Speaker: Prof. Dr. Susanne Bauer, University of Oslo
Date & Time: 3. July 2025, 17:00-19:00
Location: Goethe University, Campus Westend, SKW B
Abstract: Data critters: A Partial Inventory

Digital fish, AI-designed enzymes, voice biomarkers, epidemiological risk scores – these are just some of the digital formations that proliferate with ubiquitous datafication. Emergent data critters thrive in the life sciences and beyond; they populate research proposals, science and technology policies, public debates and are imbued with anticipation. While some data critters may be transitory and disappear again, they leave traces, modify their surroundings, are being worked upon, or seep into infrastructure. Data sets mobilized in recent AI aspirations contain legacy infrastructures that cannot be fully disentangled; rather they need to be treated as mixtures and unpurified archives from the outset. Asking for what remains unaccounted for in this current digital reassembling can help render visible the orderings and politics in pertinent data ecologies. This talk will introduce a small subset of data critters and propose the format of a partial inventory as a method to engage with things digital.

We are pleased to invite you to this public keynote lectures that will take place as part of the summer school ECOLOGICAL DATA – DATA ECOLOGIES: Engaging with Methods for Critical Data Studies.