< Social computing has also attempted to provide theoretical
foundations to the design of Ubiquitous Computing, through
analysing in depth the interaction between individuals and the
world they inhabit as supported, mediated, enhanced and also
limited by computation. One of the philosophical traditions that
have been consistently considered so far within social computing
is phenomenology. Following the work of researchers like Husserl,
Heidegger, Schutz and Merleau-Ponty, phenomenology has
developed different philosophical interpretations of the human
experience of the world. At the basis of this approach is the
realizationthat experience constitutes the starting point of our
knowledge of the world, and that thoughts and intentions arise
as the consequences of being in the world instead of existing
beforehand, as the Cartesian approach was suggesting.
The practical aspect of existence and our perception of it
determine the way we are and we act within the ‘lifeworld’.
Wihtin HCI, the research of Winograd and Flores, Dourish,
Suchman and Robertson, among others, has been inspired by
Phenomenology. >