Being, space & time in the

WebMichalis Vafopoulos,

vafopoulos.org PhiloWeb 2014

Creative Commons LicenseThis work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.

The Web is everywhere

…challenging the basic aspects of human nature

o Technologyo Bodyo Moral Valueso Socialityo Generations o Economy

Humanizing the Web Webizing Humanity

Successful science & business facilitate this dialogue

Philosophy?

what changes need to be incorporated in the Web to best serve humanity?

Outline

① Hypotheses ② Being, space & time in the Web③ Potential applications

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Hypotheses

Web:• ethically-relevant social machine• magma of Users and code

start from the Web assume a self-contained Web orthe “manna from heaven” hypothesis

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“manna from heaven” hypothesis

• Web is the only existing system • human beings are

communicating & working solely through it

• a compassionate ‘God’ provides

the necessary quantity of ‘manna’, fulfilling all human needs, with no cost & effort

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Being, space & time in the Web

• A being exists if and only if there is a communication channel linking to it

• Web beings are beings communicated through the Web

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URI minimal description of invariant

elements in communication through the Web

borderline, interlocutor & fingerprint of Web being

enables transformation from digital to Web

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URIdirectly connected to existence

(birth, access, navigate, edit & death of a Web being)

other characteristics of Web beings may change in time

a change in URI means the death of existing & birth of a new Web being

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The Web space• a division of position & place

created by the links among Web beings • each Web being occupies a

specific locus in the Web network • a 3d “geographic coordinate

system” 11

The Web space• heterogeneous• many “gravity” & relative

“distance” metrics (e.g. centralities)

• Pagerank initially build on Web space

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The Web time

• a series of choices (visits) in the Web space (Bergsonian durations)

• visiting selections attach semantic meaning

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The Web time• casual relationships among

Web beings• counting: Log file as a generic

common property & co-operation in the Web

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The Web time

time of social systems is

• indeterministic• Heterogeneous • irreversible • built on the Einsteinian time

of physical systems

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The Web time

Durations are becoming:

• Discoverable • Observable • Traceable • Processable • Massive

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The Web time

increases material dimension of networks

enables reconstruction of consciousness & memory of Users

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Being, space & time in the Web

• A being exists if and only if there is a communication channel linking to it

• Web beings communicated through the Web

• Web space: the Web being’s URI, incoming & outgoing links

• Web time: visiting durations 18

Potential applications

oHow it affects the physical oValues: moral, cultural, econ. oLink economy oApp economy oexcessive market power in

Search Engine marketo … 19

Role of philosophy

What society can learn from the Web?

What can teach it in order to become more useful?

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Thank you!

• More in vafopoulos.org

References• Being, space and time in the Web.

Metaphilosophy.• The Web economy: goods, users,

models and policies. Foundations and Trends in Web science.

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