The limits of computation: A philosophical critique of contemporary Big Data research

Abstract

This paper reviews the contemporary discussion on the epistemological and ontological effects of Big Data within social science, observing an increased focus on relationality and complexity, and a tendency to naturalize social phenomena. The epistemic limits of this emerging computational paradigm are outlined through a comparison with the discussions in the early days of digitalization, when digital technology was primarily seen through the lens of dematerialization, and as part of the larger processes of ''postmodernity''. Since then, the online landscape has become increasingly centralized, and the ''liquidity'' of dematerialized technology has come to empower online platforms in shaping the conditions for human behavior. This contrast between the contemporary epistemological currents and the previous philosophical discussions brings to the fore contradictions within the study of digital social life: While qualitative change has become increasingly dominant, the focus has gone towards quantitative methods; while the platforms have become empowered to shape social behavior, the focus has gone from social context to naturalizing social patterns; while meaning is increasingly contested and fragmented, the role of hermeneutics has diminished; while platforms have become power hubs pursuing their interests through sophisticated data manipulation, the data they provide is increasingly trusted to hold the keys to understanding social life. These contradictions, we argue, are partially the result of a lack of philosophical discussion on the nature of social reality in the digital era; only from a firm metatheoretical perspective can we avoid forgetting the reality of the system under study as we are affected by the powerful social life of Big Data.

Social Media Mechanisms for Right-Wing Political Violence in the 21st Century: Discursive Opportunities, Group Dynamics, and Co-Ordination

“…Digital platforms are not just neutral social arenas but rather they are built on certain underlying algorithms that remain opaque and often inaccessible to scholarly studies but nonetheless shape and condition the social interactions that take place. 64 This means that researchers only have access to a selection of the processes that enable and shape political organizations online, and these may also differ significantly across platforms.…”

Investigación del comportamiento de menores y jóvenes en las redes sociales mediante técnicas de Social Big Data

“…Del mismo modo se debe apreciar que la recopilación de datos a gran escala debe ser cuidadosa con la representatividad de los datos puesto que pueden dar lugar a decisiones erróneas (UN Global Pulse, 2018;Uman, 2018), lo que no es ajeno a la perspectiva de la ciencia social computacional (Törnberg & Törnberg, 2018). Además, se encuentran los potenciales riesgos relacionados con el daño a la privacidad e intimidad, la libertad de expresión y el derecho a la información (Arellano, 2014;Shuijing, 2015…”

Selling black places on Airbnb: Colonial discourse and the marketing of black communities in New York City

“…The company does not own this rental real estate, but instead collects fees by acting as a broker between those with dwellings to rent and those looking to book lodgings. Airbnb is thus part of a growing trend of online platforms that function as information hubs for connecting users, often referred to using one of a plethora of marketing premodifiers—“smart,” “social,” or “sharing”—which in reality signals their transformation of the social through an added technical intermediation (Törnberg and Törnberg, 2018). As is argued in the introduction of this special issue, this development, which Srnicek (2017) calls “platform capitalism,” implies an expansion of entrepreneurialism beyond states and regulation, and into the life of citizens (Foucault et al., 2008).…”