The Philosophy of Information Quality

The Philosophy of Information Quality

SYNTHESE LIBRARY STUDIES IN EPISTEMOLOGY, LOGIC, METHODOLOGY, AND PHILOSOPHY OF SCIENCE Editor-in-Chief LUCIANO FLORIDI, University of Oxford, Oxford Internet Institute, United Kingdom Editors THEO A.F. KUIPERS, University of Groningen Fac. Philosophy, The Netherlands TEDDY SEIDENFELD, Carnegie Mellon University Dept. Philosophy, USA PATRICK SUPPES, Stanford University Ctr. Study of Language & Information, USA JAN WOLEŃSKI, Jagiellonian University of Krakow Institute of Philosophy, Poland DIRK VAN DALEN, Utrecht University Department of Philosophy, The Netherlands VOLUME 358 For further volumes: http://www.springer.com/series/6607

Luciano Floridi Phyllis Illari Editors The Philosophy of Information Quality

Editors Luciano Floridi Oxford Internet Institute University of Oxford Oxford, Oxfordshire, UK Phyllis Illari Department of Science and Technology Studies University College London London, UK ISBN 978-3-319-07120-6 ISBN 978-3-319-07121-3 (ebook) DOI 10.1007/978-3-319-07121-3 Springer Cham Heidelberg New York Dordrecht London Library of Congress Control Number: 2014946731 Springer International Publishing Switzerland 2014 This work is subject to copyright. All rights are reserved by the Publisher, whether the whole or part of the material is concerned, specifically the rights of translation, reprinting, reuse of illustrations, recitation, broadcasting, reproduction on microfilms or in any other physical way, and transmission or information storage and retrieval, electronic adaptation, computer software, or by similar or dissimilar methodology now known or hereafter developed. Exempted from this legal reservation are brief excerpts in connection with reviews or scholarly analysis or material supplied specifically for the purpose of being entered and executed on a computer system, for exclusive use by the purchaser of the work. Duplication of this publication or parts thereof is permitted only under the provisions of the Copyright Law of the Publisher s location, in its current version, and permission for use must always be obtained from Springer. Permissions for use may be obtained through RightsLink at the Copyright Clearance Center. Violations are liable to prosecution under the respective Copyright Law. The use of general descriptive names, registered names, trademarks, service marks, etc. in this publication does not imply, even in the absence of a specific statement, that such names are exempt from the relevant protective laws and regulations and therefore free for general use. While the advice and information in this book are believed to be true and accurate at the date of publication, neither the authors nor the editors nor the publisher can accept any legal responsibility for any errors or omissions that may be made. The publisher makes no warranty, express or implied, with respect to the material contained herein. Printed on acid-free paper Springer is part of Springer Science+Business Media (www.springer.com)

Acknowledgements This volume is the outcome of a project funded by the Arts and Humanities Research Council, under the title Information Quality Standards and their Challenges, during the academic years 2011 2013. We are extremely grateful to the AHRC for its generous funding, without which our research would have been impossible. Many people played a significant role throughout the project that led to this volume. Naomi Gummer, Sarah Hunter, and Marco Pancini, all at Google, were pivotal in shaping the earlier stage of the project. Their support was essential and one of us (Luciano) imposed on their kind availability more than once. He knows his moral debt cannot be repaid. During the development of the project, we relied on the extensive help and support of many colleagues, in particular Carlo Batini, Matteo Palmonari and Gianluigi Viscusi, Università di Milano Bicocca; of Andrew Bass, Christian Benninkmeijer, Ian Dunlop, Suzanne Embury, Matthew Gamble, Carole Goble, Pedro Mendes and Sandra Sampaio, Manchester University; of Meredith Nahm, Duke University; and of Monica Scannapieco, Italian national institute of statistics. Particular thanks are due to Suzanne Embury who set up the meetings for one of us (Phyllis) in Manchester and, along with Sandra Sampaio, answered many questions. Throughout the project, Penny Driscoll provided exceptional managerial support. We are also grateful to speakers and participants in the symposium on information quality, organised as part of the AISB/IACAP World Congress 2012, July 2 6, Birmingham; and in the workshop on information quality, organised at the University of Hertfordshire, December 14 2012. A final thanks goes to all the authors of the chapters in this volume, for their time and scholarship, and for their commitment to a rather demanding research agenda. v

Contents 1 Introduction... 1 Luciano Floridi and Phyllis Illari 2 Information Quality, Data and Philosophy... 5 Phyllis Illari and Luciano Floridi 3 Forget Dimensions: Define Your Information Quality Using Quality View Patterns... 25 Suzanne M. Embury and Paolo Missier 4 Opening the Closed World: A Survey of Information Quality Research in the Wild... 43 Carlo Batini, Matteo Palmonari, and Gianluigi Viscusi 5 What Is Visualization Really For?... 75 Min Chen, Luciano Floridi, and Rita Borgo 6 Object Matching: New Challenges for Record Linkage... 95 Monica Scannapieco 7 Algorithmic Check of Standards for Information Quality Dimensions... 107 Giuseppe Primiero 8 The Varieties of Disinformation... 135 Don Fallis 9 Information Quality in Clinical Research... 163 Jacob Stegenga 10 Educating Medical Students to Evaluate the Quality of Health Information on the Web... 183 Pietro Ghezzi, Sundeep Chumber, and Tara Brabazon vii

viii Contents 11 Enhancing the Quality of Open Data... 201 Kieron O Hara 12 Information Quality and Evidence Law: A New Role for Social Media, Digital Publishing and Copyright Law?... 217 Burkhard Schafer 13 Personal Informatics and Evolution in the Digital Universe... 239 Jeremy Leighton John 14 IQ: Purpose and Dimensions... 281 Phyllis Illari 15 Big Data and Information Quality... 303 Luciano Floridi