When reading the Wright article that outlines the debate on whether GIS should be considered a science or a tool there were some very interesting points raised. The article made me think for the very first time about the significance of the definition of GIS and what it is categorized as. I had never stopped to think that the difference between the words ‘science’ and ‘system’ could be such a debate. Additionally, this seemingly unimportant word choice has a huge impact on possible grant money, tenure, and overall legitimacy in the education and scientific community. Whilst reading the article I couldn’t help but begin to wonder where I fell on the ‘fuzzy spectrum’ of GIS classification. As a undergraduate student at McGill I found myself most drawn to the argument of GIS as a tool; as this description of GIS was one I could recognize. However, I began to wonder how my position and current status as a geography undergraduate student affected how I viewed GIS. For me, GIS was always a set of equations and methods used on a set of data to store, process, and analyze it. Furthermore, one could use these results to make some rather visually stimulating maps for projects. However, reading further into the article I realized – perhaps an individual’s positionality affects how they use and thus define GIS. For a software developer such as ESRI, GIS is perhaps seen more as the second position of GIS (as toolmaking) because they focus mostly on the coding and design of the computer program. For professors or other academics, GIS may be a science as they use core concepts (usually integrated into the software) to explore hypotheses/research. Therefore, the categorization of GIS would differ based on the person doing the categorizing.
The article – while excellent at provoking a stream of thought in my mind – was also somewhat confusing in certain parts. I found that there was a general lacking in of a clear definition of GIS. In each of the three ‘positions’ one can take on GIS, I found that Wright picked elements to his liking and molded the definition of GIS to properly fit that viewpoint while completely ignoring other key elements of the ‘system’. This brings me to my next point of contention: that Wright mentioned in the introduction that the ‘s’ in the GIS stands for ‘system’ rather than ‘science’. Unfortunately, Wright never thought to indicate to the reader what he means by Geographic Information System, how it differs from ‘science’, and how it connects to the debate. Finally, I thought that the discussion on what it means to do ‘science’ was somewhat vague, as no concrete definition of science was ever described. This part of the article felt very heavily based on philosophy (concerning the ‘isms’) and didn’t feel like it was doing what it was supposed to – which was to describe what science is.
Overall I liked the article, it made me think about what I study and how it is viewed by other people. Being as I am I figured: I’ll study what I like and not worry about what other people think – now I am not so sure. It also made me think about how I will describe what I study to my friends and family, do I focus more on the scientific aspects of GIS, the toolmaking, or the tool itself? At any rate, I think this seemingly circular argument of the word ‘science’ over ‘system’ all boils down to semantics should be left to the linguists for now.
Until next time,
Nod