For this purpose, we distinguish two perspectives that have shaped most existing work on artefacts. To describe the background against which many papers in this issue have been written, we briefly take stock of the traditional situation of artefacts in analytic philosophy, in particular metaphysics. Finally, we give an overview of the papers in this issue. Then, we sketch some promising, very recent developments regarding the philosophy of artefacts. We first present the way in which artefacts have typically been studied in analytic philosophy. In this introduction, we set the stage for this exchange. In particular, we want to start a cross-disciplinary exchange and interaction between philosophy of technology and analytic metaphysics. With the collection of papers we present in this special issue, we aim to strengthen artefacts as a topic for philosophical research. In this work, philosophy of technology seems not to play a detectable role. ) and a volume has been published in which artefacts are approached from the perspective of metaphysics and cognitive science ( Philosophers have discussed the nature and categorisation of artefacts ( In this subdiscipline, traditional metaphysical inquiries into the nature, constitution and categorisation of reality are made by using the methods of analytic philosophy, such as formalisation and conceptual analysis. The importance of scientific instruments and experimentation for epistemology and the philosophy of science has been scrutinised in, e.g., Radder (Īnother subdiscipline of philosophy in which work on artefacts has appeared is analytic metaphysics. ) and in the philosophy of engineering and architecture ( Comparably cross-disciplinary volumes have been published on artefacts in the philosophy of psychology and technology ( ) in which analyses of functions of both biological items and artefacts are contrasted and integrated. ), for instance, wrote a monograph on the artefact model in the philosophy of biology, and this will be followed up with an edited volume ( This development can also be witnessed in recent publications, and this special issue is another contribution to this exchange and interaction. Yet, some of that recent work seems to be conducted in relative isolation of the analysis of artefacts in the philosophy of technology, a situation which calls for establishing exchange and interaction between our field and the other fields involved. Research on artefacts is arguably suitable for cross-disciplinary research, since artefacts play a role in technology but also in, say, biology, psychology, cognitive science and architecture. But outside of our field artefacts have also become a topic of analysis, as is witnessed in a series of recent publications. In our field of philosophy of technology, they obviously already held centre stage, most notably in, for instance, the work of Don Ihde ( Artefacts in Analytic Metaphysics: Introductionĭepartment of Philosophy and Ethics of Technology,Īrtefacts analytic philosophy metaphysicsĪrtefacts increasingly become the subject of philosophical attention.
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