Aesthetics of Universal Knowledge

Simon Schaffer is Professor of History of Science at the University of Cambridge, UK. He is the author of La fabrique des sciences modernes and the coeditor of The Material Cultures of Enlightenment Arts and Sciences.
John Tresch is Associate Professor of History and Sociology of Science at the University of Pennsylvania, USA. He is the author of The Romantic Machine: Utopian Science and Technology after Napoleon, among other works.

Pasquale Gagliardi, former Professor of Sociology of Organizations at the Catholic University of Milan, Italy, is now Secretary General of the Giorgio Cini Foundation in Venice, Italy. He is the author of Symbols & Artifacts. Views of the Corporate Landscape and Le imprese come culture, among other books.

Born out of a major international dialogue held at the Fondazione Giorgio Cini in Venice, Italy, this collection of essays presents innovative and provocative arguments about the claims of universal knowledge schemes and the different aesthetic and material forms in which such claims have been made and executed. Contributors take a close look at everything from religious pilgrimages, museums, and maps of the world, to search engines and automated GPS.
Current obsessions in information technology, communications theory, and digital culture often concern the value and possibility of a grand accumulation of universally accessible forms of knowledge: total libraries, open data bases, ubiquitous computing, and 'smart' technologies. These obsessions have important social and philosophical origins, and they raise profound questions about the very nature of knowledge and its organization. This volume's contributors draw on the histories of maps and of encyclopedias, worldviews and visionary collections, to make sense of the crucial relation between the way the world is known and how it might be displayed and transformed.

Offers a very interdisciplinary approach, bringing together philosophers, historians, anthropologists, sociologists, technical experts, and artists.

Preface: Text And Context: Genius Loci; Pasquale Gagliardi.- Introduction; Simon Schaffer.- Part I. Visions.- 1. Re-Visioning The World: Mapping The Lithosphere; Adam Lowe And Jerry Brotton.- 2. Architects Of Knowledge; Pierre Chabard.- 3. Pictorialism (Prelude & Fugue); Cheryce Von Xylander.- 4. The Unending Quantity Of Objects: An Observation On Museums And Their Presentation Modes; Anke Te Heesen.- Part II. Worlds.- 5. Cosmopragmatics And Petabytes; John Tresch.- 6. Gaia Without The Sphere; Bruno Latour.- 7. Mapping Dark Matter And The Venice Paradox; David Turnbull.- Part III. Economies.- 8. The Web, Google And Cosmograms; Steve Crossan.- 9. Rhetoric, Economics, And Nature; Deirdre N. Mccloskey.- 10. Lodestar; Richard Powers.