A few thoughts on the political artifacts paper that I found very interesting and am tempted to develop further in a blog post format.
Here is one common way that the claim “Artifacts are neutral” tends to be understood.
- Artifacts are strictly dependent on users
- As users [subjects of use] we are able to make judgments (on how to best use them)
- Therefore, artifacts are dependent on our own judgment
I want to defend the proposition that artifacts are not neutral and that they are not merely dependent on human judgments. The reason for this claim is that artifacts possess features that act as built-in functions, which fulfill design stage intentions and shape specific outcomes - individual and collective. In other words, artifacts have their own norms and in turn, generate social effects independently of human judgments. Example: speed bumps are designed to reduce car speed in certain contexts and purposely function independently of human judgments. Speed bumps are intentional artifacts, in their own right.
Also, we need to distinguish between levels of complexity of artifacts. Think in particular about automated artifacts. A table is not the same as a youtube algorithm, which is designed to be sticky - increase use volume on the platform.
I hope this helps the discussion on this topic.