Digital Technologies: Benefits, Functioning, and Developments

• Grant number: 24/21899-6
• Support Opportunities: Scholarships abroad - Research Internship - Scientific Initiation
• Start date: April 01, 2025
• End date: June 28, 2025
• Field of knowledge: Humanities - Philosophy - Epistemology
• Principal Investigator: Itala Maria Loffredo D'Ottaviano
• Grantee: Letícia Vitorino da Silva
• Supervisor: Jorge Manuel Anacleto Louca
• Host Institution: Centro de Lógica, Epistemologia e História da Ciência (CLE). Universidade Estadual de Campinas (UNICAMP). Campinas , SP, Brazil
• Institution abroad: Instituto Universitário de Lisboa (ISCTE-IUL), Portugal
• Associated to the scholarship: 23/18018-5 - Epistemicide and digital technologies: a philosophical-interdisciplinary study, BP.IC

Abstract

The marks of Portuguese colonization on Brazilian lands are still carried today by those who suffered, and continue to suffer, from epistemicide. However, amidst the adversity of invisibility faced by cultures oppressed by the erasure of their epistemologies, digital technologies can serve as a means of support. As tools for territorial demarcation, raising awareness of problems, and providing more representation for these peoples, technologies have been helping in various ways to bring to light some cultures that were once suppressed by attempts to standardize knowledge. In this research project, our focus is to delve into the topic of digital technologies, aiming to explore the hypothesis about the benefits that digital technologies (whether information and communication technologies or artificial intelligence) can bring to the indigenous peoples of Brazil. We will present a brief introduction to historical colonization, with emphasis on the concept of epistemicide as presented by Boaventura de Sousa Santos and Maria Paula Menezes (2010) and Sueli Carneiro (2023). It will also be primarily discussed how information and communication technologies (ICTs) and artificial intelligences (AIs) have impacted society-positively or negatively-over the past decade. To this end, we will study their development and functionality to understand their societal implications. However, we intend to highlight the possible benefits that these technologies have brought or may bring to human life, specifically focusing on Brazilian ethnic groups.