Reactions to Technology: past and present

Key words: technology, new technologies, computers, writing, Walter Ong, Plato

What we understand by technology is not always clear. Realising that most of the things that surround us are technology should help us consider new technologies from a more open and critical perspective.

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From an anthropological point of view, the word technology could be defined as “the body of knowledge available to a civilization that is of use in fashioning implements, practicing manual arts and skills, and extracting or collecting materials” (The American Heritage Dictionary).

Whenever we hear the word technology, however, we tend to instantly associate it with computers, electronic appliances, cell phones and the like. If we understand technology in its broader sense, we should also think of writing, books or pens as technologies. The difference between a pen and a cell phone is that cell phones are later technologies, but no doubt they’re both technologies in the end.

The problem seems to be that we tend to naturalise those technologies that have been with us for a long time and look at them acritically. Nobody, for example, sees anything wrong in a book; but new technologies like computers are commonly looked at with distrust and apprehension. Many people see books as natural elements, while they consider computers openly artificial things. Or, what is even less clear, they think books are less artificial than computers, as if there was anything natural in a book. They would attack computers by dubbing them cold and impersonal, but nobody would say the same of books, even though the way of approaching text is essentially the same, and books –unlike computers- are not suited for real-time communication.

Negative reactions towards new technologies have always been present throughout history, although in different extents. The Luddites in 19^th century England charged against textile factories sabotaging and destroying their machinery. Even today, Amish communities try not to rely on modern technologies that can alter their simple lifestyle and promote individualism. Current environmentalist movements plan mediatic demonstrations to boycott technologies that are considered harmful, like nuclear energy or GMOs. In education, current technologies like notebooks, ball pens and calculators have also had to go through harsh criticism when first introduced in the classrooms [1].

Walter Ong, in a book subtitled "The Technologizing of the Word," writes that “most persons are surprised, and many distressed, to learn that essentially the same objections commonly urged today against computers were urged by Plato in the Phaedrus and in the Seventh Letter against writing” [2]. The author explains:

Writing, Plato has Socrates say in the Phaedrus, is inhuman, pretending to establish outside the mind what in reality can be only in the mind. It is a thing, a manufactured product. The same of course is said of computers. Secondly, Plato’s Socrates urges, writing destroys memory. Those who use writing will become forgetful, relying on an external resource for what they lack in internal resources. Writing weakens the mind. Today, parents and others fear that pocket calculators provide an external resource for what ought to be the internal resource of memorized multiplication tables (…)

Ong also quotes Hieronimo Squarciafico, who in 1477 expressed similar misgivings towards print. But, just as Squarciafico still promoted the printing of books, Plato also wrote. This paradox can prove even greater if we agree with Ong, who -citing Havelock- goes on to affirm that Plato’s analytical thought was only possible because of the effects that writing was beginning to have on mental processes. This means that Plato could articulate his thought the way he did only because his mind was not the mind of an oral person. Writing affects our mental structures, as any technology does. If technologies transform our societies and our minds, then, the question seems to be: How positive or negative can these transformations be?

Of course, together with the pessimistic views on new technologies, we also have the optimistic ones. Some people during the 18th century and later thought power engines would make labourers’ life easier, turning the world a better place. Before that, some thought print would make everyone wiser. Similar ideas were also heard about television during the aftermath of the Second World War, and can still be heard about computers.

The pessimistic and optimistic views on technology usually fall under the terms technophobia and technophilia –dislike or love for new technologies. Placing ourselves on any of these extremes implies avoiding the task of consciously pondering and analysing technologies. I have for me that if we really want to arrive at a sensible perception of a particular technology, we should get to know it, use it, apply it, see its benefits and disadvantages, and be critical about it. No technology is hundred per cent good or bad [3]. Sometimes it is us who either feel unconsciously charmed by new fashionable things, or who can’t be flexible enough to challenge our habits and try something that is not what we’re used to.

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[1] Fisch’s What if… presentation gives a clear survey of this reluctance to new technologies in education. I’ve already included this video in a previous post.

[2] Ong, Walter (2002) Orality and Literacy: The Technologizing of the Word. London: Routledge. (Chapter 4 can be consulted here.)

[3] Langdon Winner (1983) analyses whether certain values and power relations are inherent to some technologies. In his article Do Artifacts have Politics? the author answers positively to the question in the title.

Lost and the hyperbole of mystery

Key words: Lost, TV series, mystery, time, flashback, fast forward

The TV serial Lost is built on mystery. The nature of this mystery, however, seems qualitatively different from more traditional enigmas due to the complex relationships arising from the interaction of three different temporal planes: past, present and future.

No, I don’t watch much TV. However, I’ve become quite fond of the series Lost (2004-onwards). I’ve devoured the three first seasons in a few months and I’m still deeply engaged during this fourth season. I’m anything but an exception; most of the people I know have become equally addicted to the series. Are we so conventional then, or is there really something about this TV show?

I’ve always seen the series as the hyperbole of mystery. Mystery is a narrative strategy; a fine strategy to hook the audience to a story. More specifically, a mystery is an enigma, an unresolved question, a puzzling and incomprehensible thing, something whose meaning and reality is hidden from us [1]. From the very first chapter, Lost begins overwhelming the viewer with questions. Every single element in the story gives rise to an increasing number of enigmas; and, whenever an answer arrives, it comes along with more and more perplexing questions.

For instance, when the veil on the nature of the hatch was finally lifted at the beginning of the second season, this new knowledge came together with a plethora of new enigmas: Why was the hatch inhabited? How did these other people arrive on the island? How long have they been there? Why didn’t they go outside? What was their function? What would happen if they didn’t comply with their obligations? Who did they work for? And so...

This hyperbolic nature of mystery in Lost, however, is not based on mere accumulation. It’s not only adding one enigma over the other. In fact, the structure of mystery in the series is a bit more complex. What I’ve found particularly interesting is the different levels on which the enigmas work. During the first seasons, the enigmas in Lost worked on two different planes: the present and the past. Questions and doubts not only arose regarding the events on the island, but also about events prior to the plane crash. Here it is important to notice that the past in Lost is not inferred through present actions and dialogue, but concrete, and brought forward through the regular use of flashbacks.

To the question “what is happening?” it is added the one “what happened?”

In relation to this, I consider of particular interest the way the real nature of the characters becomes itself a mystery. The characters in Lost are not only qualified through their present actions, but also through their past behaviour; and, by showing that past actions sometimes contradict present ones [2], the series screenwriters are able to build both new and more complex mysteries and characters.

To the traditional question “who are they?” (answered by what the characters are doing in the present), it is added the new “who were they?” (answered by what the characters are doing in the past).

The convergence of past and present complicates the nature of the mysteries. Some mysteries arise from present events and situations (What will Sayid find in his self-exile from the camp?), some from past events and situations (How did an Iraqi torturer end up in a Los Angeles bound flight?), and some from the relationship between both past and present events (Will Sayid torture and kill the false Henry Gale?)

But this is not all. This plural-plane strategy seems to have found its apex during this fourth season, when the future is added to the levels on which actions and enigmas work [3]. As with the past, this future is not a predicted but a concrete one (this time brought up through flash forwards). As such, the future acts as a new plane in which specific enigmas are posed (Why is Sayid killing people? Why does Hugo regret having gone with Locke?) while generating a new reading about the present (Has Ben been always speaking the truth? Is Locke leading his group to death?)

The convergence of these three planes and the complex relationships they establish turn mystery in Lost qualitatively different from more traditional uses of it. Mystery is not only a present question about the past that will be answered in the future (the typical detective mystery), nor a present element that we can’t understand yet (the usual fantastic mystery); mystery, in Lost, is provided by the three planes simultaneously –past, present and future. There is no solid ground then, no certainty in Lost. The present poses questions about the past and the future; future and past pose questions about the present. We don’t know what’s happened yet, nor do we know what is happening, or what will happen. It is the hyperbole of mystery. We’re facing the past, the present, the future, but any of them gives us certainties, just more and more questions.

This is perhaps one of the reasons why Lost proved so addictive, even to those who were not much interested in this type of series before. Lost is a huge open question and natural curiosity forces the viewer to sit in front of the TV screen to get some answers. And, provided some answers are delivered from time to time, those who feel hooked by mystery seem to have found in Lost the right place to feed their endless hunger for uncertainty.

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[1] Not by chance, etymologically speaking, the word is derived from the Greek verb muō (to shut or close lips or eyes).

[2] For example, characters who seemed dull, naïve, spoiled or mischievous in the past can acquire a new heroic dimension in the present.

[3] Lost is not the only TV series rediscovering the flash forward technique. Read here.