Im mainly writing this for Tony but if someone else reads it that's awesome too. So here are my completely honest last thoughts on the class and what i found hard or what i really liked. Here goes...
So i think that every class was fun to go to and it was because of the unusual discussions we had in class. I think right off the bat everyone felt that they are a part of a very unusual class setting that i doubt i will experience again. I think that's why it felt literately like leaving a very fun summer camp of the last day of class. Furthermore i like most people in the class have never clapped for a teacher just for being awesome but Tony definitely deserved it!Having the plurk website was a way to feel like you where just chatting with people outside of class for fun. It really made me feel like i was bonding with the class. That feeling was strengthened by the class discussions, i think my favorite one was where Tony just stopped talking and let us work as a class, that rocked. I loved leaving each class with new ideas and with a slightly puzzled train of thought. I always left the class in a better mood even if the day before that sucked. It was the only class where the thoughts of the student REALLY mattered. The ideas in class could flow from one topic to another one and then yet to another one and there no limits to the ideas we could come up with. Being able to learn from books, pics, videos, and websites just felt like such a well rounded experience.
Every person got something different from this class. The amount of energy put into it probably is the best measure of the outcome. For myself i think i tried to do my best in class and on plurk. Truth be told i didn't always feel like my ideas matched up to some of the other people in the crowd but oh well i enjoyed sharing with the class even if there would be that awkward silence afterwords (I just found the silence hilarious as time went on.) Yet my biggest challenge was to keep up with all the work at one, from book discussions to plurking, to reading a book for class and then blogging about it, followed by having a life outside of class. Despite the hardships i wouldn't take it back at all or change it, because i enjoyed every part of the process. I appreciate the understanding that Tony had for me being behind on some of the tasks.
If i could i would totally take the class again haha I hope that Tony got everything that he wanted and more out of this class. Thanks for making it. The world seems different after taking this class. I really enjoyed it!!!
Tuesday, March 17, 2009
I wish i could read your mind...
So I just got done reading the book "Postsingular" the biggest reason for the delay was that i for some reason didn't order the book like all the rest. So in my creative way i decided to read the book in the bookstore, but then i just found the book online and finished it all in one session. I think that this book for me was rather interesting because of all the levels of reality that the reader gets thrown into while going from nants world of the orthid net or to a flashback of memory and such.I thought that the idea of the orthids was a rather cool concept that would be interesting to experience, i mean what would the world be like if you had all this capability and knowledge all so close to you? I think that people would adapt to the new lifestyle and learn to take advantage of their new skills. Yet the thought of that kind of soceity makes me wonder if a people can function under those conditions effectively. I mean what is the motivation to keep working or doing anything for that matter when you can live when you can constantly entertain yourself with new knowledge from the web.
The part of the book i didn't really like was that all these crazy things concerning the saving and destruction of the world took place in same part of the world with the same people. I mean it wouldn't the wrest of the world be interested in these issues concerning their own life? I guess this lack of interaction from the rest of the world made it easier for us to follow the story since we only had a limited amount of charachters.
What i though was interesting in this book is the role of sexual partners and how different kinds of sexuality is judged based on the characters interactions. For example the gay and lesbian relations seem to be looked down because first of all there is Jeff the crazy designer of the nants who want to destroy the world just so he can create a world where the love of his live would be "alive", then there is Kitty and Thuy who dare lovers but really Thuy is just using Kitty as a way to get over JayJay. So it is mostly shown that the best relationship is between a man and a woman in this case Thuy and Jayjay. I guess in the end Kitty and Nektar got together but i wonder how much the author thought about the sexual orientations of this character and if they are supposed to reflect on the level of social acceptance to those groups.
I think that this book shows us the difference between advancing our world through technology versus advancing it through self development. This is where the other world with its telepathy and technology free lifestyle comes to play. Its like seeing the two consequences of one world if two different paths are followed. It seems that the author proposes that life without technology is the better choice between the two. I find this dilemma interesting because i think that if people spent as much time making all kinds of new machines as they did on self development and forms of mind expanding, telepathy and those kinds of things WOULD be possible, the problem is that technology is the easier answer of the two. Yet no person becomes any better off from owning technology, to the contrary a person becomes dependent on technology. If a person works on self improvement, on the other hand, the benefits of that work is constantly present. The sad thing is that the choosing point between which path to take is far behind us, i think.
Like we discussed in glass maybe the smartest thing technology had done was convince us that it is unintelligent. Like in this book the orthids where supposed to be harmless but they created the Big Big who by becoming more and more intelligent started to seek more knowledge in ways that would hurt the rest of the world , like creating 2.0 Vearth. So maybe it is wise to realize that we need to learn to be independent of machines and not to give them too much power of our life, without thinking about the possible consequences.
The final part that i thought was interesting was the part that pain and suffering where needed to finish the novel. This was true for the novel that Thuy was writing but also for the book as a whole. It seems that the reader likes to be emotionally manipulated through reading books, and the more complex the emotions that are aroused the better. I think this happens because a book is a way to get away from life into a different reality and the more realistic and relatable the book becomes the more it interests the reader, and gives him/her more incentives to forget about troubles or boredom of the real world behind.
The part of the book i didn't really like was that all these crazy things concerning the saving and destruction of the world took place in same part of the world with the same people. I mean it wouldn't the wrest of the world be interested in these issues concerning their own life? I guess this lack of interaction from the rest of the world made it easier for us to follow the story since we only had a limited amount of charachters.
What i though was interesting in this book is the role of sexual partners and how different kinds of sexuality is judged based on the characters interactions. For example the gay and lesbian relations seem to be looked down because first of all there is Jeff the crazy designer of the nants who want to destroy the world just so he can create a world where the love of his live would be "alive", then there is Kitty and Thuy who dare lovers but really Thuy is just using Kitty as a way to get over JayJay. So it is mostly shown that the best relationship is between a man and a woman in this case Thuy and Jayjay. I guess in the end Kitty and Nektar got together but i wonder how much the author thought about the sexual orientations of this character and if they are supposed to reflect on the level of social acceptance to those groups.
I think that this book shows us the difference between advancing our world through technology versus advancing it through self development. This is where the other world with its telepathy and technology free lifestyle comes to play. Its like seeing the two consequences of one world if two different paths are followed. It seems that the author proposes that life without technology is the better choice between the two. I find this dilemma interesting because i think that if people spent as much time making all kinds of new machines as they did on self development and forms of mind expanding, telepathy and those kinds of things WOULD be possible, the problem is that technology is the easier answer of the two. Yet no person becomes any better off from owning technology, to the contrary a person becomes dependent on technology. If a person works on self improvement, on the other hand, the benefits of that work is constantly present. The sad thing is that the choosing point between which path to take is far behind us, i think.
Like we discussed in glass maybe the smartest thing technology had done was convince us that it is unintelligent. Like in this book the orthids where supposed to be harmless but they created the Big Big who by becoming more and more intelligent started to seek more knowledge in ways that would hurt the rest of the world , like creating 2.0 Vearth. So maybe it is wise to realize that we need to learn to be independent of machines and not to give them too much power of our life, without thinking about the possible consequences.
The final part that i thought was interesting was the part that pain and suffering where needed to finish the novel. This was true for the novel that Thuy was writing but also for the book as a whole. It seems that the reader likes to be emotionally manipulated through reading books, and the more complex the emotions that are aroused the better. I think this happens because a book is a way to get away from life into a different reality and the more realistic and relatable the book becomes the more it interests the reader, and gives him/her more incentives to forget about troubles or boredom of the real world behind.
Nanotext Final
1. Book groups: the additional texts have been a key component of the course. How has the work in your book groups differed from that which takes place in our discussions of the other texts in class and elsewhere (plurk & blogs)? What kinds of discussions are possible in the setting of the book groups? What is not possible within these settings?
Being a part of a book group was a new experience for me. Having to work out the detail and make a plan of action is always the hardest think to do in a group. Especially as the number of people you have to contact increases. The next difficulty in the group is finding initiative from people. A group needs someone to lead it along the way into different discussions and also to make decisions like the reading schedule. For some reason I have noticed that people don’t like taking indicative especially in college classes when thinks come to team work. That’s why I decide to be the lead when I could. It’s very rewarding in the end for me to make this effort since on the evaluation people noted my effort. Yet the truth is that being in the lead is rather easy because it doesn’t necessarily require some kind of better knowledge on the subject from the leader but rather the desire to lead and people skills are also helpful. After the discussion is opened up by a person the rest of the groups feels it is easier to join the discussion, knowing that they no longer have to start the topic and can just express their ideas.
All this was different from the Blog and from Plurk because in those cases you where only thinking about your own work, you had to lead yourself and follow your own thoughts on the books you read. In the book group you had a chance to discuss, explain, argue and agree on the points the other readers made. In a way that helped explore the book more in depth because it each person in the group to saw the book through the eyes of the rest of its members. In a blog you don’t see this process of interaction between different people, and you usually don’t see the growth that comes from those interactions. A blog is one person opinion and insight on the subject, while a book group takes each individuals opinion and tries to reflect on the similarities and differences for the benefits of the group as a whole. Plurk is also a place where each person is on his/her own. You don’t have to collaborate with others or to even talk to them to get your work done. Plurk was used for a lot of completely different and random topics discussed by members of the whole class rather then just focused on one subject with a defined group.
Within a book group discussions are mostly addressing the topic of the book and rarely go beyond that only if to explain something that yet again goes back to the book. It is inappropriate to go off on a random tangent in this setting because by making this group we have in a way picked our topic of interest, and are now bound to it. I think that this is good because that insures that the topic of the book will not be replaces with something random and that the members focus more deeply on each subject in the book because the book is constrained by the amount if pages in it. On the other hand Plurk is a place with no constraints where anything that interests the Plurker can be discussed. Yet by focusing on just the book we as a group get more insights on it and also get a more thorough understanding of it.
In the book group that we had via blackboard I think it was rather impossible to get too personal with the other members. For the most part I didn’t know who the members where and all we talked about was the book, therefore I never got to know the members more in terms of their life away from the book. I think that this lacking component is essential for forming some kind of emotional bond. With Plurk on the other hand I got to know people though their pictures and ideas and plurk themes with showed me the person behind the screen and made me more connect more with each person on their. So I think that a book group is good for getting a thorough understanding of one book in particular but it won’t bring up a closer bond between its members if done via blackboard.
2. Plurk: Without it the class would not be the class. Using the texts we have read in class explain how plurk fits in with the issues of technology and the human body that we have discussed thus far.
Plurk to me was a great example of alternity. It was a new world for every member of the class where each person could redefine themselves. Also every member of plurk was a stranger to the other members yet it was the same situation as the artificial stranger in “Radical Alternity.” The fact that we didn’t know each other created a distance between us which made it easier to openly share ideas without the fear or being looked down upon by someone you know. Like the book also said technology is a way to form alternity and that is exactly what we where doing by using the computer, the internet, the website. The interesting process that followed the stranger phase is that the plurk names each person created began to grow an identity. I would see people on plurk and just see their plurk name and over time my ideas about the person would be intervened with his plurk name and that would form his/her plurk identity. The best part is that I never will know the differences between the plurker I met and the person who real life person who plurks his ideas. On the other hand plurk let you share the thoughts you wouldn’t otherwise share with other people with other plurkers, so maybe in a way we all got a chance to know each other much better then we would have through other mediums of communication. The great thing about plurk was the way you could create yourself on there by editing your theme and using emotions and by sharing things with others, be those things pictures, videos or ideas. Without that possibility of personalizing our plurk pages I don’t think the class would have bonded as well as it has. Another thing that we discussed in class is the manipulation of emotions, which was sooo easy to do on plurk. I mean I remember Tony putting a sad crying face when we where in class to reflect the topic that tears add sadness to the face, yet the people who were not in class and saw that image probably thought that Tony was sad for real. As the class progressed plurks became more complex in that people started discussing topics of their interest like books and theories and enriched them through videos and pictures and you had to really follow the plurking to stay on track. In a way this reminds me of the Big Pig high where you are constantly getting more and more information, adding new plurks, new photos, new videos to continue your thoughts on the idea. In between the intellectual discussions plurk also offered a place to just vent or let other people know how you where doing. It was like having little orthids who would try to cheer you up or talk to you about the concerns of your day. The final thing that I will mention about Plurk being great for this class in particular is the 140 character limit. It made the writer think about how to condense their writing without loosing meaning. Since nanotext is the study of the small, it showed us that you can do anything with those 140 characters by either condensing or commenting on your own post. The trick was that in order to do anything with the 140 character you just had to be creative. So the “limit” actually thought us how to think outside the limit to achieve what we want using the small to creative the big and wise versa. The same can be said about nanotechnology as creative small technological objects that can combine to create bigger objects which can later deteriorate to become small again. I think that like it was said in the question, Plurk was an essential component of this class and that we molded to fit out study of the small and had great ideas come from that.
3. Limits: one of the ways that we have approached the small is with our plurk assignments, in your opinion how have these limits: 1) made you think about language 2) made you think about the small 3) helped you with your writing
Plurk assignments seemed at first just a fun way to plurk, but when looking back on it I have come to realize that before doing them I have never though about thinking how to write. Having limits in how to write was a new and fun idea, yet more importantly it started the idea about thinking how to write. It also made me look in search of new words when I couldn’t use the ones I was used to, because they where excluded. The limit of in the 140 characters was the one that we had to work with all quarter throughout the other limits Tony gave us so it is also important to discuss is along with the assignments. After a while we started saying that everything is possible inside the 140 characters and that is quite true. The limited amount of space made it more efficient for people to condense their ideas to include only the most valuable thoughts. This provoked the feeling of expressing your ideas in as few words as needed to get the point across. This evolved into putting up videos and pics to get a complex thought across while still being well within the limit. So in a sense the limit pushed a plurker to think more creatively about achieving things outside the 140 characters limit. Thinking about small writing makes me realize the power to being able to clearly express your idea in as few words as possible.
I have always thought that I need to improve my writing skills. All the work that we did with Plurk helped me understand that an important element of writing is really thinking beforehand about what I want to explain to the reader and then how am I going to say it in a simple format. Furthermore the limit that we used on our words in plurk made me think about the necessity of having a broad knowledge of words so that you can express an idea in the most articulate way. Also this is beneficial in writing because it varies the vocabulary inside a text. When it comes to personal writing I think that plurk was helpful in identifying important elements through all my writing. By that I mean that when I write in my diary I like to fully express all my ideas and feeling without sparing and words, yet then I can go back and limit some parts of the text that is more relevant then the rest and reflect on just those pieces in the future. I think it’s important to be able to define the significant small pieced from inside a bid piece and the limit in plurk was a way of learning how to do that. This was best seen when a lot of people where plurking at the same time and it was up to the reader to choose which messages where important to follow and which were not.
4. Animals and Machines: our texts have been filled with both of these things. Working with Ronell & Kac’s text Life Extreme, make a case for the difference between animals and machines. Is there such a difference? And where do humans fit in all of this?
Before this class started I though of technology and animals as being two separate entities yet now my thoughts on the subject have shifted a bit. I think that technology was created to simulate human/animal behavior with the goal of making human life easier or to gain power over nature (think air conditioning) and other human being (think military advancements). The research and development in biology and technology has come to advance to a level where the two groups have started to combine. Examples of this combination can be seen in the pictures in “Life Extreme.” In this book we see the example of animals and plants that were created through bio-tech advancements. Despite the fact that these animals/plants are not found in nature I would not call them machines. Machines to me are creations that do not have a living brain, ones that don’t breath or feel emotions, machines to me are those things that need to be programmed my humans in order to operate. All those things make up a machine to me, yet I fully understand that in the future, perhaps not too far away, machines can become more “alive” with the use of biotechnology, but since that hasn’t happen yet I prefer to not guess and base my answer on the present state of development. In which case animals and machines are two different things which are starting to move closer together.
Animals are not machines and machines are not animals at least for now. Animals have a desire to live to breathe and to love, which comes to them from birth. Yet machines don’t have desires, they have programs that they follow. Even animals that where not naturally produces in nature, but where rather made in labs, are still not machines to me because they still have an ability to think for themselves, the capability to breath and to bleed which a machine can’t. With all that said it’s hard to define what makes and animals such, because then a machine can be created to simulate those definitions. When Plato defined a human as a “featherless, biped animal” people then applauded him and now we realize that a plucked chicken can fit that description and will not be any closer to being a human. The same goes for machines they can imitate qualities of animals but imitating something doesn’t make it real. I can foresee that technological advanced might change that but for now machines are not animals.
So where do humans fall into in this question of machines and humans? I think that humans are just another animal. Yet humans are on the top of the food chain and they have taken control over the earth and the animals below themselves. Being on this imaginary higher ground above other animals made humans feel like it is ok to create machines and play biological games with other animals all in the name of science and self interest I might add. Humanity can be seen in a way as a boy who burns an ant by using a magnifying glass, the boy represents humanity, the ant represent other animals and the earth and the glass is the bio/tech advances humans make. Each person I guess wants to play God and by manipulating life on the planet they feel they are Gods in a way. I think that this kind of power is dangerous and should have some kind of safeguard on it, but people like me won’t be heard behind the people who are doing all they can to make technological advances happen. Because we really need glow in the dark bunnies, or Schwarzenegger cows, or hypoallergenic cats, don’t we? I think not!
5.Filth/Censorship/Mores/Sexuality and Technology:
Sexuality is a topic that is rarely discussed in the open. The way that society sees sexuality as something private has to do a lot with that I think. Talking about sex in public is consequently seen as rude, vulgar and dirty. Sex becomes something you can’t discuss in the open yet something everyone seeks. Knowing that everyone wants sex, people try to sell sex through advertising, modeling and plain up porn. While the first two ways to sell sex are socially accepted, pornography is looked down upon because it is more revealing.
Further consideration should be given to the way that society tells us sex is ok. What I mean is that it is ok to have sex is you are in love and if it is love between a man and a woman. Otherwise if any part of that is not present, say sex is present without love or that its between two men or women the socially accepted thing to do is to judge and look down upon these actions. The reason the Ticket that Exploded had so much resistance is that it showed the reader a relationship exactly contradicting the norms of sex with love between a heterosexual couple. There was love and definitely no women even close by in the Ticket. Yet the hardest part about the Ticket was to discuss it in class. It made us confront the reason each individual was uncomfortable talking about the book. The obvious reason was because it had a lot of sex in it, and no one wants to come off as being the perverted, promiscuous person who openly talks about sex. Yet after doing that work with the book I think people realized that yes its sex, so what? You can talk about it and that doesn’t make you a worst off person like society would have us believe. Thus when we moved on to working on the Filth it was easier to look at the graphic sex images without feeling shocked at them. I guess once you have seen the things in the Ticket the level of things that will shock you go up more and more things become acceptable to the mind of the reader this way. As for the way that people addressed their emotions about the Ticket and Filth it makes a lot of sense that many tried to express it in the most anonymous ways because then they can share their true feeling on the subject without and fear of harsh judgment or resentment from others. I think that blog entries are probably the most anonymous of the three (plurk, class, blog) forms of communication we had for this class. So I expect that to be the place that most people expressed their truest feeling about those books. In the class room you are the least anonymous since people can see who you are and can directly link their judgment of your comments to you. Next we have plurk where you are somewhat anonymous depending on the kind of level of anonymity you wanted to reach (I mean that in a sense that you could make it so no one had clue who you really where or you could make it rather obvious) and so depending on that level you know that the comments you make will be linked to you only if the reader actually knows who you are. If not they will link it to your plurk identity of they might not even look at your post with the help of the “mark all as read” button. Finally there is the blog which is the most anonymous strangely enough because although all the thoughts on it are directly yours, you can choose who you show the blog to and even if you post the link to your blog on plurk the chance that everyone will go ahead and read it is rather low from my experience, so I think that knowing (or maybe assuming) that less people will read your blog then your ideas on plurk makes it more anonymous and therefore more sincere.
What I find amusing about all of this is that society as a whole decides what is the right way for people to live, how/who to love, what way to interact with people and so on. Yet no one is perfect and so if they do something wrong and still want to be respected by society they will try to cover it up. Like the case with porn sight viewing in conservative states. It makes complete sense that a place that tries to be all proper on the outside had dirty secrets on the inside. The more you try to deny something the more you will want it. Yet I find this whole wanting to please society c*** hilarious, I mean you can’t ever please everyone, so why try? Why change who you are so as to please other people? And finally why does it even matter what other people think of you lifestyle? I think that sex should be a more openly discussed topic since it is a big part of our life. I find it funny and sad how the hardest person to talk about sex to is your sexual partner. I find it sad that people tell other people who to love and people listen to them denying their natural instincts. “Society” is a way to limit a person’s life and tell him how to live. Just think of the Matrix, there is no such thing as an ideal perfect society. There can’t be rules to make it such either. We are not robots to follow the whims of “society” and each person needs to realize that before it’s too late; and he/she need to start thinking about what they want to do in life and not what someone else wants them to do. So if you want to watch porn be my guest but don’t go back and tell other not to watch porn because then you are being a hypocrite, and trying to control other peoples’ lives too.
Being a part of a book group was a new experience for me. Having to work out the detail and make a plan of action is always the hardest think to do in a group. Especially as the number of people you have to contact increases. The next difficulty in the group is finding initiative from people. A group needs someone to lead it along the way into different discussions and also to make decisions like the reading schedule. For some reason I have noticed that people don’t like taking indicative especially in college classes when thinks come to team work. That’s why I decide to be the lead when I could. It’s very rewarding in the end for me to make this effort since on the evaluation people noted my effort. Yet the truth is that being in the lead is rather easy because it doesn’t necessarily require some kind of better knowledge on the subject from the leader but rather the desire to lead and people skills are also helpful. After the discussion is opened up by a person the rest of the groups feels it is easier to join the discussion, knowing that they no longer have to start the topic and can just express their ideas.
All this was different from the Blog and from Plurk because in those cases you where only thinking about your own work, you had to lead yourself and follow your own thoughts on the books you read. In the book group you had a chance to discuss, explain, argue and agree on the points the other readers made. In a way that helped explore the book more in depth because it each person in the group to saw the book through the eyes of the rest of its members. In a blog you don’t see this process of interaction between different people, and you usually don’t see the growth that comes from those interactions. A blog is one person opinion and insight on the subject, while a book group takes each individuals opinion and tries to reflect on the similarities and differences for the benefits of the group as a whole. Plurk is also a place where each person is on his/her own. You don’t have to collaborate with others or to even talk to them to get your work done. Plurk was used for a lot of completely different and random topics discussed by members of the whole class rather then just focused on one subject with a defined group.
Within a book group discussions are mostly addressing the topic of the book and rarely go beyond that only if to explain something that yet again goes back to the book. It is inappropriate to go off on a random tangent in this setting because by making this group we have in a way picked our topic of interest, and are now bound to it. I think that this is good because that insures that the topic of the book will not be replaces with something random and that the members focus more deeply on each subject in the book because the book is constrained by the amount if pages in it. On the other hand Plurk is a place with no constraints where anything that interests the Plurker can be discussed. Yet by focusing on just the book we as a group get more insights on it and also get a more thorough understanding of it.
In the book group that we had via blackboard I think it was rather impossible to get too personal with the other members. For the most part I didn’t know who the members where and all we talked about was the book, therefore I never got to know the members more in terms of their life away from the book. I think that this lacking component is essential for forming some kind of emotional bond. With Plurk on the other hand I got to know people though their pictures and ideas and plurk themes with showed me the person behind the screen and made me more connect more with each person on their. So I think that a book group is good for getting a thorough understanding of one book in particular but it won’t bring up a closer bond between its members if done via blackboard.
2. Plurk: Without it the class would not be the class. Using the texts we have read in class explain how plurk fits in with the issues of technology and the human body that we have discussed thus far.
Plurk to me was a great example of alternity. It was a new world for every member of the class where each person could redefine themselves. Also every member of plurk was a stranger to the other members yet it was the same situation as the artificial stranger in “Radical Alternity.” The fact that we didn’t know each other created a distance between us which made it easier to openly share ideas without the fear or being looked down upon by someone you know. Like the book also said technology is a way to form alternity and that is exactly what we where doing by using the computer, the internet, the website. The interesting process that followed the stranger phase is that the plurk names each person created began to grow an identity. I would see people on plurk and just see their plurk name and over time my ideas about the person would be intervened with his plurk name and that would form his/her plurk identity. The best part is that I never will know the differences between the plurker I met and the person who real life person who plurks his ideas. On the other hand plurk let you share the thoughts you wouldn’t otherwise share with other people with other plurkers, so maybe in a way we all got a chance to know each other much better then we would have through other mediums of communication. The great thing about plurk was the way you could create yourself on there by editing your theme and using emotions and by sharing things with others, be those things pictures, videos or ideas. Without that possibility of personalizing our plurk pages I don’t think the class would have bonded as well as it has. Another thing that we discussed in class is the manipulation of emotions, which was sooo easy to do on plurk. I mean I remember Tony putting a sad crying face when we where in class to reflect the topic that tears add sadness to the face, yet the people who were not in class and saw that image probably thought that Tony was sad for real. As the class progressed plurks became more complex in that people started discussing topics of their interest like books and theories and enriched them through videos and pictures and you had to really follow the plurking to stay on track. In a way this reminds me of the Big Pig high where you are constantly getting more and more information, adding new plurks, new photos, new videos to continue your thoughts on the idea. In between the intellectual discussions plurk also offered a place to just vent or let other people know how you where doing. It was like having little orthids who would try to cheer you up or talk to you about the concerns of your day. The final thing that I will mention about Plurk being great for this class in particular is the 140 character limit. It made the writer think about how to condense their writing without loosing meaning. Since nanotext is the study of the small, it showed us that you can do anything with those 140 characters by either condensing or commenting on your own post. The trick was that in order to do anything with the 140 character you just had to be creative. So the “limit” actually thought us how to think outside the limit to achieve what we want using the small to creative the big and wise versa. The same can be said about nanotechnology as creative small technological objects that can combine to create bigger objects which can later deteriorate to become small again. I think that like it was said in the question, Plurk was an essential component of this class and that we molded to fit out study of the small and had great ideas come from that.
3. Limits: one of the ways that we have approached the small is with our plurk assignments, in your opinion how have these limits: 1) made you think about language 2) made you think about the small 3) helped you with your writing
Plurk assignments seemed at first just a fun way to plurk, but when looking back on it I have come to realize that before doing them I have never though about thinking how to write. Having limits in how to write was a new and fun idea, yet more importantly it started the idea about thinking how to write. It also made me look in search of new words when I couldn’t use the ones I was used to, because they where excluded. The limit of in the 140 characters was the one that we had to work with all quarter throughout the other limits Tony gave us so it is also important to discuss is along with the assignments. After a while we started saying that everything is possible inside the 140 characters and that is quite true. The limited amount of space made it more efficient for people to condense their ideas to include only the most valuable thoughts. This provoked the feeling of expressing your ideas in as few words as needed to get the point across. This evolved into putting up videos and pics to get a complex thought across while still being well within the limit. So in a sense the limit pushed a plurker to think more creatively about achieving things outside the 140 characters limit. Thinking about small writing makes me realize the power to being able to clearly express your idea in as few words as possible.
I have always thought that I need to improve my writing skills. All the work that we did with Plurk helped me understand that an important element of writing is really thinking beforehand about what I want to explain to the reader and then how am I going to say it in a simple format. Furthermore the limit that we used on our words in plurk made me think about the necessity of having a broad knowledge of words so that you can express an idea in the most articulate way. Also this is beneficial in writing because it varies the vocabulary inside a text. When it comes to personal writing I think that plurk was helpful in identifying important elements through all my writing. By that I mean that when I write in my diary I like to fully express all my ideas and feeling without sparing and words, yet then I can go back and limit some parts of the text that is more relevant then the rest and reflect on just those pieces in the future. I think it’s important to be able to define the significant small pieced from inside a bid piece and the limit in plurk was a way of learning how to do that. This was best seen when a lot of people where plurking at the same time and it was up to the reader to choose which messages where important to follow and which were not.
4. Animals and Machines: our texts have been filled with both of these things. Working with Ronell & Kac’s text Life Extreme, make a case for the difference between animals and machines. Is there such a difference? And where do humans fit in all of this?
Before this class started I though of technology and animals as being two separate entities yet now my thoughts on the subject have shifted a bit. I think that technology was created to simulate human/animal behavior with the goal of making human life easier or to gain power over nature (think air conditioning) and other human being (think military advancements). The research and development in biology and technology has come to advance to a level where the two groups have started to combine. Examples of this combination can be seen in the pictures in “Life Extreme.” In this book we see the example of animals and plants that were created through bio-tech advancements. Despite the fact that these animals/plants are not found in nature I would not call them machines. Machines to me are creations that do not have a living brain, ones that don’t breath or feel emotions, machines to me are those things that need to be programmed my humans in order to operate. All those things make up a machine to me, yet I fully understand that in the future, perhaps not too far away, machines can become more “alive” with the use of biotechnology, but since that hasn’t happen yet I prefer to not guess and base my answer on the present state of development. In which case animals and machines are two different things which are starting to move closer together.
Animals are not machines and machines are not animals at least for now. Animals have a desire to live to breathe and to love, which comes to them from birth. Yet machines don’t have desires, they have programs that they follow. Even animals that where not naturally produces in nature, but where rather made in labs, are still not machines to me because they still have an ability to think for themselves, the capability to breath and to bleed which a machine can’t. With all that said it’s hard to define what makes and animals such, because then a machine can be created to simulate those definitions. When Plato defined a human as a “featherless, biped animal” people then applauded him and now we realize that a plucked chicken can fit that description and will not be any closer to being a human. The same goes for machines they can imitate qualities of animals but imitating something doesn’t make it real. I can foresee that technological advanced might change that but for now machines are not animals.
So where do humans fall into in this question of machines and humans? I think that humans are just another animal. Yet humans are on the top of the food chain and they have taken control over the earth and the animals below themselves. Being on this imaginary higher ground above other animals made humans feel like it is ok to create machines and play biological games with other animals all in the name of science and self interest I might add. Humanity can be seen in a way as a boy who burns an ant by using a magnifying glass, the boy represents humanity, the ant represent other animals and the earth and the glass is the bio/tech advances humans make. Each person I guess wants to play God and by manipulating life on the planet they feel they are Gods in a way. I think that this kind of power is dangerous and should have some kind of safeguard on it, but people like me won’t be heard behind the people who are doing all they can to make technological advances happen. Because we really need glow in the dark bunnies, or Schwarzenegger cows, or hypoallergenic cats, don’t we? I think not!
5.Filth/Censorship/Mores/Sexuality and Technology:
Sexuality is a topic that is rarely discussed in the open. The way that society sees sexuality as something private has to do a lot with that I think. Talking about sex in public is consequently seen as rude, vulgar and dirty. Sex becomes something you can’t discuss in the open yet something everyone seeks. Knowing that everyone wants sex, people try to sell sex through advertising, modeling and plain up porn. While the first two ways to sell sex are socially accepted, pornography is looked down upon because it is more revealing.
Further consideration should be given to the way that society tells us sex is ok. What I mean is that it is ok to have sex is you are in love and if it is love between a man and a woman. Otherwise if any part of that is not present, say sex is present without love or that its between two men or women the socially accepted thing to do is to judge and look down upon these actions. The reason the Ticket that Exploded had so much resistance is that it showed the reader a relationship exactly contradicting the norms of sex with love between a heterosexual couple. There was love and definitely no women even close by in the Ticket. Yet the hardest part about the Ticket was to discuss it in class. It made us confront the reason each individual was uncomfortable talking about the book. The obvious reason was because it had a lot of sex in it, and no one wants to come off as being the perverted, promiscuous person who openly talks about sex. Yet after doing that work with the book I think people realized that yes its sex, so what? You can talk about it and that doesn’t make you a worst off person like society would have us believe. Thus when we moved on to working on the Filth it was easier to look at the graphic sex images without feeling shocked at them. I guess once you have seen the things in the Ticket the level of things that will shock you go up more and more things become acceptable to the mind of the reader this way. As for the way that people addressed their emotions about the Ticket and Filth it makes a lot of sense that many tried to express it in the most anonymous ways because then they can share their true feeling on the subject without and fear of harsh judgment or resentment from others. I think that blog entries are probably the most anonymous of the three (plurk, class, blog) forms of communication we had for this class. So I expect that to be the place that most people expressed their truest feeling about those books. In the class room you are the least anonymous since people can see who you are and can directly link their judgment of your comments to you. Next we have plurk where you are somewhat anonymous depending on the kind of level of anonymity you wanted to reach (I mean that in a sense that you could make it so no one had clue who you really where or you could make it rather obvious) and so depending on that level you know that the comments you make will be linked to you only if the reader actually knows who you are. If not they will link it to your plurk identity of they might not even look at your post with the help of the “mark all as read” button. Finally there is the blog which is the most anonymous strangely enough because although all the thoughts on it are directly yours, you can choose who you show the blog to and even if you post the link to your blog on plurk the chance that everyone will go ahead and read it is rather low from my experience, so I think that knowing (or maybe assuming) that less people will read your blog then your ideas on plurk makes it more anonymous and therefore more sincere.
What I find amusing about all of this is that society as a whole decides what is the right way for people to live, how/who to love, what way to interact with people and so on. Yet no one is perfect and so if they do something wrong and still want to be respected by society they will try to cover it up. Like the case with porn sight viewing in conservative states. It makes complete sense that a place that tries to be all proper on the outside had dirty secrets on the inside. The more you try to deny something the more you will want it. Yet I find this whole wanting to please society c*** hilarious, I mean you can’t ever please everyone, so why try? Why change who you are so as to please other people? And finally why does it even matter what other people think of you lifestyle? I think that sex should be a more openly discussed topic since it is a big part of our life. I find it funny and sad how the hardest person to talk about sex to is your sexual partner. I find it sad that people tell other people who to love and people listen to them denying their natural instincts. “Society” is a way to limit a person’s life and tell him how to live. Just think of the Matrix, there is no such thing as an ideal perfect society. There can’t be rules to make it such either. We are not robots to follow the whims of “society” and each person needs to realize that before it’s too late; and he/she need to start thinking about what they want to do in life and not what someone else wants them to do. So if you want to watch porn be my guest but don’t go back and tell other not to watch porn because then you are being a hypocrite, and trying to control other peoples’ lives too.
Monday, March 16, 2009
Pretty much the first comic book i ever read
"The Filth" was a fun read for me probably because it had a lot of pictures haha. Nevertheless it wasn't just the pictures that caught my attention, the sexual and graphic pictures quickly made me understand that this isn't the kind of comic I would let little brother read, until he was at least 16 or so.
I remember some body asking in class about the main theme throughout the comic and someone else mentioned that it was love. In theory that does sound great by the only place i found love in this book was the love of Greg to his cat. On the other hand it is that love that throughout the book moved Greg away from his alter ego as Officer Slade, so maybe love does have something to do with it. I guess that love in this comic is also rather depressing and dark because it involves a lonely old man and his cat, not quite love novel material, yet this kind of projection of love goes quite well with the dark, disturbing, overly sexual mood we see through the rest of the book.
The author of this book like the author of any other book has the power to manipulate the characters in any way he/she sees hit. In this case the authors of Filth made superheroes and villains who comment throughout the book about the cruelty of the manipulation they have undergone, as if they had minds of there own, now independent of the author. We mentioned in class that people admire superheroes but also seek to find superhero like people in the real world. For example the case of Miley Cyrus how in her show has an alter ego as a pop singer, or something like that. So people admire having alter egos like one that can be relatable to them and then one that has some kind of awesome power/skill. This i think gives the rest of the people hope that they also can reach great things since they can relate to one of the later egos.
Like we saw in the case with Greg and Officer Slade the question of which identity is the real one comes up. This is interesting because it also reflects how people act differently in different situation with different people, and then the same question comes up, how do you know the true identity of a person if he/she constantly changes. I don't think it is possible to ever completely know someone, even yourself for that matter, but having an alter ego lets you explore life by acting out new interacting with different consequences. Furthermore Slade found out that the Hand could easily make copies of any of its officers with its resources. This made me think about the loss of identity and how so many people strive to be like each other, for reasons of acceptance or popularity, while not realizing that the more you become like someone else, the more of yourself you loose.
When i mentioned that authors have the power to manipulate the actions of the characters they write about, i came to the thought that each person is an author if his/her own life. In the sense that we make ourselves do all kinds of wacky, silly, even stupid things by our own will. Furthermore we can decide to manipulate our emotions, like pretending to cry, in order to get a desirable response from another person or group. On the hand you can look at it as an advantage because if you know you are the author of your own life that gives you the power to "write" your own story however you want it. Its similar to how people who write down their goals are more likely to achieve them then those who don't. So realizing that you are in charge of your life is empowering.
Finally i was thinking about why the Filth wasn't as disturbing to me as the Ticket. I came up with some different ideas. First of all the Ticket was the first book we read that was so graphic and complex in its detailing and structure. Therefore after reading the ticket the graphic images in the book just didn't seem so disturbing. Another issue was that in the Filth the fact that I had pictures limited my imagination on the subject, while the Ticket let me image all the events taking place which is more disturbing because it lets the mind freely wonder to all the dark places. Last but not least is that the highly sexual scenes in the filth all include male and female interaction while the sex in the Ticket is always between men and other beings. This shows the level social influence on the way we perceive things, like in this case where society tells us that straight is the way to be, we group up having to learn to deal with other forms of sexuality, by either excepting it or rejecting it. Some of the negative reactions to the Ticket i think are coming from these phobias.
I think both the Ticket and the Filth were great book to read because they moved be out of my shell of easy reading. It made me understand that reading something challenging is more fun, and that even very graphic comic, which i would probably never read on my own, have a message one can get by reading them.
I remember some body asking in class about the main theme throughout the comic and someone else mentioned that it was love. In theory that does sound great by the only place i found love in this book was the love of Greg to his cat. On the other hand it is that love that throughout the book moved Greg away from his alter ego as Officer Slade, so maybe love does have something to do with it. I guess that love in this comic is also rather depressing and dark because it involves a lonely old man and his cat, not quite love novel material, yet this kind of projection of love goes quite well with the dark, disturbing, overly sexual mood we see through the rest of the book.
The author of this book like the author of any other book has the power to manipulate the characters in any way he/she sees hit. In this case the authors of Filth made superheroes and villains who comment throughout the book about the cruelty of the manipulation they have undergone, as if they had minds of there own, now independent of the author. We mentioned in class that people admire superheroes but also seek to find superhero like people in the real world. For example the case of Miley Cyrus how in her show has an alter ego as a pop singer, or something like that. So people admire having alter egos like one that can be relatable to them and then one that has some kind of awesome power/skill. This i think gives the rest of the people hope that they also can reach great things since they can relate to one of the later egos.
Like we saw in the case with Greg and Officer Slade the question of which identity is the real one comes up. This is interesting because it also reflects how people act differently in different situation with different people, and then the same question comes up, how do you know the true identity of a person if he/she constantly changes. I don't think it is possible to ever completely know someone, even yourself for that matter, but having an alter ego lets you explore life by acting out new interacting with different consequences. Furthermore Slade found out that the Hand could easily make copies of any of its officers with its resources. This made me think about the loss of identity and how so many people strive to be like each other, for reasons of acceptance or popularity, while not realizing that the more you become like someone else, the more of yourself you loose.
When i mentioned that authors have the power to manipulate the actions of the characters they write about, i came to the thought that each person is an author if his/her own life. In the sense that we make ourselves do all kinds of wacky, silly, even stupid things by our own will. Furthermore we can decide to manipulate our emotions, like pretending to cry, in order to get a desirable response from another person or group. On the hand you can look at it as an advantage because if you know you are the author of your own life that gives you the power to "write" your own story however you want it. Its similar to how people who write down their goals are more likely to achieve them then those who don't. So realizing that you are in charge of your life is empowering.
Finally i was thinking about why the Filth wasn't as disturbing to me as the Ticket. I came up with some different ideas. First of all the Ticket was the first book we read that was so graphic and complex in its detailing and structure. Therefore after reading the ticket the graphic images in the book just didn't seem so disturbing. Another issue was that in the Filth the fact that I had pictures limited my imagination on the subject, while the Ticket let me image all the events taking place which is more disturbing because it lets the mind freely wonder to all the dark places. Last but not least is that the highly sexual scenes in the filth all include male and female interaction while the sex in the Ticket is always between men and other beings. This shows the level social influence on the way we perceive things, like in this case where society tells us that straight is the way to be, we group up having to learn to deal with other forms of sexuality, by either excepting it or rejecting it. Some of the negative reactions to the Ticket i think are coming from these phobias.
I think both the Ticket and the Filth were great book to read because they moved be out of my shell of easy reading. It made me understand that reading something challenging is more fun, and that even very graphic comic, which i would probably never read on my own, have a message one can get by reading them.
And you don't even know
When looking through the book "Life extreme", i noticed pictures of all different kind of animals and plants. What i didn't realize is that non of the animals/plants in the pictures where found in nature. They where instead produced as results of human manipulations of different sorts, from genetic manipulation to using a cube shaped square as a way to achieve unnatural shape. Yet when i use the word manipulate it sound to be like it has a negative connotation which i don't actually imply for all of cases. Naturally i don't like to see animals like the bull being pumped with growth hormones, because i don't understand the reason behind doing that to another animal.
One of things i think about in this book is the nature of relations between humans and other animals. Humans have taken over as the dominant species on the planet. We live on this world and use the earths resources without, or with very little concern about other creature on this earth. Most of us no longer are worried with basic needs for survival but rather are worried about seeking new luxuries for life. Yes there is nothing wrong with trying to make life better for oneself, but what i strongly disagree with is finding luxury in something that hurts other animals. Simple examples like meet production or fur usage comes to mind. We don't need those things but since humans have more power they look down on other animals and feel its is their right act with animals however they please. I know you are probably thinking that I'm a crazy veggy who sprays red paint on people, but the reality is that i just think about looking at things through the eyes of animals. I mean would you like to live a life where you where on a lower food chain level then a human, i think not. Like the book says "An animal's eyes have the power to speak a great language." Maybe they can't tell you how they feel in words but they can share there feeling with you if you look them in the eyes.
I like the little quotes throughout the pictures which are co-related to the pictures on the sides. The element of humor make the book enjoyable but also makes me think about how i look don't on some of the quotes because i know a more advanced answer, what i mean is the like the example with the blue rose, the quote talked about the desire and impossibility of seeing one. Yet this book shows the power humans have over nature, in a certain sense (we can't stop hurricanes), to achieve what was previously thought to be impossible, or what previously didn't exist. That power gives humans a sense of superiority, which in my head is only good in very small doses.
I wonder what is the price we pay or the price the earth/animals pay for our decisions to advance and better our lives. Is it worth it? Should the human curiosity have some kind of limits or precautions that would help better all life on the planet not just the humans? I think that its not worth it for the most part, I understand the achievements that were reached but the desire for knowing more will never be stopped, yet that doesn't make it right to be abusive to the planet so issues like this should be addressed more to the public, which is something i think "Life Extreme" is exactly doing, even if those there not the exact intentions of the authors.
One of things i think about in this book is the nature of relations between humans and other animals. Humans have taken over as the dominant species on the planet. We live on this world and use the earths resources without, or with very little concern about other creature on this earth. Most of us no longer are worried with basic needs for survival but rather are worried about seeking new luxuries for life. Yes there is nothing wrong with trying to make life better for oneself, but what i strongly disagree with is finding luxury in something that hurts other animals. Simple examples like meet production or fur usage comes to mind. We don't need those things but since humans have more power they look down on other animals and feel its is their right act with animals however they please. I know you are probably thinking that I'm a crazy veggy who sprays red paint on people, but the reality is that i just think about looking at things through the eyes of animals. I mean would you like to live a life where you where on a lower food chain level then a human, i think not. Like the book says "An animal's eyes have the power to speak a great language." Maybe they can't tell you how they feel in words but they can share there feeling with you if you look them in the eyes.
I like the little quotes throughout the pictures which are co-related to the pictures on the sides. The element of humor make the book enjoyable but also makes me think about how i look don't on some of the quotes because i know a more advanced answer, what i mean is the like the example with the blue rose, the quote talked about the desire and impossibility of seeing one. Yet this book shows the power humans have over nature, in a certain sense (we can't stop hurricanes), to achieve what was previously thought to be impossible, or what previously didn't exist. That power gives humans a sense of superiority, which in my head is only good in very small doses.
I wonder what is the price we pay or the price the earth/animals pay for our decisions to advance and better our lives. Is it worth it? Should the human curiosity have some kind of limits or precautions that would help better all life on the planet not just the humans? I think that its not worth it for the most part, I understand the achievements that were reached but the desire for knowing more will never be stopped, yet that doesn't make it right to be abusive to the planet so issues like this should be addressed more to the public, which is something i think "Life Extreme" is exactly doing, even if those there not the exact intentions of the authors.
Our bodies are just not good enough?
Till the 19th century Chinese little girls would get their legs deformed in order to fit into a lotus shoe. Women would wear breath taking (literately) corsets to get their waists to be a certain size. Even as far back as the Egyptian time natural elements and colors where used to boost the natural look of the face/body. All this makes me think about the natural step forward in controlling our bodies. Like the humans in Ribofunk who get all kinds of animal upgrades like corral spikes to whiskers and beetle legs. It seems that the body just of itself without any adjustment is looked down upon as weaker then the other, as uncool or unfavorable. But why is it that the body is not enough? To me that's an important question, I think that humans have gone a far way, maybe even to far in indulging their consent desire for something better. Thus the likelihood that humans are going to become less human and more of something else via technological advances doesn't seem too far fetched.
I think that the body is wise and knows how to feel and protect its inner environment. Yet even nowadays people take medicine for things like the common cold or a headache without giving the body a chance to fight and improve its immune system on its own. I'm not arguing that some people, who REALLY need it, should stop taking their pills, but rather saying that by giving pills and other things like technology control over our bodies we make our bodies weaker in the end.
What was interesting in this book is how being a human is seen as something different in that world. As more and more people change their bodies they loose % of their human DNA, so a line of 51% is drawn to separate the humans and the new form of slaves -splices and the kibs. The line itself is an interesting thing which implies that somewhat has to determine the measurement for humanity. Someone has to say that this is human and this is not. Yet who can have that kind of power, or rather who can really be trusted with that kind of responsibility? I think no one should be. In this book both the people (who seemed less and less human from their exterior) and the splices (those below 51%) all kept their human emotions of love, hate, etc. Which means that no matter how advance our bodies become our weakness lies in our emotions and in the way we think, and if those "weaknesses" aren't changed all the upgrades in the world won't make a human more happy. Its hard to say that emotions are only our weakness' but they are to a point, on the other hand they are also a way of feeling alive and enjoying life. You can't have one side without the other. Or can you???
In an idealistic plan it would make more sense to work on mastering and upgrading our emotions rather then our bodies because those the way we think is what matters in terms of how we look at the rest of the things in life. Again that can lead to complete elimination of emotions like in a movie i saw, which is again an extreme, yet it seems that humans tend to like to go for extremes rather then try to achieve a stable middle ground.
How do you control something as it becomes more and more advance? I guess you have to follow alongside the path and also upgrade, get new stronger arms, faster legs, better eyes and there doesn't seem to be a limit in sight. Yet in the end the path leads to destruction in one way or another when the advances just get too high stake and the effects become global, but human desire to know about the greatest and latest, and to compete for that, will eventually bring us to an end, if not serious measures of control are implemented.
So all in all this book makes me think that the world we have to concur is world inside our own heads. Our bodies can be changed through varies manipulations, but no matter how much you progress on the outside your flaws will still be there to haunt you in your head. Therefore the place to start a war should not be with your body or with other people it should be with yourself and your unrealistic or destructive expectations from life.
I think that the body is wise and knows how to feel and protect its inner environment. Yet even nowadays people take medicine for things like the common cold or a headache without giving the body a chance to fight and improve its immune system on its own. I'm not arguing that some people, who REALLY need it, should stop taking their pills, but rather saying that by giving pills and other things like technology control over our bodies we make our bodies weaker in the end.
What was interesting in this book is how being a human is seen as something different in that world. As more and more people change their bodies they loose % of their human DNA, so a line of 51% is drawn to separate the humans and the new form of slaves -splices and the kibs. The line itself is an interesting thing which implies that somewhat has to determine the measurement for humanity. Someone has to say that this is human and this is not. Yet who can have that kind of power, or rather who can really be trusted with that kind of responsibility? I think no one should be. In this book both the people (who seemed less and less human from their exterior) and the splices (those below 51%) all kept their human emotions of love, hate, etc. Which means that no matter how advance our bodies become our weakness lies in our emotions and in the way we think, and if those "weaknesses" aren't changed all the upgrades in the world won't make a human more happy. Its hard to say that emotions are only our weakness' but they are to a point, on the other hand they are also a way of feeling alive and enjoying life. You can't have one side without the other. Or can you???
In an idealistic plan it would make more sense to work on mastering and upgrading our emotions rather then our bodies because those the way we think is what matters in terms of how we look at the rest of the things in life. Again that can lead to complete elimination of emotions like in a movie i saw, which is again an extreme, yet it seems that humans tend to like to go for extremes rather then try to achieve a stable middle ground.
How do you control something as it becomes more and more advance? I guess you have to follow alongside the path and also upgrade, get new stronger arms, faster legs, better eyes and there doesn't seem to be a limit in sight. Yet in the end the path leads to destruction in one way or another when the advances just get too high stake and the effects become global, but human desire to know about the greatest and latest, and to compete for that, will eventually bring us to an end, if not serious measures of control are implemented.
So all in all this book makes me think that the world we have to concur is world inside our own heads. Our bodies can be changed through varies manipulations, but no matter how much you progress on the outside your flaws will still be there to haunt you in your head. Therefore the place to start a war should not be with your body or with other people it should be with yourself and your unrealistic or destructive expectations from life.
In search of the Other
In the book "Radical Alternity" I start a journey to understand what or who is the Other that people search for, and the process that is correlated to that search. To be completely honest this book was the hardest for me to understand which seems rather odd after "The Ticket that Exploded". So to deal with that problem i decided that the best thing to do so for me to explore the message that author conveyed from my own understanding of it and see where that gets me.
Throughout the book Jean and Marc (the authors) talk a lot about what the Other is and what it/he/she is not, also an example of Japan was used to show what is an Other. To me it seems that the Other in this book is something that we strive to interact with in the case of Japan it is perceived to have "an appearance of proximity and a core that rejects that proximity". So in order to have another there needs to be a distance between the Other and the person, more importantly the distance is measured in the form of alternity rather then anything else. "Alternity is basically the other way of thinking by refusing to think in terms of finiteness" Well for me reading that sentence is a lot easier then grasping its meaning. The secret to alternity is to think that everything comes from the outside the authors say well let me think about that...So to be the Other there needs to be a distance created by the alternity which relies on the idea that it is nothing if itself and comes from the other. Hm...so by thinking that things come from the outside the Other separates itself from its surroundings. I'm pretty lost in all of this so I'll move on to things I understood better.
I liked the concept of the Artificial Stranger because it addressed the interesting fact that it is easier to open up to stranger sometimes then to people we know. The fact that the other person doesn't know you gives you the feeling of security in the sense that no matter how he reacts to your confessions you don't have to have any relations together afterwards so that knowledge of no future correlation makes it easier to share things without the fear of feeling any negative responses from that person in the future. Or knowing that that person isn't a part of your life and therefore by letting him in on your secrets you let go of some stress but protect the privacy of your lifestyle at the same time. The most important part of being that stranger is that there needs to be plenty of distance for there to be that moment of closeness; which is rather interesting.
One of the ways that people distance themselves from each other that i didn't think about before this book is the use of our names. I mean you can have a conversation with someone and never tell them your name and go on never knowing. You can exchange names as a sign of a form of acknowledgement of the other persons existence in your life. Then there is room for manipulation which is the form of interacting with someone while keeping your distance. For example you can lie about your name or last name. But what does that mean? How much of ourselves is in our name? On a basic level its just a couple of letters, but what it really is, is a part of a persons identity. So by giving your name to someone else you are letting the other person start to get to know that identity. Therefore becoming more vulnerable and less distant, less of the Other I guess. "The allusion of identity make connections easier" in the sense that by creating an identity that has some alternity in it one becomes less vulnerable, because that identity doesn't not match the complete truth, thus opening up to others becomes easier. Or so i think.
The last thing I wanted to touch upon in this book is the connection of technology and alternity. "Technology is a way to fall out of the world" the authors say, which is completely true. Since alternity is seeking a way to think in without finiteness, technology strangely enough comes to help with that. You can create new dimensions of the world through film, photography, music and other art. You can live a different life online and explore your identity by trying to be different things on the net. The fact that you feel unidentified on the web gives you a chance to recreate yourself without the fear or other people reactions to it. So technology becomes also a form of an Other that we seek.
Like i mentioned from the very beginning this book was really the hardest for me to understand in a complete sense but i tried and got some further understanding on the subject.
Throughout the book Jean and Marc (the authors) talk a lot about what the Other is and what it/he/she is not, also an example of Japan was used to show what is an Other. To me it seems that the Other in this book is something that we strive to interact with in the case of Japan it is perceived to have "an appearance of proximity and a core that rejects that proximity". So in order to have another there needs to be a distance between the Other and the person, more importantly the distance is measured in the form of alternity rather then anything else. "Alternity is basically the other way of thinking by refusing to think in terms of finiteness" Well for me reading that sentence is a lot easier then grasping its meaning. The secret to alternity is to think that everything comes from the outside the authors say well let me think about that...So to be the Other there needs to be a distance created by the alternity which relies on the idea that it is nothing if itself and comes from the other. Hm...so by thinking that things come from the outside the Other separates itself from its surroundings. I'm pretty lost in all of this so I'll move on to things I understood better.
I liked the concept of the Artificial Stranger because it addressed the interesting fact that it is easier to open up to stranger sometimes then to people we know. The fact that the other person doesn't know you gives you the feeling of security in the sense that no matter how he reacts to your confessions you don't have to have any relations together afterwards so that knowledge of no future correlation makes it easier to share things without the fear of feeling any negative responses from that person in the future. Or knowing that that person isn't a part of your life and therefore by letting him in on your secrets you let go of some stress but protect the privacy of your lifestyle at the same time. The most important part of being that stranger is that there needs to be plenty of distance for there to be that moment of closeness; which is rather interesting.
One of the ways that people distance themselves from each other that i didn't think about before this book is the use of our names. I mean you can have a conversation with someone and never tell them your name and go on never knowing. You can exchange names as a sign of a form of acknowledgement of the other persons existence in your life. Then there is room for manipulation which is the form of interacting with someone while keeping your distance. For example you can lie about your name or last name. But what does that mean? How much of ourselves is in our name? On a basic level its just a couple of letters, but what it really is, is a part of a persons identity. So by giving your name to someone else you are letting the other person start to get to know that identity. Therefore becoming more vulnerable and less distant, less of the Other I guess. "The allusion of identity make connections easier" in the sense that by creating an identity that has some alternity in it one becomes less vulnerable, because that identity doesn't not match the complete truth, thus opening up to others becomes easier. Or so i think.
The last thing I wanted to touch upon in this book is the connection of technology and alternity. "Technology is a way to fall out of the world" the authors say, which is completely true. Since alternity is seeking a way to think in without finiteness, technology strangely enough comes to help with that. You can create new dimensions of the world through film, photography, music and other art. You can live a different life online and explore your identity by trying to be different things on the net. The fact that you feel unidentified on the web gives you a chance to recreate yourself without the fear or other people reactions to it. So technology becomes also a form of an Other that we seek.
Like i mentioned from the very beginning this book was really the hardest for me to understand in a complete sense but i tried and got some further understanding on the subject.
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