Jag börjar allt mer inse vattnets betydelse för sjöfarten. Så lär kung Gustav V ha sagt en gång i samband med dop av ett fartyg. Uttalandet har senare kommit att bli ett sätt uttrycka att något är så uppenbart att det knappast ens behöver sägas. Vilken betydelse har datorer för tänkandet? Frågan är relevant att ställa i en tid när datorer gör intrång på allt fler områden och har blivit en så naturligt integrerad del av våra liv att användningen av dem sällan ifrågasätts. Svaret på frågan är dock inte lika uppenbart som den om vattnets betydelse för sjöfarten. Denna masteruppsats i yrkeskunnande och professionsutveckling rör sig i gränslandet mellan maskiner och människor och handlar om hur datorer och datoranvändning påverkar det mänskliga tänkandet och den mänskliga kunskapen. Utgångspunkten är den brittiske matematikern Alan Turings arbete och hans berömda artikel från 1950, med titeln Computing machinery and intelligens, där han definierar ett test (Turingtestet) avsett att kunna avgöra maskiners tankeförmåga. Den traditionella tolkningen av artikeln är att Turing menade att det en dag kommer att vara möjligt att bygga en maskin som kan imitera allt mänskligt beteende perfekt (Turingmaskinen), vilket har gett upphov till forskningsområdet artificiell intelligens. I praktiken har dock maskiner inte kunnat ersätta människor på det sätt som man trott och som många fortfarande tror. Närmandet mellan människor och maskiner tar sig andra uttryck. Utvecklingen går snarare i en riktning som gjort att människor genom att använda maskiner anpassar sig till och allt mer börjar likna dem. Vi förvandlas till Turingmänniskor med succesivt minskande utrymme att utöva vårt omdöme och ta ansvar, när maskinerna ställer sig i vägen för det mänskliga sinnet och känslan.

(in English): Chatbots are automatised computer programs which are built to simulate an exchange in communication with a human being. Simultaneously, they provide new user interfaces. In 1994, Jacob Nielsen defined ten heuristic rules that are traditionally used within the design of user interfaces. This thesis's aim is to find out whether these ten rules are applicable in new fields of conversational environments. Secondly, what are the conditions under which the exchange becomes possible. The matter was examined through a qualitative research with the sample of eleven respondents who'd created chatbots within the Czech professional environment. The next step was a grounded analysis of existing established theories. The theoretical part explains the context in which chatbots are being created. It also shows theoretical canons of user interfaces which are the base of data and experience for the researches.

The Enigma code was one of the most dangerous and effective weapons the Germans wielded at the outbreak of the Second World War. The Enigma machine was capable of encrypting radio messages that seemed virtually unbreakable. In fact, there were 158,900, 000,000,000 possible combinations in any given message transmitted. On the eve of the war’s outbreak, the British had recently learned that the Poles had made significant progress against this intimidating cipher in the early 1930s. Incensed and with little help, the British Government Code & Cipher School began the war searching for a solution. Drawing from their experiences from the First World War, and under the visionary guidance of Alan Turing, Gordon Welchman, and countless others, the British created a new, mechanical approach to breaking the seemingly impossible German code. By breaking the code, they could very well save Britain.

The aim of this thesis is to report on a transdisciplinary approach, regarding the complexity of thinking about human embodiment in relation to machine embodiment. A practical dimension of this thesis is to elicit some principles for the design and evaluation of virtual embodiment. The transdisciplinary approach suggests, firstly, that a single discipline or reality is, on its own, not sufficient to explain the complexity and dynamism of the embodied interaction between the human and machine. Secondly, the thesis argues for thinking of transdisciplinary research as a process of individuation, becoming or transduction, that is, as a process of mediation between heterogeneous approaches rather than perceiving research as a stabilized cognitive schema designed to accumulate new outcomes to the already-there reality. Arguing for going beyond the individualized approaches to embodiment, this thesis analyzes three cases where the problems that appear in one case are resolved through the analysis of the following one. Consisting of three phases, this research moves from objective scientific 'reality' to more phenomenological, subjective and complex realities. The first study employs a critical review of embodied conversational agents in human-computer interaction (HCI) in a learning context using a comparative meta-analysis. Meta-analysis was applied because most of the studies for evaluating embodiment are experimental. A learning context was selected because the number of studies is suitable for meta-analysis and the findings could be generalized to other contexts. The analysis reveals that there is no 'persona effect', that is, the expected positive effect of virtual embodiment on the participant's affective, perceptive and cognitive measures. On the contrary, it shows the reduction of virtual embodiment to image and a lack of consideration for the participant's embodiment and interaction, in addition to theoretical and methodological shortcomings. The second phase solves these problems by focusing on Mark Hansen's phenomenological account of embodiment in new media. The investigation shows that Hansen improves on the HCI account by focusing on the participant's dynamic interaction with new media. Nevertheless, his views of embodied perception and affection are underpinned by a subjective patriarchal account leading to object/subject and body/work polarizations. The final phase resolves this polarization by analyzing the controversial work of Alan Turing on intelligent machinery. The research provides a different reading of the Turing Machine based on Simondon's concept of individuation, repositioning its materiality from the abstract non-existent to the actual-virtual realm and investigating the reasons for its abstraction. It relates the emergence of multiple human-machine encounters in Turing's work to the complex counter-becoming of what it describes as 'the Turing Machine compound'.

The aim of this thesis is to report on a transdisciplinary approach, regarding the complexity of thinking about human embodiment in relation to machine embodiment. A practical dimension of this thesis is to elicit some principles for the design and evaluation of virtual embodiment. The transdisciplinary approach suggests, firstly, that a single discipline or reality is, on its own, not sufficient to explain the complexity and dynamism of the embodied interaction between the human and machine. Secondly, the thesis argues for thinking of transdisciplinary research as a process of individuation, becoming or transduction, that is, as a process of mediation between heterogeneous approaches rather than perceiving research as a stabilized cognitive schema designed to accumulate new outcomes to the already-there reality. Arguing for going beyond the individualized approaches to embodiment, this thesis analyzes three cases where the problems that appear in one case are resolved through the analysis of the following one. Consisting of three phases, this research moves from objective scientific ¿reality¿ to more phenomenological, subjective and complex realities. The first study employs a critical review of embodied conversational agents in human¿computer interaction (HCI) in a learning context using a comparative meta-analysis. Meta-analysis was applied because most of the studies for evaluating embodiment are experimental. A learning context was selected because the number of studies is suitable for meta-analysis and the findings could be generalized to other contexts. The analysis reveals that there is no ¿persona effect¿, that is, the expected positive effect of virtual embodiment on the participant¿s affective, perceptive and cognitive measures. On the contrary, it shows the reduction of virtual embodiment to image and a lack of consideration for the participant¿s embodiment and interaction, in addition to theoretical and methodological shortcomings. The second phase solves these problems by focusing on Mark Hansen¿s phenomenological account of embodiment in new media. The investigation shows that Hansen improves on the HCI account by focusing on the participant¿s dynamic interaction with new media. Nevertheless, his views of embodied perception and affection are underpinned by a subjective patriarchal account leading to object/subject and body/work polarizations. The final phase resolves this polarization by analyzing the controversial work of Alan Turing on intelligent machinery. The research provides a different reading of the Turing Machine based on Simondon¿s concept of individuation, repositioning its materiality from the abstract non-existent to the actual-virtual realm and investigating the reasons for its abstraction. It relates the emergence of multiple human¿machine encounters in Turing¿s work to the complex counter-becoming of what it describes as ¿the Turing Machine compound¿. / Ministry of Higher Education in the Sultanate of Oman