Palestinian Border-Making in Digital Spaces

The dissertation conceptualizes border making online through a historical and spatial analysis of the Palestinian Web, by using digital methods for Web research. It analyzes the emergence and development of the Palestinian Web from the introduction of the Internet in the Palestinian Territories in 1993, immediately after the establishment of the Palestinian National Authority following the Oslo Interim Peace accords, and until 2010.

Gender, Judaism, Internet: Religious Authority and Feminism in Online Spaces

This dissertation deals with relationships between gender, Judaism and the internet, and focuses on opportunities and challenges facing Jewish religious feminists in obtaining religious authority for women in online spaces. The purpose of the study is to examine the ways in which female religious authority is shaped in different online spaces, and how these spaces can serve the purposes of religious feminism in reforming the structures of religious authority. The study seeks to shed light on the relationship between religion and the Internet, and the relationship between religious women and the Internet in particular.

Advocacy Center Manager, ITIM

הגבלה חברתית של טכנולוגיה: ניתוח וביקורת על פי SCOT

התפישה הרווחת באשר להתפתחות טכנולוגית מסמנת רציונאל משותף בבסיס השקת גרסאות חדשות של טכנולוגיה: להוסיף – ולא להפחית – עוד אפשרויות, עוד יכולות, עוד דרכי הפעלה שלא עמדו לרשות המשתמש בגרסאות הקודמות של המוצר. עבודה זו תבחן אירועים המעמידים רציונאל זה על ראשו. היא תציג שרשרת אירועים שמובילה לכך שתכונה שהיתה זמינה קודם לכן, נבלמת, נמנעת או נמחקת לגמרי בגרסה החדשה.

העבודה מבקשת לענות על כמה שאלות מרכזיות: מה קורה כאשר נוצר פער בין כוונות מפתחי הטכנולוגיה, שמנסים לכוון את המשתמש לסוג "השימוש הנכון", לבין השימושים בפועל של המשתמשים, שיכולים "לקרוא" שימושים אחרים מהשימושים שנצפו מראש ותוכננו על ידי היצרנים? מהו אופי המאבק שנוצר בין הקבוצות החברתיות השונות סביב "הפרשנות הנכונה" וכיצד מנסות חלק מהקבוצות להחזיר לידן את השליטה על "השימוש הנכון" בטכנולוגיה?

The Social Construction of LSD: How Set and Setting Shaped the American Psychedelic Experience 1950-1970

This study examines the way in which the 1950s and 1960s hallucinogenic drug research was shaped by extra-pharmacological factors (set and setting).  It relates the story of nine distinct schools of mid-twentieth century hallucinogenic research and demonstrates how their social and cultural assumptions ended up shaping the outcomes of their research, sparking a scientific controversy which had profound implications for the reception of psychedelics in 1960s culture and for the development of the 1960s counterculture. By looking at the role of set and setting – a tapestry of physical, social and cultural framing elements such as research agenda, expectation, priming, aesthetics, politics and culture – the study points to psychedelics’ inherent interpretative flexibility, and to the way in which the dispositif  into which they were injected, shaped the psychedelic experience in mid-twentieth century American culture. 

Dr. Katvan, senior lecturer and head of research authority, College of Law and Business, received his first Ph.D. from the Faculty of Law, Bar-Ilan University, where he produced his thesis titled: “Compulsory Examinations and Their Connection to the Oppression of Women”.  He received his second Ph.D. at the Interdisciplinary Program for Science, Technology & Society at Bar-Ilan University (his thesis titled: “The Medical, Physical and Mental Examinations of Jewish Immigrants to Eretz-Israel 1919-1939”).  Eyal’s academic interests lie in the fields of bioethics, law & medicine; The Legal and Medical Professions; legal history and the history of medicine; He specializes in the topics of “Medical, Physical and Mental Examinations,” as well as “Women's Legal History" (especially "Women's Entrance into and Integration within the Legal and Medical Professions in Eretz-Israel and in Israel") and The History of Law & Medicine.  He is a member of the Israeli Bar since May 1998; Eyal also served as a visiting scholar at: the Center for Clinical Bioethics, Georgetown University, Washington D.C.; The Hadassah-Brandeis Institute on Jewish Women at Brandeis University; the Department of Ethics, Philosophy and History of Medicine, Radboud University Medical Center, Nijmegen, Netherlands; the International Institue for the Sociology of Law, Onati, Spain; and the Max-Planck-Institute for European Legal History, Frankfurt, Germany. He served as the chair of Public Committee on Age as a Criterion for Organ Transplantation. 

Ph.D. Research title: Techno-educational Imaginaries and the Startupization of Education: Ethnography of an Edtech Incubator (Submitted: January, 2017).

Expert Systems:  the Promise, the Disappointment, the Comeback

The tale of Expert Systems as unveiled in this dissertation reflects an ambitious project of imitating a phenomenon created by nature: being able to adapt, so as always to make the right decision. The conclusion, which calls for the adoption of nature's "strategy" – evolution and natural selection – seems to be the unavoidable solution. In the struggle for survival, Expert Systems must adopt the same strategy which made their human partner a winning species.

Location Based Services and Local Communities

Using qualitative and quantitative methods, this work examines the role of location based social networks in mediating local social interactions. Combining social theories such as Place Attachment and the Familiar Strangers to analysis of big data trends, the analysis points to the way this technology shapes local identity and urban dynamics. 

Computational Sociologist, Research Lead at Oculus

A History of Life-Extensionism in the Twentieth Century​

This work explores the history of life-extensionism in the 20th century. The term life-extensionism is meant to describe an ideological system professing that radical life extension (far beyond the present life expectancy) is desirable on ethical grounds and is possible to achieve through conscious scientific efforts. This work examines major lines of life-extensionist thought, in chronological order, over the course of the 20th century, while focusing on central seminal works representative of each trend and period, by such authors as Elie Metchnikoff, Bernard Shaw, Alexis Carrel, Alexander Bogomolets and others. Their works are considered in their social and intellectual context, as parts of a larger contemporary social and ideological discourse, associated with major political upheavals and social and economic patterns. The following national contexts are considered: France (Chapter One), Germany, Austria, Romania and Switzerland (Chapter Two), Russia (Chapter Three), the US and UK (Chapter Four).

The Code of Life: Computer Simulations of Emergent Phenomena in Complex Biological Systems

My dissertation focused on the scientific value of dynamic computer simulations in two principal manners: Their ability to form a scientific explanation of biological phenomena and their ability to generate new emergent phenomena (structure or behavior), making possible a prediction or hypothesis about the equivalent real phenomena. The discussion was guided by a thorough inspection of three state-of-the-art highly complex computer simulations that demonstrate emergence of novel treats, features or behaviors, not specifically designed or programmed within the computerized models. It seems that simulations have a "life" of their own, characterized by complexity, creativity and dynamic interactive computational power, which can exceed the standard Turing computation. These features, I showed, along with various considerations in the construction process of the simulation and its user-interface, allow the formation of new features and unexpected behaviors, which may serve as speculations in the scientific sense and as a basis for further real-life in-vivo research. The verification and validation processes integrated into the simulations, the usefulness and contribution of the models in scientific discourse and the cumulative reliability of the applied techniques, ultimately provide simulations their credibility and scientific significance.

Head of Science & Technology Department at CET (Center for Educational Technology, Matach). Also a Photographer and Geneologist, editor and manager of the Organization of Siedlcers in Israel website (http://www.siedlce.org.il).

Technics and Subjectivity: Case Studies of 21st Century Technologies

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My dissertation is based on the presupposition that contemporary technologies are based on a new paradigm. There is a difference, I argue, between tools, machines and digital technologies (such as the cellphone), so that each of them produces different experiences. This dissertation examines the experiences provided by digital technologies, using as a case study the cellphone, the emblem of contemporary everdayness.