How Data Happened by Bradley Wiggins
Tracing the rise of data from early state record-keeping and Enlightenment attempts to quantify populations through the development of statistics, bureaucracy, and surveying, the book shows how measurement practices and institutions—censuses, insurance, scientific classification, and colonial administration—produced modern data infrastructures. It connects nineteenth- and twentieth-century techniques like actuarial science, eugenics, and survey methods to the emergence of computing, algorithms, and machine learning, arguing that data is socially produced and shaped by power, politics, and institutional interests. By following the people, tools, and incentives behind data collection and use, it highlights how seemingly neutral numbers embed historical biases and how contemporary algorithmic systems inherit those legacies, raising ethical and democratic questions about transparency, accountability, and who benefits from data-driven decisions.
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- 2023
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