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This week we started reading a new book, Open Sky, by Paul Virilio that focuses on mass media, how it is affecting our society, where it is coming from and where it is going. In order to accomplish this, Virilio takes an almost scientific philosophical approach to examining how technology is becoming an ever greater part of society. This book is a lot to wade through though I do believe that he presents many societal trends for new means of communication. On the other hand, I believe that sometimes he takes his claims of how technology will affect our future a bit too far. He makes wide, sweeping claims that are not nearly supported enough.
Teletopia
The first major concept that Virilio brought up was "teletopia." From my understanding, I took this to be a world where the focus was around technology/telecommunications. Teletopia is a place where all of society focuses around growing communications technology and nothing else. Virilio presents our society as one trending towards "real time" which allows us to be both here and "there." He presents this as a reach across the globe. I view this as technological globalization because soon most people will have access to other countries fairly easily. At the end of chapter 1, Virilio makes a really big claim though that I don't necessarily agree with or see enough support to back it up.
"At the end of the century, there will not be much left of the expanse of a planet that is not only polluted but also shrunk, reduced to nothing, by the teletechnologies of generalized interactivity."
This I don't necessarily see as true. I think that the planet will be more interconnected as he points out, but are our future prospects for the state of our planet/society so grim? This claim just seems very negatively focused. I believe that interconnectivity will be a benefit for us because we can communicate more efficiently and quickly, but I do not believe that the world will be "polluted" per say.
Real Time
I had a difficult time trying to define real time as Virilio intended it to be. So here is a list of working definitions that I came up with or inferred from the reading.
Real time:
- the immediate communication of information
- communication of the present or current happenings around the world
- a focus only on the here and now without perspective/context (without looking forward or backwards)
Being Sedentary
As I stated before, I believe that some of the claims made take trends too far. For example, Virilio pointed out that society was headed toward sedentariness where it is never necessary for one to get up and communicate and walk around. I don't believe activity will ever truly be abandoned. Technically I shouldn't have to get up now to talk to my roommates or go to class. I could text or call the roomies. Or I could Skype into class to hear the lecture. Yet, we still do physically go to class or speak directly to each other. There is something special about direct human interaction. The personal quality makes it important and necessary to our emotional development and maturity. Also, I cannot see giving up exercise even if my health was taken care of because it just makes me feel good. It releases those endorphins.
The only example I could think of for the world that I feel like Virilio is portraying is that from Wall-E, the Pixar movie. In this scene, humans are featured as sedentary creatures who have totally trashed planet Earth and now live in space, never needing to leave their chairs. Just a bit extreme.
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Virilio does make a good point that a lot of what we do now does lead to sedentariness such as desk jobs or driving to work, which will soon be a technology due to the Google car. Therefore, I agree with his claim that technology will and does touch all aspects of our lives, but I don't think that it will control it.
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