ABSTRACT
Any work that is carried out on engagement with research and investigation into academic discipline or field of inquiry must also involve itself in an engagement with the notion of data. 'Data' is a signifier: it represents, it involves identification and, as a consequence of all these constructions, it does. In the study of geodetics, for example, a datum acts as a starting point; it is a point from which all other measurements can be projected and, thus, as a system of ordinates. It offers a view of the world which is imbued with fixity, stability and the metaphysical artifice of prediction: the datum enables us to know where we are. When the terrain is rocky, treacherous and unpredictable, the datum offers a sense of security which provides the uncertain traveller with something to trust. This chapter proposes a madness as methodology which conceptualises data as constantly event/ful and that promotes an active and problematising conceptual elision of data/non/data.
