[-empyre-] Process as paradigm: Time/Tools/Agency

[Yann Le Guennec]

Hello Maria

Maria Verstappen a écrit :
> Hello Yann, How can a computer, this "environment" act by itself. A
> computer needs to be programmed in order to process, in order to
> network, in order to self organize, in order to simulate. 

Sure, i see the computer as a multilayered thing, including hardware and 
software. I dont think a computer can only be seen from it's hard side, 
if so, it would just be like a stone on a beach. I think a computer is 
both a physical and logical machine.

> So I rather
> stay with the idea of a "tool", though a very special one.
> 
>> Believing in this context that computers, bits in silicium, genetic
>> codes, global networks connected to global economy at the speed of
>> light, that all these entangled things are just tools, looks
>> like... outdated positivism?,
> 
>> missing the fact that our existence at every level is getting
>> modeled (at abstract level) by these things, that these things are
>> deciding for us, for many instants in our life, more than we can
>> decide for ourself, as human entities.
> 
> I'm not missing that at all, but these things are caused by the
> software, not by the tool (the hardware). Best, Maria

I think they are caused by the whole system including hardwares, 
softwares, electricity, networks, abstractions, codes, and humans with 
minds at many positions in this global system. In this context, a 
computer can be seen as an interface between an agent and this system, 
if we consider that this agent is outside the system. But at this point, 
the computer is not a black box anymore (a tool) but a black hole (an 
environment) swallowing everything in it's logical abstract structure, 
including the agent mind ('a fortiori' if this agent is a programmer ;-).

Best,
Yann