[Humanist] 26.459 when amplification makes new

[Humanist Discussion Group]

                 Humanist Discussion Group, Vol. 26, No. 459.
            Department of Digital Humanities, King's College London
                       www.digitalhumanities.org/humanist
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        Date: Tue, 6 Nov 2012 10:38:32 -0800 (PST)
        From: Laval Hunsucker <amoinsde at yahoo.com>
        Subject: Re:  26.456 when amplification makes new; usefulness of mapping interface
        In-Reply-To: <20121106064130.C74B82E10 at digitalhumanities.org>

John Laudun wrote :

> Doesn't this inquiry connect back to previous threads about the 
> location of "ability" or "knowledge" when using tools? Certainly, 
> if one follows the work of cognitive anthropologists like Charles 
> Frake and Edwin Hutchins, who argue that in cognition is embedded 
> (often) in a larger process which includes materiel outside the human 
> body, then the skilled operator does indeed possess the ability. That's 
> Frake notion, to some degree, when discussing the Medieval sailor's 
> use of the compass rose and also Hutchins' notion when exploring the 
> expanded socio-technological landscape of modern ship navigation, a 
> landscape he ultimately describes as "distributed cognition."

As far as Classics ( my former field ), at least, is concerned :  this jogs 
in my memory that, interestingly, such a line of thought was being 
pursued by Don Fowler not too long before his very untimely death, 
as I heard him discuss in a presentation which he gave at the colloquium 
"Computing in Classical Studies" at the ULondon Institute of Classical 
Studies back in February of 1998.  Willard will probably know more 
about this and about whatever further may have come of it. And, in that 
connection, I note his own relevant "A network with a thousand 
entrances: commentary in an electronic age?" ( p.359-402 in _The 
classical commentary: histories, practices, theory_ / ed. by R.K. 
Gibson & C. Shuttleworth Kraus. - Brill, 2002 ) -- an article which he 
in fact dedicated to Fowler. Perhaps he might wish to say something 
more about this.
 
- Laval Hunsucker
  Breukelen, Nederland