Bruce Sterling tweeted the link to this philosphical “documentary” essay – an exploration of identity in the digital age, the absorption of self within technology and the expression of being within an ethereal existence.
The digital settles in as background. We remember less and query more. Our identity play would be considered schizophrenic in the last century. We have more friends than ever before yet know new frontiers of isolation. The quantification of our experience haunts us in the form of a persistent history. And we are distracted more than we ever knew possible. These circumstances are paradoxically a description of the near future and a diagnosis of the current state of affairs. The truly timeless is redefined – it has transcended that which is classic; it has become that which is never finished.
On one level there’s a lot of playful bafflegab going on (hell, just read their About page for an example) but when the comments and ideas start layering upon themselves in your mind (or at least in my alleged mind) it takes on the construct of a larger perception of how we are mutating ourselves in this data soup we call the world today.
We may not (yet) be in that place described by Stewart Brand in the first publication of the Whole Earth Catalog when he said: “We are as gods and might as well get good at it.” but we are evolving ourselves with our technology and if we continue to do so with a modicum of wisdom and courage to change there may be hope for we silly monkeys.
As the introduction to Whole Earth continued:
So far, remotely done power and glory – as via government, big business, formal education, church – has succeeded to the point where gross defects obscure actual gains. In response to this dilemma and to these gains a realm of intimate, personal power is developing – power of the individual to conduct his own education, find his own inspiration, shape his own environment, and share his adventure with whoever is interested.
That was in 1968.
We are only now becoming aware as a larger community of what this means as the changes we have been investing our bodies and minds in start to take hold and change the world the world around us.
Are you ready to change? You should be because you already are in the process of self-evolvement. The big question is: how aware and self-directed will your personal evolution be? And how will you share that with the world at large?
Know thyself.
And get me a beer while you’re at it.
Cheers.
P. S. Speaking of monkeys – here’s a little Elvis for ya:
A fun and informative TED Talk by Joe Sabia, described thusly:
iPad storyteller Joe Sabia introduces us to Lothar Meggendorfer, who created a bold technology for storytelling: the pop-up book. Sabia shows how new technology has always helped us tell our own stories, from the walls of caves to his own onstage iPad.
Ryan Varga made this excellent mini-doc about the Toronto Mini-Maker Faire which I and my family attended last weekend. It was an awesome display of wit and intelligence and talent – and all of it open and inclusive.
I love the ethos of the Maker culture and wholeheartedly embrace the idea of knowing what the fuck is going on inside our gadgets – so we can make our own and better and more individualized creations.
Time to pump some humanity into the culture of tech which we find ourselves swimming in. If the future is, as Ray Kurzweil suggests, inevitably headed toward a Singularity where our machines become sentient and we become our machines we’d better be damned sure our humanity goes along for the ride.
I found this via BoingBoing and it’s a fascinating short film with obvious resonance (and apologies) to Alan Ginsberg‘s Howl. It’s a teaser trailer of sorts for a larger documentary production called Connected: A Declaration Of Interdependence but in and of itself it’s a interesting take on the predicament, fate or plight of humanity in our current technological haze.
Be sure to click and get rid of the annoying ads on the bottom of the screen – there’s text under there.
Now, I’m not one to subscribe to hysterical pseudo-Luddite notions that we are destroying ourselves with every techno-evolutionary leap humanity makes. Of course, we are, but that’s not the technology’s fault – the blame lies squarely in the hands of each and every one of the silly monkeys with car keys that litter this planet – and, yes, that includes you and me. That’s not to say the National Day Of UnPlugging is a bad idea – it’s always good to get some focus on what we’re doing and where we’re going – I just don’t think there’s any need to panic. Do you?
Should we be afraid? Should we shut ourselves down? Should we sit in a corner and take a breather? Have a little time-out so we can collect our thoughts before advancing further?
Hell no.
Full speed ahead. I’m convinced it’s our only hope to fix the messes we’ve already made and ensure we thrive and arrive at a place that has at least some sense of meaning for our existence on Sagan’s beloved pale blue dot.
And if we fuck up – at least we’ll be doing it with really cool toys.
Cheers.
P.S. Since today I seem to be ragging on all the silly monkeys it only seems appropriate to include this little gem of Ernest Cline’s again. Dance, Monkey, Dance!
P. P. S. Oh what the hell – since we seem to be on a monkey jag today I might as well toss in a little Elvis Costello and his wondrously delightful Monkey To Man video. Love those dancers.
Eric Giler from MIT gives a TED Talk showing off an innovation called WiTricity.
It’s the wireless transmission of electrical power using magnetic resonance, meaning there is no harmful radiation that will fry your junk when you walk through the field.
It is really frickin’ cool.
Upon seeing this I could not help but think of Nikola Tesla and his vision of using the Earth’s magnetic field as a source of limitless – and free- electrical power.
Ray Kurzweil spoke at TED earlier this year and announced the formation of Singularity University, an educational and research institution devoted to addressing the impending meeting of man and machine.
I’ve blogged about Kurzweil before – he’s a brilliant garden gnome of a philosopher scientist with a seemingly fantastical take on how our exponentially evolving technologies will eventually (ie. soon) meet and overtake us – but in a good way. He has been scoffed at for years despite the unimpeachable litany of statistics he presents to back up his claims. That was then – this is now.
People aren’t scoffing any more – they’re listening – and they’re participating in the creation of what could possibly be our best hope to stop acting like a bunch of fucking jerk-off stone-throwing chimps. The Singularity Univeristy is backed by NASA and Google. Not bad, Ray, not bad at all.
I don’t know if we’ll be able to meet Kurzweil’s prediction of the Singularity by 2020 and I don’t know if we’ll ever be able to upload ourselves into a technical construct and thereby live forever (or until the warranty expires) – what do I know, I’m just a drug addled puppeteer – but I do know our very near future is going to make our very near past look like the frickin’ dark ages. It won’t all be slick and shiny and happy – but it sure as shit won’t be boring.
Consider Kurzweil’s words when he says:
What used to take up a building now fits in our pockets; what now fits in our pockets will fit in a blood cell in 25 years.
Even if we can never crack that leap of wholly integrating ourselves into our machines, as Kurzweil predicts, we will still be fundamentally changed; changed in how we think, how we sense, how we feel, how we comunicate, and how our bodies grow and develop; we will have accomplished a major leap of evolution not through any process of natural selection but through the practical implementation of our own technology.
Don’t snooze while it happens – when you wake up you might not recognize anyone.
I’ve been having a series of email discussions with my friend Bryan that has become a wide-ranging exploration of how humanity is likely to evolve alongside our rapid technological advancements. I do intend to distill those emails into a one big fat ass blog post but I’m a bit too busy at the moment to get that done for you.
Instead, I found this fascinating talk by Juan Enriquez at this year’s TED conference where he touches on some of the same territory Bryan and I have been treading; and I thought I’d share it with you.
This kind of stuff has been consuming me lately because I think it is really fucking cool and pant peeingly scary. I’m not a technophobe by any stretch of the imagination and have no problems envisioning a future where we and our machines are one. The idea of the Borg makes for good storytelling but it’s not a frightening future in my eyes.
Bryan and I are not profound scholars when it comes to this shit – we just like to think up the most fucked up possibilities and then extrapolate them further to see if we can glean a sense of where the human race is heading – or maybe just scare ourselves like kids telling ghost stories around the campfire. Each time a new article or news report is published we start kicking it around like a big blob of silly putty just to see if it’ll bounce off the walls or leave dents in the ceiling – metaphorically, of course. I do have large quantities of silly putty – I know where to buy it in bulk – and when you drop five pounds of that shit you better protect your kidneys ‘cuz it comes hurtling back at you like a motherfucker.
But I digress.
I’ll come back some other day with all our notes and pimp it up with pretty pictures and links to all the crap that was inspiring us. In the meantime, enjoy Enriques and don’t be afraid of the future. Just keep your eyes on the assholes in charge right now.
I'm going to be slowly making some changes to the website both in format and content - and I'm pretty sure even the URL will change.
It's going to be more of a personal news aggregator with a featured video blog from yours truly. We'll see how long that lasts. So bear with me - thanks.
It's going to be more of a personal news aggregator with a featured video blog from yours truly. We'll see how long that lasts. So bear with me - thanks.