HIGH TECH, LOW TOUCH: Turkle, Part 2

COMPLETE YOURSELF WITH TECHNOLOGY!


In chapter 8 of Alone Together, Turkle focuses on the phenomenon of being constantly connected to our technology. She opens the chapter by telling us of seven research students at MIT who went to some particularly noticeable effort to remain constantly connected to the Internet. Utilizing radio transmitters, digital displays attached to their glasses, and with keyboards and computers in their backpacks, these students were very literally trying to become the cyborgs that they referred to themselves as. Regardless of the spectacles that they were making of themselves, and regardless of the physical burden and scars their technology inflicted on them, these "cyborgs" learned to cope and become indifferent to these problems because they felt strongly in their vision of merging with, and becoming one with their technology. What I found amazing about this segment is that these students, back in 1996, were already living in a wireless world, where they had instant access to the internet. It's sometimes easy to forget that the technology that we think of as being relatively new to the scene actually probably existed many years before it hit the mainstream, albeit in a less refined form (as in this case). 

"Cyborg, One with Technology"

What I found disturbing about this part of the chapter was the final sentence on page 151, "The brain needed help." I know there are those that might think I'm taking this statement out of context, or that I'm missing the point, but it bothers me profoundly. I don't think it's an exaggeration when I say that some people use technology as a crutch. I commend the MIT student in his mid-twenties whom Turkle described as painfully shy and suffering from an anxiety-limited memory; he was able to harness technology in such a way that he overcame his personal shortcomings. Yay for technology! What troubled me, though, was that he said he had literally "become" his device. He only felt viable as a human once he completed this merging with his technology. Technology is a tool. It makes our lives easier, it helps us work more efficiently, it helps us accomplish things that we might not otherwise be able to do...but it is not us. It is not us. And some of us--like the MIT students referenced--desperately want it to be us. Cyborgs--Cyber-organisms--a melding of technology  and our organic bodies to somehow become "complete," or what we were always meant to be. Let me make this clear: I LOVE TECHNOLOGY. I try to imagine a world where I didn’t have all my creature comforts and gadgets and I usually feel two ways. First, I feel that a life without all of my modern day technology wouldn’t be much of a life at all. But at the same time, I also feel a little silly (and a little ashamed) that I’ve become so married to technology that I think my life would be less of one without it.


TETHERED = ADDICTED?

"CrackBerry"

"Tethered"

But the point of chapter 8 was more the fact that we are always "plugged in" to our social technology. "We are all cyborgs now," Turkle says on page 152. Connectivity isn't a bad thing, of course. Referencing Erik Erikson and his concept of the moratorium, Turkle says, "This is a time, relatively consequence free, for doing what adolescents need to do: fall in and out of love with people and ideas. Real life does not always provide this kind of space, but the Internet does." (152). This is idea of taking chances without fear of harsh consequences harkens back to James Paul Gee and his 6th learning principle, the psychosocial moratorium principle. Being able to explore different identities and ideas without fear of severe consequence is, indeed, enticing; who wouldn't want to partake of a world like that all the time? But when is too much too much? Quite often, people are so consumed with being connected that it seems very much like an addiction. From the 16 year old Sanjay who felt horrible for missing over a hundred texts during the course of his one hour interview with Turkle, to the 18 year old Roman in chapter 9 who admitted to texting while driving (with no intentions of stopping), people feel compelled to answer every single text message, every single notification that there's a new message on Facebook, every single call that comes through to their cell phones. Teenagers today have been "tethered" to technology like this for most of their lives, but that doesn't mean they necessarily love it all the time. As the young people in chapter 9 expressed, there is a profound amount of anxiety that comes with constantly being tethered to social media. Things that really aren't important in the real world are suddenly important within the semiotic domain of a social website like Facebook and it can be a lot of unnecessary pressure to keep up with the social mores of a site like that. At some point, there needs to be time to untether.


WHY DIDN'T YOU JUST CALL ME?


I have two best friends, Jessica and Matt. We met each other in undergrad as graphic design students in the Visual Arts department of Francis Marion University. We've spent countless hours together both in and out of the academic setting. I'm more comfortable around them than just about anybody else on this planet, and vice versa. So why is it that Jessica is the only one I regularly talk to on the phone? Matt and I very rarely have phone conversations, even though we regularly text each other. Ironically enough, even though we call each other once in a blue-moon, we've both recently gotten into the habit of communicating with each other via an app called HeyTell, which is basically a means to send someone a short voice message but without the attention and time investment inherent in a phone call. On pages 190-191, Turkle is talking to Audrey, who says that she prefers to communicate via a text message as opposed to a phone call because a, ". . . phone call, she explains, requires the skill to end a conversation 'when you have no real reason to leave. . . It's not like there is a reason. You just want to. I don't know how to do that. I don't want to learn.'" Even older, more mature individuals have a problem with this and it's something that causes me no shortage of irritation these days. On more than a few recent occasions, I've missed important messages or information from someone because they sent me an e-mail and I'm notoriously bad at keeping up with my inbox. I always end up asking, "If it was so important, why didn't you just call me?"




questions:


1) Do you think that we've become so dependent on our technology that we've forgotten how capable we are in the first place?


2) I argue in the first part of this blog that we are not our technology and that our technology is not us. However, it could be argued that we are, indeed, our technology, since that's what sets us apart from other organisms--our ability to create and use tools. What are your thoughts on this?


3) Imagine an alternate reality where there the social media and technology that we have now didn't exist and all communications had to be done either in person on via telephone. How well do you think you'd perform in such a world and how long would it take you to adjust?




photos:
http://media.photobucket.com/image/cyborg+/megdays/Really%20Cool%20Stuff/kate-moss.jpg
http://www.antseyeview.com/blog/building-community/technology-friend-or-foe-for-worklife-balance/
http://www.northwestern.edu/magazine/