NOTE: This is a rough first draft. Still to do:
- Links to external sites
- Some extra writing as necessary to fill out some points
For the first time in human history, we are at a point where computer technologies can enhance the human experience in a way previously described in cyberpunk novels and the minds of futurists. The advent of relatively inexpensive wireless communications and processing power in cellular telephones, tablets, and notebook computers allows for more connectivity, data and tools to influence everyday choices. Mobile computing and Internet-driven communications and tools is accelerating the transition from physical-based labor and services to information and mental services in almost every corner of the planet.
More connectivity to others allows for richer experiences with more people in the world. Newspapers and cables were the primary source of information about the world one hundred years ago; in fact, radio was just starting to become an accessible media point. Television revolutionized communications when it became accessible, but that didn’t happen until three generations prior to this one. Twenty years ago, most news was distributed locally or through controlled access points such as cable television outlets. Today, news is being distributed through social media networks such as Twitter or Facebook in near-real-time, often faster than traditional media can respond. News is one example of a shift in communications technologies, but there are other, deeper layers to explore.
Moreover, this is the first time in recorded history where contact with other people around the globe has become ubiquitous. Until the advent of the Internet, social media and portable wireless access, most people did not have cheap two-way access to each other. Prior to the Internet, people had to write or use the telephone to communicate over long distances, and in most cases you personally had to know the other person first. Today, blogs and social media allow near-instantaneous connection with others and allows for people to contribute more meaningfully to the world at large.
With more connectivity comes more considerations to how the Internet and all this data is impacting our lives. The abundance of connectivity allows for more information to tap into and more information to digest. “Analysis paralysis”, the idea of having too much information or too much choice, is becoming more endemic as more opinions and facts are brought forth. More access to information also means that there is more valuable data and more junk data and noise to sift through. As more people connect to the digital world of the Internet and contribute, more and more data will be generated. We are also likely at a point where computers will generate more data based on the data it knows about and processes. This massive influx of information will continue to be an ever-present issue and conversation of our time, similar to our current physical world issues like climate change, petroleum-based energy, and food production.
From this it becomes important to reframe the conversation about data and technology from one of a problem that must be solved once and for all, into a continuous phenomenon that must be tended to like a garden. We have to consider that, like our emotional states, our physical body, and our spiritual state, we must look at technology like a structural piece of ourselves that evolves over time. In the e-book “Augmented Humanity”, Everett Bogue describes our personal interactions with technology and data as the “second self”. I will use the term “digital bodymind” in this document to mean the same thing.
Everett perceives that we need to transition as people from a primarily physical-based reality to one that has a more developed personality in the Internet that fully integrates with our physical and mental selves. Consider that these digital bodyminds are growing from a child-like state of just absorbing information and simple processing to a more adult-like state of full interaction and play. As recently as ten to thirty years ago, most people would watch TV or absorb information passively from a one-way outlet. The editorial pages, letters to the newspaper editor, or “call-in” lines to the media outlets were the only way to interact with near real-time information. Most research for school papers occurred in libraries; Wikipedia and direct quoting of pages from the Internet as source material is a fairly recent phenomenon.
With this transition, there will be a need to understand and relate to technology as a construct of ourselves. This construct will need maintenance and tending to similar to one’s professional demeanor in the workplace. For example, most media is only digested passively, and vast amounts of people use television as a way to relax and unwind. Today, if you have access to the Internet, you can project your opinions and thoughts to the world. While the act of contribution is a necessity in today’s society, we have to be aware of how we contribute just as we would face-to-face. This goes beyond the “ettequite” that was widely publicized in the 1990’s early versions of electronic communication. Today’s interaction with the internet allows those to build a presence that builds a reputation globally instead of just locally; people no longer have the ability to just move to another portion of the globe to run away from a bad situation.
“Augmented Humanity” is Everett’s first part of a longer treatise into how to construct a digital bodymind and how to use technology as a fully integrated part of one’s self. This first step describes how to observe and work with your digital bodymind to prepare for full integration, not from a classical definition of a cyborg or cybernetic being, but as a more holistic realization of ourselves. This HOWTO is intended to be one practical implementation of “Augmented Humanity”, from cleaning up one’s presence on the Internet to Everett’s recommended communication tools. I will also add in my own thoughts as another, more moderate perspective for readers and interested parties of Everett Bogue’s work.