The Evolution of Agency: Spectra of Bioagency and Cyberagency

This article examines nonhuman agency, or the capacity of nonhumans to carry out goal-directed action. The central argument is that agency should be conceptualized not as a binary (someone/something does or does not have agency) but rather as a spectrum, with degrees of agency. Based upon an empirical study of the design and use of frog dissection simulations (cyberfrogs) in high school biology classes, the author develops two parallel spectra of agency, bioagency and cyberagency, to describe the degrees of agency experienced by biological life forms and technologies. These spectra put agency into an evolutionary perspective, comparing how humans evolved agency over time to how technologies are now evolving agency. The article concludes with challenges for future research to further explore the validity and implications of a notion of cyberagency that evolves over time, can be represented on an analog spectrum, and is independent of human agency.     

Sociotechnical Interaction and Cyborg–Cyborg Interaction: Transforming the Scale and Convergence of HCI

This article describes the broadening of the range of issues addressed by human–computer interaction (HCI) in response to ongoing trends of networked and ubiquitous computing. The first trend is the growing scale of HCI, with a transformation of HCI from focusing on individuals to groups to society as a whole, resulting in sociotechnical interaction. The second trend is the increasing convergence of the human and the computer in HCI, leading to cyborg–cyborg interaction. The article considers the social and ethical implications of these two trends, in particular, the growing importance of nonhuman agency, including not only the bioagency of humans and nonhuman animals but also the cyberagency of information technology and the collective agency of networks. The article concludes that bioagency and cyberagency are in the process of converging, leading to growing collaboration not only at and through computers but also with computers.     

Agency,sociomateriality, and configuration work

Social informatics research offers insights into the relationship between information technologies and social contexts. However, the material roles of information technologies, and their interplay with the agentic work of social actors, have not been addressed. Drawing on a field study of 37 mobile knowledge workers, we examine the dual material roles (enabling and constraining) played by information technologies in their work practices. We also investigate how these workers exert agency by fashioning multiple information technologies into a functioning digital assemblage. Although information technologies provide consequential affordances that enable mobilization of work across spaces and times, they simultaneously present design-driven, local, organizational, and temporal technological constraints that require mobile knowledge workers to engage in “configuration work” to make information technologies function effectively. Building on a sociomaterial perspective, we further discuss the interplay of information technologies and work practices enacted by mobile knowledge workers, in which both human and technological agency are materialized.     

IBM's Chess Players: On AI and Its Supplements

This article investigates the ways in which the reporting of technological developments in artificial intelligence (AI) can serve as occasions in which Occidental modernity's cultural antinomies are played out. It takes as its reference point the two chess tournaments (in 1996 and 1997) between the then world champion Gary Kasparov and the IBM dedicated chess computers Deep Blue and Deeper Blue and shows how these games of chess came to be seen as an arena where fundamental issues pertaining to human identity were contested. The article considers the dominant framing of these encounters in terms of a conflict between two opposed categories—“human” and “machine”—and argues the essential role of human agency, the human supplement, in the performances of machine intelligence.     

IBM's Chess Players: On AI and Its Supplements

This article investigates the ways in which the reporting of technological developments in artificial intelligence (AI) can serve as occasions in which Occidental modernity's cultural antinomies are played out. It takes as its reference point the two chess tournaments (in 1996 and 1997) between the then world champion Gary Kasparov and the IBM dedicated chess computers Deep Blue and Deeper Blue and shows how these games of chess came to be seen as an arena where fundamental issues pertaining to human identity were contested. The article considers the dominant framing of these encounters in terms of a conflict between two opposed categories—“human” and “machine”—and argues the essential role of human agency, the human supplement, in the performances of machine intelligence.     

Boundary Objects with Agency: A Method for Studying the Design-Use Interface

The design and use of information technologies are not as easily separated as they may seem. Designers have much at stake in the use of their software, while users are greatly influenced by the design of the software that they use. In this article, I explore the complex relationships built up between the designers and users of human anatomy simulations, including processes of cooperation and conflict. I develop and apply a three-step process for studying the design and use of a software product in its social context. First, it is important to focus on the social worlds of designers and users that influence the development of the technology. Next, the emphasis shifts to the technology itself, which can be viewed as a boundary object emerging from the intersection of the contributing social worlds. Finally, the technology exhibits agency by reshaping the relationships and interactions among the contributing social worlds.     

Artificial agency, consciousness, and the criteria for moral agency: what properties must an artificial agent have to be a moral agent?

In this essay, I describe and explain the standard accounts of agency, natural agency, artificial agency, and moral agency, as well as articulate what are widely taken to be the criteria for moral agency, supporting the contention that this is the standard account with citations from such widely used and respected professional resources as the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, Routledge Encyclopedia of Philosophy, and the Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy. I then flesh out the implications of some of these well-settled theories with respect to the prerequisites that an ICT must satisfy in order to count as a moral agent accountable for its behavior. I argue that each of the various elements of the necessary conditions for moral agency presupposes consciousness, i.e., the capacity for inner subjective experience like that of pain or, as Nagel puts it, the possession of an internal something-of-which-it is-is-to-be-like. I ultimately conclude that the issue of whether artificial moral agency is possible depends on the issue of whether it is possible for ICTs to be conscious.     

电子商务对中介服务业影响思考

主要探讨了在电子商务的影响下,我国中介服务业对企业发展壮大的影响,既降低交易成本和带来更大选择范围,重整更为合理的组织结构与改变信息结构。并且论述了中介服务企业的自身发展前景问题,也就是利用电子商务为手段,更广阔,便捷的提供服务,建立更多的企业联系。     

Structure reconsidered: Towards new foundations of explanatory transitions theory

The most prominent framework for studying socio-technical transitions to date is the multi-level perspective (MLP). While appreciated for its flexibility and usefulness for studying socio-technical transitions it has not been without its critics. In this paper we focus on the ontological foundations of the MLP and its (in)ability to explain transitions and how they come about. The purpose is to initiate development of an explanatory theory for socio-technical transitions, by carrying out an immanent critique of the ontological foundations of the MLP together with a methodological critique. We show that the ontological foundations of the MLP to a large extent inhibits explanatory capacity. The argument is fourfold: since structure and agency are understood as inseparable, (i) the causal influence of material properties are undervalued, and (ii) different degrees of structural constraint and freedom of actors are ignored. As a consequence (iii) transitions are reduced to shifts in the maturity and spread of socio-cognitive rules, without analysis of systemic change. Moreover, (iv) mechanisms are reduced to recurring patterns of events which cannot explain why some transitions fail while others succeed. To remedy these limitations we outline alternative critical realist foundations for transitions theory.     

公司代理效率的随机前沿研究

以2004～2009年中国制造业上市公司的数据为基础,根据Habib和Ljungqvist提出的基于企业价值的随机前沿模型,测算公司的代理效率。研究发现:(1)我国制造业上市公司平均代理效率为70.59%,呈逐年递增趋势;(2)代理成本使得制造业公司平均每年减少27171亿元的潜在市场价值;(3)制造业各行业中,食品行业代理效率最高,电子行业代理效率最低;(4)国有企业的代理效率比私有企业低1.36%。     

旅行社员工绩效考核指标设计

基于构建旅行社绩效管理体系为前提,探讨如何设计合理的可操作性强的旅行社员工绩效考核指标,以充分调动员工的积极性,保证绩效管理在旅行社管理中发挥作用,实现旅行社的发展战略目标。     

Letter from the Editor-in-Chief

The design and use of information technologies are not as easily separated as they may seem. Designers have much at stake in the use of their software, while users are greatly influenced by the design of the software that they use. In this article, I explore the complex relationships built up between the designers and users of human anatomy simulations, including processes of cooperation and conflict. I develop and apply a three-step process for studying the design and use of a software product in its social context. First, it is important to focus on the social worlds of designers and users that influence the development of the technology. Next, the emphasis shifts to the technology itself, which can be viewed as a boundary object emerging from the intersection of the contributing social worlds. Finally, the technology exhibits agency by reshaping the relationships and interactions among the contributing social worlds.     

浅析专利代理机构培育高价值专利策略——以上海市为例

[目的/意义]基于《专利代理条例》强化高价值专利培育导向,以有效举措激励高价值专利产出和转化运用,支撑专利代理机构高质量发展.[方法/过程]通过调研分析,指出目前高质量知识产权服务的机构总体偏少,行业规模与机构规模不匹配、市场需求与机构能力不匹配、国内业务与国际业务不匹配、服务本地与服务长三角一体化乃至全国不匹配、面临...     

专利代理服务的相关研究综述

采用文献计量、总结归纳等方式对国内外专利代理服务的相关研究进行了梳理与评述,明确此领域的研究现状及热点。发现关于专利代理服务的研究主要集中于对专利代理服务的概念、内涵及其对专利质量和专利技术转移的影响作用等方面,并在此基础上指出当前研究的不足和未来研究的方向。建议加强专利代理服务对专利质量、专利技术转移深层次影响机理的研究,并开展有关专利代理服务质量的评价体系研究,以为专利代理机构各项服务在实践中的开展提供理论支撑,促进专利代理服务质量的提升以及专利代理服务业的良性发展。     

公司治理要素对代理成本影响的实证研究——来自我国上市公司的证据(2000～2007)

以2000~2007年沪深两市6264家上市公司为研究样本,以资产周转率作为代理成本的度量指标,采用最小二乘和面板数据两种计量方法,对公司治理要素与代理成本之间的关系进行实证检验。结果显示,在9个公司治理要素中,第一大股东持股比例、管理层薪酬和管理层持股比例与代理成本显著负相关;持股董事比例与代理成本显著正相关,且持股董事比例可能存在区间效应;而前五大股东持股比例、董事会规模、独立董事比例、董事持股比例和监事会规模与代理成本无显著相关性,不能有效影响代理成本。     

股权激励对中小企业双元创新战略的影响研究

设计有效的激励契约以引导高管在资源约束条件下进行理性的技术创新战略选择是提高中小企业创新能力的关键途径。本文采用2007~2014年中国中小上市公司的平衡面板数据，运用均值T检验与多元回归分析等方法实证检验了高管股权激励对中小企业双元性创新战略选择的影响。结果表明：授予高管股权激励的中小企业，自主研发投入水平、突破性创新与渐进性创新水平等均明显高于其他中小企业；在技术创新路径方面，股权激励强度越大，中小企业越倾向于选择内部自主研发，而非外部技术引进；在技术创新模式方面，股权激励强度与突破性创新模式之间存在显著的倒U型关系，这是传统委托代理理论与行为代理模型共同作用的结果。研究结论为创新导向的公司治理制度设计提供了理论借鉴与实践参考。     

On the Move: Technology, Mobility, and the Mediation of Social Time and Space

The current explosion in mobile computing and telecommunications technologies holds the potential to transform "everyday" time and space, as well as changes to the rhythms of social institutions. Sociologists are only just beginning to explore what the notion of "mobility" might mean when mediated through computing and communications technologies, and so far, the sociological treatment has been largely theoretical. This article seeks instead to explore how a number of dimensions of time and space are being newly reconstructed through the use of mobile communications technologies in everyday life. The article draws on long-term ethnographic research entitled "The Socio-Technical Shaping of Mobile Multimedia Personal Communications," conducted at the University of Surrey. This research has involved ethnographic fieldwork conducted in a variety of locales and with a number of groups. This research is used here as a resource to explore how mobile communications technologies mediate time in relation to mobile spaces. First the paper offers a review and critique of some of the major sociological approaches to understanding time and space. This review entails a discussion of how social practices and institutions are maintained and/or transformed via mobile technologies. Ethnographic data is used to explore emerging mobile temporalities. Three interconnected domains in mobile time are proposed: rhythms of mobile use, rhythms of mobile use in everyday life, and rhythms of mobility and institutional change. The article argues that while these mobile temporalities are emerging, and offer new ways of acting in and perceiving time and space, the practical construction of mobile time in everyday life remains firmly connected to well-established time-based social practices, whether these be institutional (such as clock time, "work time") or subjective (such as "family time").     

Places and Spaces: The Historical Interaction of Technology, Home, and Privacy

While recent developments in information and communication technologies have produced heightened concern over privacy issues, technology and privacy have a long history of interaction. The home has served as a key locus for this interaction. By distinguishing inside from outside, the home supports the allocation of particular behaviors and information to different areas, both physical and virtual. This article explores how different technologies, including structural elements, have affected and reflected over time the boundary represented by the home and how that boundary has helped shape the construction of privacy in the West. This illustrates how privacy might be conceptualized as a social condition arising from the interaction of various boundaries, including the principal one separating the public and the private.     

陕西省上市公司代理成本研究

分析陕西省上市公司存在代理成本的现状和代理成本的计量;然后,建立模型分析找出引起代理成本居高不下的原因从而提出降低代理成本的措施。     

财政补贴、代理问题与企业技术创新——基于R&D投资异质性视角

利用深圳证券交易所2008~2013年上市高新技术企业的数据,基于第二类委托代理问题,研究政府财政补贴对创新投入与创新模式的影响。研究结果显示:财政补贴对高新技术企业的创新投入具有正向促进作用;财政补贴对创新模式的影响存在差异,即财政补贴对探索式创新有激励作用,而对开发式创新没有作用;控制权私有收益对财政补贴与创新投入之间有负向调节作用;控制权私有收益对财政补贴与探索式创新产生正向调节作用,而控制权私有收益对财政补贴与开发式创新之间的关系不起作用。