Another issue of "Technology and Language" has appeared, and with it a new call for contributions that appeals to the interests of science and technology studies, of linguistics and multilingualism, of cultural and literary studies, art and engineering education.

https://soctech.spbstu.ru/en/issue/15/ www.philosophie.tu-darmstadt.de/T_and_L

Guest-edited by Elena Seredkina and LIU Yongmou, the most recent issue is dedicated to “ChatGPT and the Voices of Reason, Responsibility, and Regulation”: When we evaluate the capacity of ChatGPT to match or surpass human capabilities, this is evidently an invitation to look at ourselves. Some of the authors offer enactivist or Derridean accounts of human communication, understanding, and thought that allow for machines to do the same. Others cite creativity and conceptual reasoning to highlight an unbridgeable gap between human and machine intelligence. ¬– More generally, André Leroi-Gourhan (1911-1986) viewed humanity through the lens of technical intelligence. His 1952 lecture on the origin of science is here for the first time published in English, accompanied by three papers about his historical and philosophical legacy. Werner Rammert finally provides a social pragmatist perspective on "Doing Things with Words and Things."

For the June 2025 issue, we are issuing once again a general call for contributed papers (deadline March 15, 2025). All papers at the intersection of technology and language will always be considered, of course. This is a chance also to submit small groups of papers, e.g., from workshops, conferences, summer schools, research projects. This issue can exhibit a great variety of themes: on the language of things, on human and machine voice, on resonance, on technology and tragedy – or comedy or farce. And much more.

Other open calls (shortened):

„Speculative Technologies“ (inquire about the upcoming submission-deadline) — It is a distinctive feature of human language that we can refer to things that aren't there - to events in the future or the past and even to things that wiill never exist. Does this hold for technology as well? Can machines and other technical schemes refer to impossibilities? Can they invite us to engage in hypothetical thinking about alternate worlds? And where do they come from, what is the cultural or socio-technical milieu for their conception? Astronomical clocks invoke ideas of the cosmic order, a perpetuum mobile reflects the human ambition to conquer physical limits, von Kempelen’s chess player challenges humans to question human and machine intelligence, prototypes herald an imagined future, envisioned carbon reduction technologies enter into calculations of climate futures - and a machine that is standing still holds the secret to that machine in motion. There is a long tradition of wish-fullfilment machines (quantum computers, fusion reactors), and a long tradition of difference engines with different settings for various contingencies. We invite historical reconstructions, philosophical reflections, and cultural technology assessments on this range of subjects. (guest editors: Anna Kotomina and Colin Milburn)

“Translation - Theory and Technology” (deadline: Oct 5, 2024) —A mechanical device delivers faithful translations of rotary motion into the vertical back and forth of a beam - and vice versa. Ludwig Wittgenstein analogized translation to the ways in which a musical performance can be mapped onto the grooves of a gramophone record as well as a score - no interpretation involved. And if only the data set is big enough, new computer applications for translating between natural languages require nothing but the discovery of correlations in the occurrence of words in phrases - again, no interpretation involved. To be sure, there are other conceptions which highlight gains and losses, proximity and distance, inventiveness and transformation in the process of translation. If one thinks of translation as a kind of transport from the one bank of a river to the other side, this would be akin to the work of engineers who transport knowledge of functional regularities in biological systems into the sphere of human devices. And if one thinks of the techniques and collaborative arrangements for rendering old meanings in new settings, one will appreciate how new works and new ideas are created. — Considered for its linguistic as well as technical dimensions, the art of translation will be of interest not only to philosophers, linguists, and literary scholars, but also to cultural studies, biomimetics, mathematics and engineering. (guest editors: Andrea Breard and Marco Tamborini)

mediaopera. Recomposing Agency (deadline: Dec 15, 2024), guest editor:

Cheryce von Xylander. The word „opus“ refers to a technically or artfully produced work. The plural form „opera“ refers to an art-form that draws together many artists and technicians - musicians, singers, dancers, architects and builders of the space, costume and light designers, and then writer(s) and composer(s), conductor(s) and stage-director(s) who bring all this together. Not only the cinema has been transformed by video which is now routinely incorporated in opera stagings and, most recently, spawned a whole new genre of „mediaoperas“

• such as „Einstein and Margarita,“ „Theremin’s Last Secret,“ or „Pink Mouse“ by Iraida Yusupova. Akin to the medieval and renaissance Cathedral, modern opera and cinema enable assembly — and the „Gesamtkunstwerk“ finally constellated is arguably never completed. — We invite contributions from history, art theory, media studies, data science, sociology, philosophy, and related fields to consider more generally the configuration of aesthesis in social space: How are technical media and sensory modalities organised in spectacular art-forms which herald the historical changes they exemplify?

Beyond these calls for special topics, any submitted paper and interdisciplinary exploration at the interface of technology and language is always welcome. The next deadline for submitted papers in English or Russian is October 10, 2024.

“Technology and Language” is a quarterly journal: international, peer reviewed, Scopus listed, online, open access, academic (no fees). Queries, suggestions, and submissions can be addressed to soctech@spbstu.ru or to Daria Bylieva (bylieva_ds@spbstu.ru) and Alfred Nordmann (nordmann@phil.tu-darmstadt.de).

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