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Applying Wittgenstein in scholarly communication: A framework to overcome the challenges of transdisciplinary communication
  • Asura Enkhbayar
Asura Enkhbayar
Simon Fraser University

Corresponding Author:[email protected]

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Abstract

In times of ever accelerating technological progress scholarly communication is increasingly inter- and cross-disciplinary, posing the challenge of communicating specialized terminology across disciplines. In this paper I want to illustrate how a therapeutic application of Wittgenstein coupled with modern technology can help to overcome this problem. Instead of attempting to formalise or theorise Wittgenstein's idea to address the challenges an application of Wittgenstein is proposed which attempts to utilise technology in a therapeutic manner that clears away the mist of confusion caused by the use of (interdisciplinary) language. This essay is an attempt to show a potentially fruitful way of using Wittgenstein to engage in the applied sciences. Furthermore, the goal of overcoming the challenges of transdisciplinary communication are addressed from the perspectives of two theories: One the one hand technology games (Coeckelbergh, 2017) provide ample grounds for further discussion of technology and communication in Wittgensteinian terms. On the other hand conceptual metaphor theory (Lakoff & Johnson, 2003) serves as a framework for the mechanics of a technical solution for transdisciplinary communication. Finally, in the therapeutic framework and the proposed solutions are evaluated using the existing tool Open Knowledge Maps. The  analysis of both theoretical framework and practical solution shall exemplify how to move beyond theorising, in the hope to show a new way of applying Wittgenstein in a modern and technology-driven scholarly communication.