In yesterday’s class, I was lecturing on four approaches in dealing with distributive justice of science and technology policy, namely: utilitarian, libertarian, (John) Rawl’s contractarian, and communitarian. Of course I talked more about the dominant, if implicit, distributional framework of ST policy, which is utilitarian one, with the reading from Cozzens. We know that in the utilitarian view, a distributional system is justified as long as it increases total happiness for the group, not among the individuals. Utilitarianists argue that what they advocate contributes to economic growth and the solution of major societal problems, and then let other areas of policy (social one) worry about whether the benefits are distributed equally or not, or whether everybody get benefit or not — they ‘grow the pie’ someone else cuts it.
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I want to write about so many things. About the soon-to-be-formalized pornographic bill, about the US election, about the 3 dollar package that killed more than twenty people in Indonesia… ah about so many things. But, as always, not enough time/energy, and then last Sunday (yesterday) I squeezed my left hand between headboard and bedframe while fixing the bed set (ouch, that’s perhaps one of the most talented parts of my body) so now I have difficulties typing. So I’ll just write something short, unimportant though.

I am on a tenure-track and supposed to go for tenure and promotion in about 4 years from now, according to the US university system. So, still long way to go. (more…)

Last Tuesday we talked about the politics of technology in my JUS 494 class. Just like my JUS 394 class last semester, I began this class, too, with endorsing the idea that technology is political — the politics are built into the design of the artifact. How? You can listen to my lecture, but ah, perhaps that’s really too much to do, it’s a long lecture. Just enjoy the slideshow then. Though without my lecture, the slideshow is barely understandable.
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The first week of semester is almost passed and I survived the first week class of JUS 494: Science, Technology, and Inequality. I got 30 students filled all seats in my class (max 30) and still have some students emailed me asking for an override. We’ll see whether there’s any student who drop next week or not.

The first week is all about introduction. Introduction to the class, to the syllabus, to the professor, to the students, to all. Professor-students’ introduction part was quite fun. I got each of students in the class spoken about who she/he is, what she/he likes, and why she/he is in my class — all in less than one minute :). (more…)

Schedule:
Tuesdays-Thursdays afternoon somewhere at ASU

Professor:
Dr. Merlyna Lim

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Not yet home, but it’s only 5.5 hours away from my Tempe home. Many stories to share from all of my transit places as it took me about 5 days to get here from Dayeuhkolot with stopovers in Jakarta, Singapore, and Tokyo.

Now I am sitting here in the circle of Dupont in Washington DC, trying to finalize my powerpoint presentation to deliver this afternoon at the Independence Day’s celebration (and 100 years of Nationalist Awakening) of Indonesian Embassy. Just knew yesterday that apparently I am the only speaker in this event, and it scares me a little.
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After Los Angeles, I had another conference trip. This time it was Minneapolis conference on Media and Human Right. Honestly, being drugged all the time didn’t help much in preparing me for the presentation. And for this presentation, I couldn’t recycle from my old powerpoint files. I hadn’t presented this one before.

But anyway, between sleepy and drowsy (biggest chunk of my time in LA and Minnesota was spent for sleeping!) I managed to finish my powerpoint before my turn. In order to hinder me from rambling too much, I decided not to take the painkiller before my panel. So I was kinda in pain. The result was I became a different person. This time my presentation was serious. No usual jokes. I was fast. And perhaps furious :p. Pain kept me awake too. And perhaps it’s good to be ‘different’, since I only had 10 minutes ++ to tell all! (more…)

Can we talk about non-ness without nonsense?
Can you be nonscientific and yet be rational?
Can you be rational and non-utilitarian?
Is there intellectual space for non-evidential knowledge?
Can technology close intellectual space for alternatives to technology?
Can we open a self-sustaining space for interactions of systems of knowledge?
Can story-tellers capture reality better than scientists? (more…)

Oh, so good to be home again. I just got back home after a week trip in the Brit land of Cambridge and London. Despite some usual odds — if you're interested, you can check out my series of postings on 'luggage, glasses and the gate' here (English version) or here (Indonesian version, yes it's a totally different side of me!!!!) — it was a great trip. 

What a coincidence, a conference I attended in Cambridge shared the same topic with a London workshop, though they were organized by different people and different institutions, from two different worlds. The world of scholars/academics and the world of activists (NGOs). Both were about the public interests of information and communication technologies.  

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I spent some hours of my weekend planning on the Summer trips. Three months ago, my plan was to split the summer into a long stay in Indonesia to do research and fun and a long stay here in Tempe to write. But two months ago, the whole plan was changed as one rare opportunity to go to a place I'd always wanted to go came. A conference in St Petersburg Russia!!! I cannot and shouldn't miss it. And it also means that I might stop by Amsterdam the Netherlands as I'll fly with NWA/KLM — I could always make events in the Netherlands of course. My former professors, colleagues, are friends are there! It means I need to get Russian and Schengen visas. Which means I need to go to LA to apply for a Schengen visa at the Netherlands consulate as they only serve in-person application! Ugh.

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