colonel@gloria.UUCP (Col. G. L. Sicherman) (06/29/85)
> >There is simply nothing in the Sarnoff statement > >that will bear scrutiny, for it ignores the nature of the medium, of > >any and all media, in the true Narcissus style of one hypnotized by > >the amputation and extension of his own being in a new technical > >form. > >It has never occurred to > >General Sarnoff that any technology could do anything but _add_ > >itself on to what we already are." > > I don't follow these explanations (but then, perhaps I'm hypnotized . . . :-). > Please eleborate. The motor-car will serve as an example. The car is an extension of the foot. It serves the same basic purpose, but on a vastly different scale. If you use feet to go about, you can run, skip, or gallop when you like. You can go in the street, on the sidewalk, or on the grass; you can detour to greet somebody or pat a dog. Car travel does not permit this fineness of detail. But if you use a car, you can breakfast in Buffalo and lunch in Albany--an experience denied to pedestrians. So far, nothing new: the car is optional, so we can regard it as an addition to your capabilities. But now consider your actions rather than your perceptions. In a car you use your feet mechanically, to regulate the car's motion. The only feeling your feet do is to feel the position and pressure of the pedals; any other feeling is a distraction. (Ever drive with itchy feet?) Nor can you use your heels, arches, and toes independently. Your feet become mere transmission pads. This is an example of how technology amputates people, by overriding their direct sensory and motor capabilities. Now multiply this effect by thousands! As E. T. Hall says, "Today man has developed extensions for practically everything he used to do with his body. The evolution of weapons begins with the teeth and the fist and ends with the atom bomb. Clothes and houses are extensions of man's biological temperature-control mechanisms. Furniture takes the place of squatting and sitting on the ground. ..." I could quote further, but you get the idea. And in technological culture, most of these extensions are mechanical. Small wonder that people from non-industrial cultures regard us as eerily mechanical in many ways: our passivity and helplessness in un- familiar situations; our capacity to function in inhumanly adverse conditions; our emotional inexpressiveness and booklike speech. We accept these as normal because they predominate in any mechanical culture. -- Col. G. L. Sicherman ...{rocksvax|decvax}!sunybcs!colonel