Pixel or it Didn't Happen: Thinking With (and Through) Terrestrial Pixels

• In Event: Visualizing Security: Remote Sensing, Visualization Technologies and the Making of Risk and (In)securities II - Knowledge Production in Insecure Worlds

Abstract

In this presentation, I will investigate the political economy of a remotely-sensed terrestrial pixel: how this most basic unit of a digital earth image is negotiated and constructed. First, I will briefly explore the guidelines that constitute accuracy in the world of terrestrial remote sensing. In this realm, accuracy -- also known as validity or “ground truth” -- is the extent to which a pixel’s discrete, digital identity aligns with a continuous, analog reality on the ground. As both the digital signatures and the on-the-ground measurements are negotiated by scientists and their instruments, I will trace the pathways by which these negotiations occurs. Secondly, I will clarify how these notions of accuracy -- both on a screen and on the ground -- guide climate science, warfighting, and resource extraction projects by way of remotely-sensed data. I aim to catalyze a dialogue around the ways in which data inform instrumentalism in terrestrial remote sensing research or, more specifically, I aim to ask the question: How is the discrete pixel turned into an actionable thing? I will conclude that (1) the terrestrial pixel contains politically oppositional stabilities, and (2) that terrestrial satellite data is often sold as a savior of humane and environmental causes, while its most actionable findings relate to warfighting and resource extraction.

Author

• Samantha Jo Fried, Virginia Tech