Theme 3 - Reflections

I participated in the lecture and the seminar this week. I discussed in the divided seminar group in the seminar where we talked generally about the definition of theory. One thing we talked about was whether and how philosophical and scientific theories are related.

I spent some time finding relevant journals and papers. I did not feel like I had to struggle that much to find the relevant answers to the themes questions this week, maybe because of how the paper was structured. Even though the questions for the blog this week in large was to understand literature and paper and draw conclusions, I felt that it was also more practical and that parts of it was to find the right answers in the paper by using the literature as manual.

I think the important issue of the week was to understand theory as a whole. I think one could think of it as, even though there might be different theory definitions depending on different fields, they are still connected to the whole subject of theory. But it might be that it can be extended/adjusted to fit the problem of the particular field.
For example, in the field of research, and when it comes to research papers, one could categorize the theories used in them according to different theory types (such as explained in “The Nature of Theory in Information Systems”), and these fits the field of research better than the philosophy field.

Theme 4

I think the paper “Noise in an intensive care unit” used quantitative methods in two cases.

They made a staff survey and gathered information about how the staff felt about the noise in an intensive care unit ([1], “Introduction”). I think the survey was a good to start with to see whether the noise problem is experienced as a problem and to what extent. The limitation may be that it is hard to determine the cause of the noise through a survey.

They also measured the sound pressure in different locations in the unit and analysed sound pressure levels of important medical devices ([1], “Description of measurements”). In this case, it is possible to see what causes the noise. The limitation may be that it doesn’t measure whether a person experiences it as a problem.

My conclusion of this is that I think the methods complemented each other.

One improvement to the survey could be to include more participants (though they did make references to similar studies which showed similar results) as it can be more accurate, and also it can be beneficial if used in the analyze and comparison with the sound pressure measurements (which may not be possible with the external studies). I could not think of any further improvements in the sound pressure measurements.

Which are the benefits and limitations of using quantitative methods?
Data can be collected efficiently and compared. Limitations can be that it doesn’t answer the question ‘why’ and that answers in a question of a survey for example can be limited, and does not always present the exact feeling/response of a participant ([2], p. 1).

Which are the benefits and limitations of using qualitative methods?
Can be used to answer the question ‘why’. Limitations may be that there can be few participants in a study and that the study may take some time due to for example data collecting and interview time where quantitative method have an advantage ([2], p. 1).

References
[1]
Noise in an intensive care unit
Salandin, Andrea and Arnold, Jörg and Kornadt, Oliver, The Journal of the Acoustical Society of America, 130, 3754-3760 (2011), DOI:http://dx.doi.org/10.1121/1.3655884
[2]
ACET, Inc. (2013).
Selecting an evaluation: Qualitative,
quantitative, and mixed method approaches.
Minneapolis, MN.

Theme 2 - Reflections

My contribution to Theme 2 the past week have been primarily in the seminar. We tried to solve out questions in the discussion group, and I contribute with some of my answers and received as well some clarification on my questions. Some questions were difficult for us, so we were in need of help in the open discussion in the seminar.

As preparation, I focused on answering the questions for the seminar and used the theme literature and wikipedia. I looked at the questions, using literature as the source of reading and looked up words in wikipedia when I did not understand parts of the text.

While the previous theme was primarily philosophical, I felt this theme was a combination of philosophy and historical facts. I think finding the connection between the philosophical thoughts and the cultural and political situation in the countries or parts of the world the authors were living in was the key concept in this theme.

Words that I saw clarification in as a result of the seminar/lecture:

Aura was perhaps the most difficult term for me to understand this seminar, and as I understood it now, it has to do with the authentic work (of art for example) which is surrounded by an aura, however once you do a reproduction of it, the aura fades away. For example, when you have a piece of art in a museum, as it is the original, it gets a special kind of attention or value. But once you make a reproduction of it, no matter of what quality, it loses its aura.

Nominalism, as I understood from the lecture and seminar, one could compare this to the leaves on a tree, where none of them are considered them same, but unique. A blue pen can be considered different from a red pen, even though they share the same name.

Theme 3

Journal: International Journal of Computer Vision
A popular journal which publishes journals in the growing field of Computer vision. Covers math, applications and the connection between computer and the human eye. The journal have a broad content in the field. [1]

Paper: Smart Grid Technologies: Communication Technologies and Standards
(journal: Industrial Informatics, IEEE Transactions on [6])
A research paper presenting the current state of the smart grid, a new, more efficient and reliable infrastructure compared to the current power grid. It focuses on providing an understanding on the current state of technologies in the field, and also on what is happening in the current research.
The paper goes through the current power grid and why it needs an upgrade, and the smart grid technologies with advantages, disadvantages and requirements [3]. Facts, backed up with references are represented along with figure and tables. The paper is quite easy to read for the common reader (some tech things in the later part of the paper can get tricky). The paper is also divided into chapters that make sense in the way they are arranged.

Question 1: What theories are and what they are not
According to the published paper “What Theory Is Not”, it is easier to claim what theory is not, rather what it is. In short, 1.references, 2. data 3. lists of variables or constructs (theory must bind them together) 4. diagrams or figures - are not theories. However, the authors agree that the answer to Why? can be a theory. ([4], pages 371-377)

Question 2: Major theory and which theory type
The major theory I would say, is the establishment of an understanding on the current state of the smart grid. Therefore, I believe the theory type to be Explanation ([5], pages 619-620).

Question 3: Benefits and limitations of using the selected theory or theories?
The Explanation theory can be used to promote further research in the field for the interested ([5], page 619). In the abstract, the authors of the paper mentions this, “… provoke interest among the the research community…” ([3], page 529). In the conclusion, the authors also invites to future work and suggests a number of topics to complete the overview on Smart Grid Technologies ([3], page 537).
The limitation of the theory is that it doesn’t have propositions and predictions. ([5], page 620)

References
[1]
http://www.springer.com/computer/image+processing/journal/11263 Retrieved 2015 sep.
[3]
Gungor, V.C.; Sahin, D.; Kocak, T.; Ergut, S.; Buccella, C.; Cecati, C.; Hancke, G.P., "Smart Grid Technologies: Communication Technologies and Standards," in Industrial Informatics, IEEE Transactions on , vol.7, no.4, pp.529-539, Nov. 2011
[4]
Sutton, R. I. & Staw, B. M. (1995). What Theory is Not. Administrative Science Quarterly, 40(3), 371-384.
[5]
Gregor, S. (2006). The Nature of Theory in Information Systems. MIS Quarterly, 30(3), 611-642.
[6]
http://ieeexplore.ieee.org/xpl/RecentIssue.jsp?punumber=9424 Retrieved 2015 sep.

Theme 1 - Reflections

With the difficulties I had with the reading of Theme 1’s text, I was glad to get some clarification on the lecture and the seminar. For example, we concluded in our group in the seminar, after discussing on various things, that previous knowledge leads us to conclusions about future knowledge. I was also relieved to know that there were others who also needed clarification on the subjects discussed. One of the things I did as preparation was to write down questions that popped up in my head during the lecture. In the preparation for the theme, I used wiki’s and encyclopaedias when I did not understand a concept in the text.

Many thoughts and concepts in Kant’s thoughts were clarified. For example:
"Thoughts without content are empty, intuitions without concepts are blind.” (Immanuel Kant, Critique of Pure Reason), although I think this phrase was put out a bit different on the lecture, at least the beginning of it. It was something like, “Conception without perception is empty, perception without conception is blind”, which actually at least for me was easier to understand. Because you can’t see anything without previous knowledge about what you see, in my understanding. And if you have knowledge about something, but never can perceive it, that knowledge would be ‘empty’ because it can’t anyway be seen.
This quote can be compared with the part from Plato’s Theaetetus, that we see ‘through’ the eyes and ears, not ‘with’. Because, it would not enough to see ‘with’ the eyes, and comprehend. But you also need the knowledge about it, which the mind possess.

The main question which to be raised (and I think which Kant was asking), was whether we can see the world objectively, or if we see through faculties. And, yes, it is possible according to Kant, we can have a objective view of the world, by objective knowledge, referring to the Kant’s categories. The categories are necessary for the intuition to come about.

Theme 2

Dialectic of Enlightenment

Enlightenment seems to me, from what I read in the chapter “The concept of Enlightenment”, be related to putting mythologies aside, and putting focus on reasoning which takes a great importance through knowledge.
I had problems understanding dialectic from the text, and had to look up the word instead. As I understand it, dialectic is a way of debating and using truth and reasoning as much as possible.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dialectic

Nominalism should be the denial of abstract things, or the denial of universals. However, I did not quite understand what universals really are, it seems that they are similar to the abstract but in the way of describing things or properties of things.
https://sv.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Universalia&redirect=no
http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/nominalism-metaphysics/
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nominalism

I was unable to find the direct connection of “Nominalism” in the text, so my hopes is that it will get more clear on the lecture/seminar.

As I understood from the text, myths can be used to explain things and explain the past through collecting and recording of happenings or things.

The Work of Art in the Age of Technical Reproductivity

My understanding is that the substructure is the foundation or the base of a function in the society and the superstructure is another function atop the substructure which are to be affected by the substructure. It seems if I understand correctly, be useful in the “politics of art”. In the text, production is mentioned, as conditions have slowly changed due to preceding cultural changes.
https://sv.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bas_och_%C3%B6verbyggnad

Benjamin mentions that film, even though he did not believe it had a revolutionary merit, did not deny that it had the possibility to “… promote revolutionary criticism of social conditions…” (part X). In the “The Culture Industry: Enlightenment as Mass Deception" part by Adorno & Horkheimer’s, something not too different from the first part of previous sentence is mentioned, where the opinion is that culture have “…contributed to the subduing of revolutionary…”.

My thoughts regarding how to determine naturally and historically perceptions of the world, is that it might be regarding how you organise and record your impressions at the time, which depends on what options you had, as it got easier by time to get the right tools to record the perceptions of the culture. From the text is an example, where a pair of scholars were limited to observe the hallmarks of 5th century but that alone seemed not suffice to explain the social changes at that time.

Understanding the term “aura” was probably the most difficult part for me on this exercise. Perhaps it has to do with appreciation of art objects at the time and that it gets harder to appreciate as time goes past, but I look forward to get a more in-depth understanding of this on the seminar/lecture.

Theme 1

In the preface of “Critique of Pure Reason”, at page B XVI, I interpret that part as that in order to think in the way of metaphysics, and not the traditional way as science goes, one would have to approach it quite the different way. If I understand correctly, instead of perceiving objects through cognition in the traditional way in order to find out something about them, somehow be aware of the object with help of intuition, which should be impossible as far as science and I guess reality goes because you would need to know the object before you can interpret it through your senses (unless some experience have been gained through cognition prior to that, where one could use the intuition to determine the object). The text continues with a further reasoning on a possible way to do that, where I lose myself a bit in the text, but as I try to understand, one should turn things around. The author refers to Copernicus and how he turned things around in the explanation of celestial motions, and while I did understand that, I could not figure out the same way with intuition and objects. I do not think I understand this thouroghly, why I look forward to the seminar.

As for the text part where Socrates and Theaetetus are discussing the difference between perceiving through and with senses, my intrepretation is that the senses are merely tools where the mind is the centre and connector of the perceived. But it also appears that mind itself can perceive things by its own, such as how you differentiate things. I looked up the word empiricsm in an encyclopedia (more precisely Wikipedia), and while I am not entirely sure, the similarities seems to be in the way that we collect information through our senses and thus do not base our conclusions on theorys and the like. However, the difference might be that the mind in which Theaetetus mentioned, is doing perceptions by its own (and I wonder whether that could be intrepreted as theorys), and that does not seem to belong in empiriscm.

Some keywords I looked up/paid some extra attention to while reading: A priori, Metaphysics and Empiriscm.