: 99%

Towards a hermeneutic definition of software

Possati

2020

Humanit Soc Sci Commun

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The paper intends to establish a comprehensive definition of software from a postphenomenological and hermeneutic point of view. It intends to show the contribution of continental philosophy to the study of new technologies. In section "Introduction: why do we need a comprehensive definition of software?," I underline the need for a philosophical analysis that can highlight the multifaceted and paradoxical nature of software. In section "Engineering in written form: the five criteria," starting from some remarks on the history of programming languages, I define a list of minimal requirements (five criteria) that something needs to meet to be qualified as software. All these requirements share two essential features: the written form and the effectiveness, that is, the need to be executed by a physical machine. In section "Software as text: a hermeneutic model," I focus on software as form of writing. I develop this idea by using Ricoeur's hermeneutic model. I claim that software is a type of text. In section "The grammatology of microprocessor," I focus on the second aforementioned feature: the effectiveness of software. I claim that this effectiveness is based on the analogy between electric circuitries and Boolean logic. Software is a writing and rewriting process that implies an interpretation on two levels, epistemological and ontological.

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“…9 It is very difficult to establish a clear limit between the philosophical tradition that discusses this problem and a more technological tradition. Timothy R. Colburn (1999) is a very well-known author in the technological field for discussing the problem of the dual nature of software or its ontology, just as David R. Koepsell (2003)like an invented machine or process, or an original expression to be copyrighted, like drawings and books? This distinction is artificial, argues Koepsell, and is responsible for the growing legal problems related to intellectual property law.…”

Section: Approaches To Softwarementioning

confidence: 99%

An Ontology of Software: Series, Structure and Function

et al. 2020

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This article proposes a guideline to develop an ontology of software. The first section gives a brief introduction to the importance of such ontology as a possible conceptual grounding for the philosophy of software, philosophy of computing and philosophy of information. The second section presents the background of the scope of this article in terms of both a symbolic and materialistic approach to software. The third section deploys the basic guidelines with the expositions of the two dimensions of software: the serial dimension and the structural dimension. The first dimension consists of three series, while the second in the exposition of the structure of any program. The fourth and last section will deal with a better understanding of what we can call the digital universe.

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Software, Abstraction, and Ontology

Cited by 24 publications

References 0 publications

What is a Simulation Model?

What is a Simulation Model?

Towards a hermeneutic definition of software

An Ontology of Software: Series, Structure and Function

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