Bumble: 2/28 post class

My post will probably ree flect some of the fear that comes out of Starfish's response...

why is it that technology always seems to get us into a frenzy? For one thing, humans are creatures of habit and so thinking about dramatic change can throw someone off and make them freak. But, if we all notice gradual changes which creep up on our society (as in all of the technology we are obsessed and involved in) we accept them, because we do not view them as change.

The class about technology initiated a lot of discussions and thoughts regarding development of technology… where in the world is it taking us? One of the most fascinating things about class was all of the tangents that we could connect to the Poster reading. In my group we were discussing that technology has led to an increase and shift of communication patterns and techniques. What is boggling is that a majority of our lives are spent communicating and interacting with people who are not physically there. If we each got a penny for the number of times we pick up our cell phones to communicate in the virtual world of technology, we would be billionaires. Then, if we continued with the number of times we each went into a virtual space like the internet and either spoke with someone via e-mail or instant messenger, we would have money to the gazillionth power! First of all with the amount of time we are walking and talking with people who are not around you, reminds me of the Habermas concept of hyperstimulated sensitivity. I can be in a room with 10,000 people and be talking with someone who is thousands of miles away. This also relates to the post modern concept of blurring the lines of space and time. I can instantaneously press a call button on a little cell phone and talk with my parents in Dubai, when they might be having dinner and I am eating breakfast. The physical space is irrelevant and time is blurred, we are taking but they are living in tomorrow. It is eerie to think about how we even try to conceptualize time and space and categorize it. Honestly though, by taking a post modern stance on it all, there is no such thing as time, it is intangible. Internet allows us also to follow time in a cyclical pattern and not linearly. Think about a book online, you can click on a word that might take you to a tangent that you might be thinking about, and then click again and keep moving your thoughts rapidly in a non-linear progression. Imagine we applied the information technology concept to a regular paper… In school we learn to follow a thesis and intro which leads you in order through a progression in a paper. While jumping from concept to concept might make sense to the writer, would it make sense to the reader? Perhaps we still need to keep this linear lines for certain things.

What does this development of interactions in the virtual world even mean? For one thing, it brings up the aesthetic of speed and technology. If I am at work in an office, who has time anymore to get up and walk to the person down the hallway? NO ONE! We have a need for speed and with a click of a button we can intercom them or e-mail them.

Another thing is that it all contributes to the shift in communication techniques and strengths. In the past, before the explosion of technology, people were dependent on face to face interpersonal communication. People needed to directly interact and were dependent of non verbal cues. Now, if we look at the preferred means of communication it would be the least face to face as possible. Particularly between the relationship between males and females who are attracted to one another. The easiest thing is to pick up a phone and text them, or “facebook” them, which has now become a verb. What does it mean that we have come to the point that our communication skills have so depleted to the point that picking up a phone and calling is still a step in the “too extreme” direction. My brother, who is just 6 years older, finds texting aggravating, and is much more comfortable talking to other people in face to face communication.


In this world where we are spending more and more time in cyber space, we have to put our imagination to good use! Are our relationships and communication with others online actually real? This reflects Baulldriard’s idea of reality, and is there such thing as reality?

I feel like these developments question what it means to be human. Particularly as we keep delegating tasks from our mind (our central processing system) to faster, smarter and more efficient computers. Particularly with cell phones and memorizing numbers, we already outsource that information. The last time I memorized a phone number was when I was in middle school. We have all delegated our mathematical skills to calculators; we delegate information searching to our blackberries and google.com. Will humans ever have to think again? What happens when they put these outsourced like our phones in a chip and implant them into our heads? We will truly be living into a virtual world.