It’s taken me a while to get around to Nicholas Carr’s Is Google Making Us Stupid? in the July/August Atlantic, and I have no excuse. For all its assertion that we need to be immersed in narrative and longer stretches of prose, at 4,000 words, it’s not even that lengthy an article! In it Carr says:
The human brain is almost infinitely malleable. People used to think that our mental meshwork, the dense connections formed among the 100 billion or so neurons inside our skulls, was largely fixed by the time we reached adulthood. But brain researchers have discovered that that’s not the case. James Olds, a professor of neuroscience who directs the Krasnow Institute for Advanced Study at George Mason University, says that even the adult mind “is very plastic.” Nerve cells routinely break old connections and form new ones. “The brain,” according to Olds, “has the ability to reprogram itself on the fly, altering the way it functions.” […]
The process of adapting to new intellectual technologies is reflected in the changing metaphors we use to explain ourselves to ourselves. When the mechanical clock arrived, people began thinking of their brains as operating “like clockwork.” Today, in the age of software, we have come to think of them as operating “like computers.” But the changes, neuroscience tells us, go much deeper than metaphor. Thanks to our brain’s plasticity, the adaptation occurs also at a biological level.
The Internet promises to have particularly far-reaching effects on cognition. In a paper published in 1936, the British mathematician Alan Turing proved that a digital computer, which at the time existed only as a theoretical machine, could be programmed to perform the function of any other information-processing device. And that’s what we’re seeing today. The Internet, an immeasurably powerful computing system, is subsuming most of our other intellectual technologies. It’s becoming our map and our clock, our printing press and our typewriter, our calculator and our telephone, and our radio and TV.
Fine. Good. So? That’s bad? He suggests it is bad, though he never really fleshes out the argument.
I argue, emphatically, it’s not!
Intelligence is contextual. Technology changes the context. Google is the clearest expression of our current technology (technology having shifted quickly from expressing itself mainly through hardware to software to expressing itself today most manifestly through the network). Now that the paradigm has shifted, we had better get on with the business of adapting to it. Good that Carr’s found our brains are equipped to do that!
June 20th, 2008 By DR. CLARISSA PINKOLA ESTÉS, Assistant Editor, TMV Columnist
A critical key for the future viability of blogging and the future viability of the msm, that most bloggers and quite a few in the msm already understand, is the strong symbiotic relationship developed, and which continues to develop rapidly and creatively, between certain of the msm and the blogosphere…
A symbiosis is wherein two or more hosts are nourished by and from one another, reciprocally, complementarily, so that all thrive even the more. And such is all around us to see. When I drove the Pan American hiway in the 1960s, I saw many jungle orchids which had symbiotic relationship with certain trees; each literally would die without one another.
Also, here, were you to come with me up past timberline in these rock and hard packed mountains, there is a process by which tiniest micro-organisms nibble away at the roots of the bristlecone pines for nourishment. But they do not destroy these trees that are often over 2000 years old. In their microphageous puncturing the roots of the trees, the micro-organisms literally make the roots more porous so the trees can take advantage of spare rainfall and the few nutrients that manage to make it past the hardpack.
Thus too, a symbiosis between the blogosphere journalists and the msm journalists is, in prototype form, a present paradigm and it is a rich one. There has long been a symbiosis between book authors, with quotes and multi paragraph quoting accepted as fair use practice when cited consistently and well. There is also a working symbiosis between msm and book authors and book publishers for nearly 200 years. There is no obstacle that I know of, when mutual benefits are brought in good will, that ought stand between such being worked out easily and amiably between msm and bloggers.
A parasitic relationship is another form altogether. That occurs when a life form attaches itself to the host, and thrives… while the host is depleted and dies. Where I grew up in the Great Lakes, for instance, the lamprey eel fastens itself to the sides of large fish, penetrating the skin… and over time, literally sucks the guts out of the fish, killing them.
Traveling in the south, I saw huge green kudzu vines, once thought to be the saving grace remedy for loss of topsoil back during the dust bowl droughts. Thus, kudzu was imported to the south and midwest, and planted by droves. It took over, growing outside its more meek native environment (Japan, for instance). It rose like Rodan over everything. It grew so quickly, people said they could hear the vines creaking overnight. The kudzu grew so tall and so widely, it canopied entire forests, keeping the trees and flora from the sunlight. Inside the bodacious green vine over everything… inside, all the trees and ferns had gone black and dead. That’s what a parasite does. Me first, me only, me forever.
The blogosphere cannot be halted from growing and developing, but it is not like kudzu. It is a natural force in its own right, that has gathered itself into existence for expedience and creative reasons, and that has laid road and infrastructure deep into the interior where there was none before.
Giving credit to this ‘young-ancient’ force doesnt depend on whether one agrees or not with every blog’s politics. The fact is, Read the rest of this entry »
One of the many places where people are chattering about the possibility of an Obama presidency is in the tiny West African island-nation of Cape Verde.
According to this editorial from the newspaper Liberal, those who expect major change from a Barack White House could be sorely disappointed - but the fact that he has a shot at the White House shows something significant has changed in the United States:
“This may come as a bucket of cold water for the many who today think Obama will be what he objectively cannot be: there will be no disruption in the United States’ establishment. He will obviously have the consent of the Pentagon and Wall Street, both still bursting with the apparent narcissism of George W. Bush, who led the country into the quagmire of war for which there is no plausible solution and to the edge of an abyss of serious economic crisis.”
“It may be said that the candidacy of an African-American for the White House was carefully prepared by the media. What was unthinkable for years (’I have a dream’ said Martin Luther King) became something consciously acceptable by the vast majority of North Americans - ‘Whites’ included - ever since television series began in which the protagonist is a ‘Black’ president. A premonition? Evidently not. The Democratic political machine worked on and prepared the way which has permitted the ‘politically incorrect’ to become the ‘politically correct.’”
Translated By Brandi Miller
EDITORIAL
June 4, 2008
Cape Verde - Liberal - Original Article (Portuguese)
It’s Practically certain. With the already-counted delegates for the Democratic Convention, Obama’s candidacy for President of the United States is nearly official. Obama has already said that he is the inevitable winner of that Convention, and even his great rival Hillary Clinton has already thrown in the towel. She admitted defeat and congratulated Barack Obama.
It may be said that the candidacy of an African-American for the White House was carefully prepared by the media. What was unthinkable for years (“I have a dream” said Martin Luther King) became something consciously acceptable by the vast majority of North Americans - “Whites” included - ever since television series began in which the protagonist is a “Black” president. A premonition? Evidently not. The Democratic political machine worked on and prepared the way which has permitted the “politically incorrect” to become the “politically correct.”
This may come as a bucket of cold water for the many who today think Obama will be what he objectively cannot be: there will be no disruption in the United States’ establishment. He will obviously have the consent of the Pentagon and Wall Street, both still bursting with the apparent narcissism of George W. Bush, who led the country into the quagmire of war for which there is no plausible solution and to the edge of an abyss of serious economic crisis. G. W. Bush confined himself to being a useful tool of the oil cartels, who have never been as fat as they are today; and to the military industry, which has also been enriched by lucrative profits. All in the name of “freedom,” “democracy,” and the jingoism of the moment.
READ ON AT WORLDMEETS.US, along with continuing translated foreign press coverage of Barack Obama’s victory and the U.S. election.
I realize this is a bit off topic but I felt it was worth posting.
As we are all enjoying our Memorial Day Weekend something special is happening on the planet Mars. A spacecraft called Phoenix has landed on the planet Mars, on a mission to explore the region around the north pole of that planet.
Even though the space program has been a reality for my entire life, these kind of events still amaze me. Imagine, we have launched a craft from Earth, sent it over tens of millions of miles and actually landed on another planet !
Considering that more that half of the missions to Mars end in failure, this is quite an accomplishment and in an era of seemingly endless bad news is something for us all to celebrate.
They have successfully transmitted the first pictures live from Mars (or live plus the 3 minutes or so to get the signal from there to here)
There’s actually a pun buried in the title of this column, but you might not find it amusing unless you have a pHd in advanced particle physics. The science community is abuzz over rumors that a research team in Italy may have discovered the long sought and highly controversial “dark matter” which some claim makes up a huge amount of the mass of the universe.
Researchers from Italy stirred up controversy eight years ago when they announced they had discovered the identity of dark matter, the invisible stuff that’s thought to make up 23 percent of the universe. Now, after a long period of silence, the DAMA (DArk MAtter) collaboration at the University of Rome is about to reinforce its claim with fresh data. That’s the rumor at the American Physical Society meeting here in St. Louis, anyway.
Before we get too excited here, it’s worth noting that not everyone is popping open the champagne bottles.
Researchers haven’t seen the new results, but they say it would take a lot to convince them that the DAMA team is really onto something.
First, let me point out that I’m not a scientist, nor do I play one on TV, but I have some problems with this entire theory. For those of you who don’t follow the science beat, let me give you the short, layman’s version of this entire dispute. Essentially, it all boils down to our understanding of the force of gravity and how very large objects behave in a gravitational field. Under the current theory, objects orbiting a star (such as planets) should move faster if they are closer to the star and more slowly if they are further away. You can observe this effect by noting that Mercury (which is very close to the sun) orbits our star at a very rapid clip compared to Neptune, for example, which spins around at a relatively liesurely pace. No problem, right?
Unfortunately, when you pull your perspective much further out something goes amiss. Our galaxy, like most (if not all) of them, rotates around a supermassive black hole at its center. So following the above theory, the stars near the center should rotate much, much faster than the ones out near the rim. (Such as ours.) The problem is, the stars - and even the random dust and gases - out here near the rim are whirling around just as fast, and sometimes even faster, than the ones near the center. This put some scientists into a tizzy and they immediately began seeking an explanation. One group of these (literal) rocket scientists came up with an explantion which relied on a vast portion of the mass in the galaxy being missing. In order to explain the observed motion under the current theory, the galaxy would have to be far more massive than the total matter we are able to observe in it. Hence, they developed the theory of “dark matter.” The problem is, though, that we’ve never seen it and we don’t even know if it exists at all. Read the rest of this entry »
The Internet is like alcohol in some sense. It accentuates what you would do anyway. If you want to be a loner, you can be more alone. If you want to connect, it makes it easier to connect.
– Esther Dyson, Interview in Time Magazine, October 2005
That quote above outlines why I laugh at the viewpoint that the Internet is evil. Like any medium, it is affected by the subjects, not itself. If you are morally bankrupt and filled with spite, the Internet has a place for you. If you are a bubbly, perky, go-getter, the Internet rolls the red carpet for you also. Just like real life, eh?
But the difference between the real world and the Internet is the power of invisibility. You can surf and surf. Read and read. And practically leave no trace of your real physical self or real mental state. Another freedom and equalizer: freedom to be invisible (mostly). Let’s just get right down to it; the Internet is freedom digitized with control!
I bring up this point because I’m wondering why people still put themselves in precarious positions on the ‘Net when they have more control in this digitized freedom. Is this just a fundamental failing of humanity that given enough rope, we tend to hang ourselves? Generalization added for effect.
the morning paper
harbinger of good and ill
- - I step over it
- Dave McCroskey
That little gem of haiku has pretty much summed up my feeling of general news overload. When I’m sitting at the local coffeehouse/bakery and the average Joe or Jane talks to me about the news or some news they have heard, I’m all attentiveness personified. But when I see it on the television or read it in newspapers, I go into a fugue state. I feel like I’ve lost myself and my individuality. I’ve become a grain of sand just being carried away by la máquina de las noticias (”the news machine” for those of you not fluent in Spanish; thank you Rosetta Stone).
But I don’t enter a fugue state when I read blogs for news. Maybe because it seems like the coffeehouse/bakery. Regular folks (for the most part) chiming in with their thought instead of la máquina de las noticias blasting it at me. Local newspapers did have that personal, next door neighbor feel. But these days, they are weighted with Associated Press, Reuters, etc (what happened to the names of the writers; they are starting to disappear). Guess this is future journalism.
In being a journeyman futurist, I often laud the advances as THE WAY AND ONLY WAY and applaud them heartily. There is always room for improvement in many aspects of our lives. But has our current corporate news state improved the news or has it just improved the money to be made off of news at the expense of news?
Transhumanism (sometimes symbolized by >H or H+) is an international intellectual and cultural movement supporting the use of new sciences and technologies to enhance human mental and physical abilities and aptitudes, and ameliorate what it regards as undesirable and unnecessary aspects of the human condition, such as stupidity, suffering, disease, aging and involuntary death. Transhumanist thinkers study the possibilities and consequences of developing and using human enhancement techniques and other emerging technologies for these purposes. Possible dangers, as well as benefits, of powerful new technologies that might radically change the conditions of human life are also of concern to the transhumanist movement.
Excellent description of the aspect of futuristics, or future studies, that deeply interests me. Call me a transhumanism apprentice. Transhumanism clashes with religion at many levels since many transhumanists are atheists. Personally I’m more of a secular spiritualist and agnostic. But I never beat people up about their religious beliefs. It is counterproductive to the nth degree. But I digress.
The following video concerns TransVision 2007 that took place in Chicago this past July. This video outlines some key questions, concerns, and issues within transhumanism. I’m posting this since it is a good primer on what I’m going to regularly (time permitting) post about here at TMV. There’s much in the transhumanism movement that crosses all spectrums of humanity. As a result, there is much to write about and discuss. Stay tuned.
Dr. Patrick Dixon, Europe’s Leading Futurist, Global Change Guru, and one of my personal heroes talks about 1 billion new consumers and the challenges that come with that in the following video. Of particular note is how he shows how Al-Qaeda will be the least of our problems if the urbanization of these 1 billion new consumers continues to point towards “slum living”.
Some people think all technology is bad. Especially those Blackberries:
English-born American theoretical physicist and mathematician Freeman Dyson once said:
If we had a reliable way to label our toys good and bad, it would be easy to regulate technology wisely. But we can rarely see far enough ahead to know which road leads to damnation. Whoever concerns himself with big technology, either to push it forward or to stop it, is gambling in human lives.
Cell phones and mobile devices are now big technology. They are permeating all aspects of society. If you push forward on mobile technology, there are dark outcomes. If you pull back on mobile technology, there are dark outcomes. Either way, our lives are constantly changing due to portable, always on, always there, always in touch devices. Are we going to become a better society as we become more connected in more elaborate ways? It’s hard to tell. The possibilities are endless in the technology game. Whether we win or lose in this game, Freeman Dyson is right: human lives are being gambled. Always has and always will. Hopefully those gambles pay off in the next great products, those next great ideas, that benefits humanity more than harms it.
My first move in the technology game: how about cars shrinking into briefcases that you can carry around?
at 4,000 words, it’s not even that lengthy an article! In it Carr says:
