Retarded by Cell Phones
by S. Ray, photo by Brody Klemer
I have a kernel of meaning to share about how we see the world on a day to day basis. In many vague terms, I could allude to what I mean to express and hope that through your sense of understanding you could get it without me being too specific. Not like a riddle, more like intuition. I could tell you that it has to do with a feeling about identity, which a college professor once told me is the key to understanding literature. She was Argentine, raised and came into her own during a time when your true identity – not your name, but what you believe, who you think yourself to be – was something valuable yet dangerous. People were thrown from airplanes into the sea in those days for nothing more than agreeing with their own thoughts.
photo by Brody Klemer
I could say something about perception and skills, street smarts and the importance of details. When I was a young child my father taught me how to fold a map properly so you could see the part you had to see, quickly fit it in your pocket, and when the time came, change to a different part on the map with a minimal number of manipulations of the sheet. Plan for the next fold, remember your turns. Have you ever thought about the way you navigate? Do you look for the name of the next town, knowing all the places you’ll have to pass on the way, or do you look for the highway number?
Think of your closest friend, wherever they are. What 160 character message would you think to them if you could not text it?
This, an observation about the evolution of human consciousness and the very nature of our own perception becoming tied with the use of small and powerful machines, is being called Augmented Reality (AR) by today’s cyborg anthropologists. As AR becomes more and more comfortable, and young children grow and become aware of the world with GPS and SMS as standard tools of life – standard features of how the world works – what, if anything, is lost? And to be fair, what is gained? As a child I dreamed of action at a distance, telepathy, telekinesis. I would venture to guess that most kids dream of this. All of the new technological tools at our fingertips attempt to satisfy our desire for these powers, and in many cases do so quite well. Which makes me wonder if the development of the internal “mental” manifestations of these powers – telepathy and an uncanny sense of direction – is being retarded by cell phones, dashboard nav systems and the casual international text message.
Perhaps the evolution of humans using AR and methods such as telepathy/telekinesis are happening simultaneously. I say use both. Just because a person may send a lot of texts doesn’t mean they aren’t using telepathy and intuition just as much!!! Maybe the key is knowing intuitively which method is the best to be used in the moment. In some instances time factors into having to go straight for the cell phone instead of sending telepathic messages out into the universe. Even as much as I’d like to believe time is an illusion.
P.S. While riding to work on the bus I had a vision of S. Ray sitting in my living room. I wondered if he would be passing through for a visit to SF soon. Later that day I got a text from him saying he’d be in SF in a few days. Could this be an example of both methods being used at the same time??
that is totally an example of that. sure enough. anyway – i am not writing to b-little or b-grudge the integration of any kind of technology i mentioned with our faculties. instead i hope only to marvel at it all and perhaps become a touch more self aware – on an individual and collective scale – as well as to keep my eyes peeled for hazards. every tool people have ever used throughout all history has had the opportunity to influence perception. communications and geospacial stuff just seems to be among the most striking. think of the children.
I am a third generation Montanan. I grew up in the mountains and along the cold clear rivers of Western MT. I was pulling a pack string in the Bob Marshal Wilderness by the time I was twelve.
I worked in the woods or with horses until ten years ago. At that time I felt I was getting too old to keep up the hard labor and found myself embracing technology and have been sitting and staring at computers ever since. Recently I went back to school to push the communication skills via technology.
A couple of years ago I was at a Rainbow Gathering in Wyoming. The government “incident team” deliberately picked a fight in Kiddy Village then opened up with pepper ball machined guns on the “rioters”. They had truck loads of troops with full riot gear and automatic weapons waiting in the hills to respond at the call.
As they opened up on us with those pepper ball guns we, through video cameras and cell phones captured their actions. There was a documentary production team doing a shoot and a gal from Democracy Now radio at the gathering so we were able to give testimony via sattalite radio in real time and the production crew put together images from the many memory cards turned in, and uploaded to You Tube within an hour of the incident.
The Democracy Now guy who was on the air in Colorado called the FBI and asked them what the hell was going down in the mountains of Wyoming. As the riot squads were assembling in the parking area just after dark, they were told to stand down.
On the way out of the gathering a few days later, I called my ailing mother to check in. She was going over her accounts and discovered an education account that was set up for me thirty years earlier and made it available. That’s the cosmic part of this tale.
I see great potential in technology as a tool of communication to be used by people who want to make changes in the world and need to mobilize others to help make it happen. The Iranian example is an inspiration. It is a way to get people together. But we still need the face time and relationships built buy getting our hands dirty together and making things happen on the ground.
For an example of people getting together from all over the world via the web, and creating activist art, check out the Coalition of the Willing.
http://coalitionofthewilling.org.uk/
And as in all things. We need to keep it in balance. Make contact with the earth. Get away from the computer at times and take walks along those cold clear rivers and listen to the breeze singing in the long Ponderosa needles.
What a funny article/post to be displayed on an ONLINE arts publication? But it’s the irony in life that makes it beautiful isn’t it?
So I would say, what we’ve lost was probably worth loosing. Cause what we’ve gained is just so needed. I confess I’m one of the 21st century technology worshipers. I believe that technology is our prophet – in the very literal sense, its the breath of all the people on this planet. Yes, I’m saying that the internet can save the world. he, he. And text messages. And laptops. And fucking Facebook. Free information, spread to all corners of this planet. The breaking down of boundaries and boarders, in countries and the countries in our minds. Montana connecting to NYC connecting to London connecting to Mumbai connecting to SF connecting to Katmandu connecting to Japan connecting to Portland connecting to Montana again. We’re talking about the very existence of the Big Family here. And we can’t do it by snail mailing post it notes to each other. Welcome to the 21st century – put your seatbelts on, cause we’re in for one hell of a ride…
OH thanks Rick! I’m thinking that most have already seen this, but maybe it’s been awhile, and it is one of my favorite examples of technological benefit: http://playingforchange.com/journey/introduction
We have a daughter in New York and one in Seattle. We can all sit and visit face to face via gmail video chat. My father in law lives with us. He is almost 97 severely crippled by arthritis and deep into Alzheimer’s. As far as he is concerned he is face to face.
I have a fantasy goal. I was into wilderness horse packing until we took on the care of my father in law. When that responsibility has run it’s course I would like to set off on 30 day or more rides. I would use a lap top, flexible solar panels that can be strapped on top of the packs and a sat uplink to broad- cast an internet reality show from the depths of wilderness.
i would watch that show if i had a tv! (maybe i could figure out how to watch tv on my phone? can i text at the same time? I know i have def done that while talking to somebody – text somebody else and use speakerphone – totally makes me a better and more effective person he he ha ha hmmm) i have to second jc’s motion that it’s kind of funny to have this discussion spring up in an online journal but also propose that maybe the ancient egyptians talked about pen and paper the same way: “all this technology man look at it, what will we become?” or not who knows. skeptics and cynics (ludites, environmentalists, nay sayers of all kinds) balance zealots and the world is as it should be. i get sick of nay saying quickly – so much of the time it’s just impulse and not thought out. the nature of perception – on an individual or collective basis has totally been one of my favorite things ever since i first saw the borg on star trek and read my first carlos castaneda book. i guess my main distress point i could identify if i were to be critical of phones / texting / computers is that so many times i find myself just using them because i have them, not because i need them. the side of this i’m most interested in now is the learning vs. growing up with shit.
Yeah, a lot of people do say that technology is bad, without really giving it any thought. But in the end, we all have to live in the age we were born into, and create and be positive with the actual tools we are given. It’s easy to find the awesome aspects of technological tools these days, like those web pages recommended by Rick and Brody– both really cool! Thanks for sparking this discussion Sammy.