front cover of From Science to Computational Sciences
From Science to Computational Sciences
Studies in the History of Computing and its Influence on Today‘s Sciences
Edited by Gabriele Gramelsberger
Diaphanes, 2011
In 1946 John von Neumann stated that science is stagnant along the entire front of complex problems, proposing the use of largescale computing machines to overcome this stagnation. In other words, Neumann advocated replacing analytical methods with numerical ones. The invention of the computer in the 1940s allowed scientists to realise numerical simulations of increasingly complex problems like weather forecasting, and climate and molecular modelling. Today, computers are widely used as computational laboratories, shifting science toward the computational sciences. By replacing analytical methods with numerical ones, they have expanded theory and experimentation by simulation.

During the last decades hundreds of computational departments have been established all over the world and countless computer-based simulations have been conducted. This volume explores the epoch-making influence of automatic computing machines on science, in particular as simulation tools.
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front cover of Natures of Data
Natures of Data
A Discussion between Biologists, Artists and Science Scholars
Philipp Fischer, Gabriele Gramelsberger, Christoph Hoffmann, Hans Hofmann, Hans-Jörg Rheinberger, and Hannes Rickli
Diaphanes, 2020
Computer-based technologies for the production and analysis of data have been an integral part of biological research since the 1990s at the latest. This not only applies to genomics and its offshoots but also to less conspicuous subsections such as ecology. But little consideration has been given to how this new technology has changed research practically. How and when do data become questionable? To what extent does necessary infrastructure influence the research process? What status is given to software and algorithms in the production and analysis of data? These questions are discussed by the biologists Philipp Fischer and Hans Hofmann, the philosopher Gabriele Gramelsberger, the historian of science and biology Hans-Jörg Rheinberger, the science theorist Christoph Hoffmann, and the artist Hannes Rickli. The conditions of experimentation in the digital sphere are examined in four chapters—“Data,” “Software,” “Infrastructure,” and “in silico”—in which the different perspectives of the discussion partners complement one another. Rather than confirming any particular point of view, Natures of Data deepens understanding of the contemporary basis of biological research.
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