Kristo Ivanov, Professor: Platonic perspectives of information technology & IT-research

In the first part of the seminar I will summarize the reasons why Plato's (and Aristotle's) work is relevant and important for supporting basic research and graduate education in informatics. The documentation for this part of the seminar is included in the hand-out which was distributed on occasion of my two earlier seminars this autumn, held on November 10th and 17th, with the title of "End and begin with Platonic information technology?".

The second part of the seminar will introduce the manuscript which I am working on with the preliminary title of "Platonic perspectives of information technology" to be followed by another one on Aristotelian perspectives. They are both aimed at supporting my planned series of seminars and course on "Theory for systems design: current problems". (This course/seminars is scheduled to run between May 2000 and May 2001/2002 and the second part of the seminar can also be seen as an explanation of its written description that was announced the past week, together with an invitation to those who are interested in following the course to submit a preliminary statement of intent after the seminar.)

The manuscript is based on personal reading-notes with a structure that will be explained during the seminar. It will be introduced by explaining its layout, and by excerpting from it an item which exemplifies the work that is being done, with possible references to research done by others at our department and in our discipline. The participants of the seminar who happen to be familiar with some of Plato's work will have the opportunity to expose their view or main question on the matter. At least 45 minutes of the time will be reserved for this purpose. The participants are therefore encouraged to prepare themselves for the seminar with the help of the written material mentioned above and by visiting the excellent and challenging web-site http://phd.evansville.edu/plato.htm, and especially its link to http://eawc.evansville.edu/essays/suzanne.htm.

Välkommna!
John Cumberbatch