Philosophy 101D

I found the video of the telepathic monkey!

By Douglas Adams

Because the Internet is so new we still don’t really understand what it is. We mistake it for a type of publishing or broadcasting, because that’s what we’re used to. So people complain that there’s a lot of rubbish online, or that it’s dominated by Americans, or that you can’t necessarily trust what you read on the web. Imagine trying to apply any of those criticisms to what you hear on the telephone. Of course you can’t ‘trust’ what people tell you on the web anymore than you can ‘trust’ what people tell you on megaphones, postcards or in restaurants. Working out the social politics of who you can trust and why is, quite literally, what a very large part of our brain has evolved to do. For some batty reason we turn off this natural scepticism when we see things in any medium which require a lot of work or resources to work in, or in which we can’t easily answer back - like newspapers, television or granite. Hence ‘carved in stone.’ What should concern us is not that we can’t take what we read on the internet on trust - of course you can’t, it’s just people talking - but that we ever got into the dangerous habit of believing what we read in the newspapers or saw on the TV - a mistake that no one who has met an actual journalist would ever make. One of the most important things you learn from the internet is that there is no ‘them’ out there. It’s just an awful lot of ‘us’.

http://xkcd.com/c251.html

this doesn’t have anything much to do with anything, but I found it amusing and semi-relevent

Our final screening will be this Thursday at 7pm in Wohler Hall rm 24. Wohler is directly behind DKH.

We will be watching the documentary Love Machine by Peter Asaro and Doug Matejka. From the press release:

Love Machine considers the social and moral implications of building humanoid robots sophisticated enough to participate in social and emotional roles that are traditionally considered exclusively or even essentially human: friendship, sex and love. The film examines the actual technologies being developed in these directions, and discusses these issues with the people who are pursuing these technologies as well as those who seek to profit from them. It also confronts various social critics, commentators and philosophers of different perspectives in a effort to open a dialogue on what implications these technologies might have for human relationships in the future.

Among those interviewed are:

Roboticists:
Rodney Brooks, Director of the MIT Artificial Intelligence Laboratory
Hans Moravec, Carnegie Mellon University
Gill Pratt, Cynthia Breazeal, and Brian Scassellatti, MIT
Ken Goldberg, University of California, Berkeley.

Philosophers:
Daniel Dennett, Tufts University
Hubert Dreyfus, Univesity of California, Berkeley
Manuel DeLanda, Columbia University and Institute of Advanced Study-Princeton

Sex & Culture Commentators:
Carol Queen, Robert Morgan Lawrence and Lisa Palac
Ernest Green, Editor of Taboo Magazine

Childhood technology-use advocates:
Joan Almon, and Colleen Cordes

and the entrepreneurs building such products as the Sybian and Real Doll and others . . .

Anyone, please feel free to answer my questions. If the Internet is so good at giving us the information that we want, why are most of the people on this website bringing up the same exact issues and examples? If we were in class would this also happen? While I like how this website is employed in class, does it hinder us when it comes to the responsibilities as students? Are we encouraged to participate more or less in class? Could this be attributed to embodiment and distant learning? Please give me some feedback.

            I agree with a lot of what Dreyfus has to say about embodiment and the internet.  Dreyfus defines embodiment as our physical location in this world, including our physical and emotional interactions with others.  He believes that using the internet is essential and plays an integral part in people’s lives; however, it does not have the same affect as embodiment has on people.   Dreyfus believes if people become disconnected from a certain point of interaction, they will lose relevance, skill and real meaning. I

  For example, on-line education will not provide people with the higher level of education they are looking for, because it for one, lacks the one-on-one interaction with teachers.  Dreyfus believes that a higher level of education relies on teacher-student relationship.  I personally have taken two self internet classes, and I strongly agree with his reasons.  Although it partly has to do with the type of learner you are, I think most people can agree they learn better when someone else tells you first hand and you are able to see different processes or concepts visually.  For myself, it is extremely difficult for me to learn new material on my own.  I learn much better when I can work each step through with someone else.  More experience and real-world situations are key to gaining knowledge and learning about the world around us. On-line education may make someone competent, but he/she will definitely not obtain rational wisdom.  Dreyfus conveys that individuals will never make that transition from novice to expert, because in order to achieve something to our full potential, we have to be truly immersed in what we are doing.  Whether it is learning how to play a sport or learning how to write cursive, you can never be a true expert unless you practice first hand. 

            In addition, Dreyfus talks about intimate relationships and how personal relationships are not the same as on-line relationships.  I could not agree more with Dreyfus, because I believe in order to have a deep and meaningful relationship with a significant other definitely requires actual embodied presence of each person.   I believe that genuine personal connection is what you essential for a relationship to grow.  Words, such as “I love you”, does not have the same meaning as hearing it first hand.  For example, I am sure a lot of guys would agree that it is just wrong to tell a girl for the first time they love her over the internet.  I know I would be upset, because it is very impersonal and it lacks genuine meaning altogether.  In addition, I don’t believe in internet chat rooms and on-line dating programs.  What makes the internet appealing to people is anonymity, which scares me a lot.  Anonymity gives people the opportunity to make up their appearance, personality, interests, ect.  I could have a complete vision in my head about an individual and they could be the exact opposite.  So, basically, I need one-on-one interaction to really develop an intimate relationship with another person.

Post here by class on Thursday for participation credit for last week.

Prompts and Questions:

• Post any thought you had about the class debate between Clark and Dreyfus.
• Jenkinson and Bleecker both claim that machines deserve credit (and responsibility) for participating in human social activities. How do their claims differ from traditional arguments over artificial intelligence?
• We have basically finished the core course material for this semester. Do you feel like you understand technology better than you did before? Did this class help? Is technology worth understanding well?

If I had to choose between Dreyfus and Clark, I would choose Dreyfus.  Dreyfus believes that the body has significance and relevance.  There are so many things that our bodies just do naturally without really thinking about it.  For example, a basketball player naturally shoots the ball without thinking “ok, I’m going to bend my knees and shoot the ball.”  I agree with Dreyfus and his views on embodiment.  One of Dreyfus’s arguments is distance learning.  He believes that you need the body interaction in order to get the full experience.  I agree with this argument because take tennis, for example.  There is no way that you get the same experience from learning the rules online or playing Nintendo Wii as you do when you actually play.  Nintendo Wii goes through the motions of hitting the ball, but the timing and contact are much different when actually playing.  Also, there is no way you can perfect a serve through the internet or through Nintendo Wii.  When you embody skills, they become natural and you can begin to master these skills.  Another argument made by Dreyfus has to do with interpersonal relationships.  When people are in a disembodied relationship, they miss out on risk and significance.  For example, can you honestly say that you get the same experience from a kiss (Muah) sent through instant messenger as you do from an actual embodied kiss? There is no way. Technological relationships are not as fulfilling as embodied relationships.  I happen to hate talking to my boyfriend through instant messenger because there are so many times when words are taken the wrong way.  You can’t feel or see any emotion expressed by that person.  I find it frustrating and I do not think I would ever be able to have a technological relationship.  Finally, there is no risk associated with technological relationships.  I agree with Dreyfus on this argument because people are willing to do and say things on the internet that they would not do in person.  I even think it is so much easier to tell someone bad news, or anything really, online.  The risk of the person freaking out at you or hitting you is gone.  Overall, I agree that body interaction is much more significant than online interaction.  

Dreyfus’s concept of embodiment is an integral part of his argument against the Internet.  He argues that truth can only be reached by looking within oneself, and that looking to outside things is misleading to us.  To Dreyfus, the Internet is one big distraction that yields few valuable lessons to us because it is not part of us. 

The rise of the Internet in the past ten years shows that this technology is here to stay, and it has become an integral part of modern culture.  Users of Facebook.com and myspace.com have made the internet sites part of their daily life and as a tool to stay in contact with friends.  This trend of turning to technology instead of social interaction is particularly troubling to Dreyfus’s theory.

 College-aged people today could hardly imagine what life would be life without the internet.  So much of our interaction is media based, Universities have uprooted the formats of their courses to include blogs and message boards for students to participate in.  Wikipedia provides a free online encyclopedia that users can update themselves, but lacks any kind of authority because it is written by common man.  Dreyfus would say that these trends are dangerous to us and unreliable.  They enable us to disembody from ourselves and seperate us from the truth. 

But Dreyfus’s view that the Internet is an unworthy substitute for social interaction is a weak one.  Though Wikipedia is not writen by experts, the cumulative knowledge of millions of people makes it nearly as reliable as other encyclopedias.  While traditional encyclopedias are still available, wikipedia is another option for those who cannot afford encyclopedias or don’t have access to them.  In the same breath, the use of blogs and message boards by higher education does not necessarily shift the learning from the classroom to the computer.  Many of these University offiliated websites are more of a supplement to the course material. 

Dreyfus’ views are too extreme to adequately attack the Internet, because he assumes that technology will replace real life.  But in actuality real life is negotiated between social interaction, the Internet, and a millieu of other facets.  As we advance as a species there will continue to be new media with which we interact.  But we should not fear these advancements will replace old ones.  Rather, we should utilize all possibilities and prepare for future technology in order to reach our full capacity. 

I know a lot of people strongly disagree with Dreyfus, but I find myself agreeing with some of his points.  Unlike Dreyfus, I love the internet and find it very useful, but I can see where he is coming from on some of his points.  Dreyfus talks about how he thinks that while we are on the internet, we are disembodied on the internet.  Dreyfus believes that without our bodies we will slip into nihilism.  I agree with Dreyfus that we are disembodied while on the internet.  People feel that just because they are on the internet they must take no responsibility for their actions or words.  I don’t know how many times in middle school that girls would get in fights through instant messenger.  People would say the most cruel, hurtful things and think nothing of it because it was on instant messenger.  It must not mean anything and it won’t hurt anyone if you say it through the internet because it isn’t as if you are really saying it to the person.  People think that nothing bad can happen to them for the actions they take on the internet. 
I also agree with Dreyfus about the internet giving people a platform to make opinions and never act on them.  I think that Facebook is the best example of this.  I don’t know how many groups I get invited to be in supporting some cause or another.  “Wear black for tolerance.”  “Support breast cancer.” “Vote for Obama.”  These groups have thousands and thousands of members and I always wonder how many of these people are actively involved in this issue they claim to believe in.  It is really easy to just click the ‘accept’ button and join a group to make people believe that you are taking a stance.  The internet allows people to make it seem like they are involved or care about things that in fact they do nothing for.  People can even make horrid videos of government officials or make videos full of racial slurs and terrible things and then think that they will never see any consequences.   We live in a world where speaking your mind is the thing to do and there are groups fighting for every issue possible.  The internet allows these things to be amplified even more and really does cause problems in our society.  This anonymity is one of the draws of the internet and this is not right.  The internet gives us the ability to pass between embodiment and disembodiment so easily it’s amazing.  I personally love the internet, but I agree with Dreyfus and think that these things are a little disturbing.  
 

I found myself agreeing with Dreyfus’ argument about how the Internet leads to disembodied (and ultimately inferior) human interaction. The Internet is a great tool in facilitating communication – making it quick and easy to talk to someone halfway across the world. In fact, the coordination and ease of communication that the Internet created led to further developments in our society. Yet, I still feel that despite the great advantages of it, no form of long distance communication (or telecommunication) can compare to face-to-face interaction.

One of the more interesting examples he gave in favor of this argument was the distance-learning example. With the advent of new video technologies, is it possible to effectively teach a class without the physical presence of an instructor? I know there are several classes on campus that have at least posted online lecture material, and even a few that have begun posting video lectures in order to supplement classroom learning. However, there are many students out there (myself included) who take advantage of this and skip class since access to the relevant material is available online and at our convenience.

But I have to admit, despite the great opportunity this gives me for sleeping in an learning another day, that going to class and being in the physical presence of the instructor has been the most efficient way of learning for me. Dreyfus discusses how that even in interactive video, that a teacher can lose “the sense of context” or feel/mood of the room (Dreyfus 60). Sometimes, even through video, you may not be able to detect subtle stresses of importance on certain facts. Even being in a class with other students facilitates learning since others may bring up questions I was afraid to ask, or these questions may help clarify a topic or help me towards a realization about class material.

I do think that the Internet is a great way to communicate. Without it, I would never have been able to communicate with friends from back home who have gone to other schools. Though it helps to be in touch, nothing compares to when we all get to hang out together in person.

  One of the most useful tools and extraordinary complex of simplest solutions that allows an individual to access any material of desire. My friend asked me one time; do you know what holds an answer to every question? I said no. He said ask the Internet. This type of formality and individual characteristics for which we hold the Internet to such high regard has got me worried. Dreyfus believes that the Internet dehumanizes an individual that allows them to say certain things that they would not say in real life. But isn’t this better because it exposes me to a side of the individual I would have never known existed? Maybe. I take myself for example writing this post. Most of the words I use I probably would never use talking to someone, just because of the seriousness and tone for writing the post. Does this make me different than who I actually am? I would have to say no. My immediate situation relative to way in which I lose my context, relevance, significance, and risk is increased to believe I can do and say what I want through the Internet. However, the Internet seems to be a double-edged sword in which I can exhibit my thoughts but also be bombarded by information overload, in which my opinion is constantly changing by views and opinions of other minds exhibiting their thoughts through this mass communication. I would have to say the Internet is a good thing because minds can collide and exhibit their thoughts to each other and build upon it.

I think that Dreyfus’ view on the internet is a bit drastic. He believes that the internet limits interpersonal communication and has a online disinheriting effect which leads to nihilism, or annihilation of the self and the individual consciousness. He believes that this leads to isolation and depression in people. I do believe that there are some people out there that spend too much time on the internet, making it their only communication with the world. This does lead to isolation, but I think that without the internet they would be even more isolated than with it. Obviously if somebody is using the internet as their main means of communication, then they probably don’t feel comfortable communication with people in reality and they would most likely be more isolated without it. I think the internet is actually a good way for people like this to be able to communicate ideas, thoughts, and feelings that they otherwise would not feel comfortable sharing and would just keep bottled up. So yes, it does isolate people, but who is too say they wouldn’t be isolated otherwise? I definitely disagree with Dreyfus’ idea that it leads to nihilism and disembodiment though. I do not think that it causes people to lose a sense of themselves and to be separated from their body. I think that it only takes down the barrier of the “physical body” and allows them to open up. Take this class, for example. Although I don’t think most of us are an example of the people who isolate themselves on the internet (because we are attending a university where we interact with hundreds of people everyday), many of us still do not feel comfortable stating our ideas in class. I know this is the case for myself, and by having the opportunity to express our ideas on the class website I can still get a chance to interact and share my opinions.

I was surprised and excited to read the article concerning Wikipedia in class the other day. I discovered the site sometime last summer and have been an avid user ever since. Come to find out it is right behind encyclopedias such as Britannica in accuracy of print. The whole idea of a ‘free’ encyclopedia, updated constantly, for the people, and by the people was in genius. It seems to me that most of the people against the site are scholars concerned with reduced income because of this free access site. They claim to be concerned with the accuracy of information on the pages, but I don’t see how their words could be anymore accurate than the millions of users that check the site regularly. I understand that with free editing it is impossible to keep things completely accurate, but I feel that within time the site could surpass encyclopedia Britannica.

I don’t claim to be an expert in any particular subject, but I know many people out there who take their interests and hobbies to an extreme. This site is perfect for them, it gives them a sense of community and importance. The article from TIME that we read a few months back rung true in this Wikipedia case. Your average Joe Schmo could know just as much about global warming as an acclaimed expert, people haven’t been given the credit they deserve in the past, but this is the time and place to shine.

I really enjoy the site because I can do searches on just about anything. The other week it was grass roots movement, and from that page it allowed me to search many other related topics. Because of its accessibility it has a wider range of topics to search from and many different contributors with different information to include. The idea of information overload could easily relate to this topic, but as we mentioned, we have gotten really good at filtering out information that is irrelevant to us, and I truly believe this site has done great things for both the user and contributor.

            I feel as though the debate between Hubert Dreyfus and Andy Clark represents the classic age-old (well, since the birth of the Internet) question of whether or not you think the Internet is an overall “good thing.”  As annoying as it is, I hate to say my opinion rests somewhere between the twos’ arguments.  Dreyfus, to me, is like your stuck-in-the-50s grandmother who looks back on the good ol’ days when you knew your paperboy on a first-name basis.  He makes excellent arguments, including his idea that the Internet creates a sense of disembodiment.  This disembodiment is the most tangible item of evidence we have studied in this class.  I see evidence of disembodiment all around me!  No need to list examples; we have all seen it or experienced it ourselves.  However, when he goes deeper into his ideas, such as the idea that hyperlinks are chaotic and unorganized, he starts sounding like someone who is refusing to accept the technological benefits the Web has to offer.  Although the library does contain an extremely organized hierarchy of information; how many people go to the library for information these days (without a professor requiring them to do so)?  I find the Internet to be a very useful and timesaving instrument—Which brings us to Clark. 

“It is the mind-body-scaffolding problem.  It is a problem of understanding how human thought and the reason is born out of looping interactions between material brains, material bodies, and complex cultural and technological environments (Clark, 11).”  Clark claims that there isn’t a difference really between the biological and technological way of gathering information.  Whether Inga memorized the location of a place in her mind or Otto looked up the location in his notebook, they both end up with the correct bit of information.  I agree with Clark that there is a fluidity of human-machine integration.  Clark seems much more likely to accept the impacts of technology than Dreyfus.  These days, the Internet plays a significant role in people’s lives.  I still, however have a problem with Clark’s definition of intelligence.  As he states, he says we are intelligent because of the way we can interact with technology, and, therefore, we are natural-born cyborgs.  I think there is a major difference between individual, biological intelligence and the intelligence of using a computer.  Anyone can learn to navigate through the Web, but only some are born with a high level of unique intelligence.       

First I will take an approach to technology based on Gehlen’s ideas.  He says that technology allows us to replace, facilitate and strengthen our present state.  He believes that using a bow and arrow will allow for man to attack animals far away and compensate for how we are under determined… in the fact that I cant kill a deer 50 yards away.  To me the concept of technology lays in the way in which the bow and arrow was constructed.  If we are talking about 500 years ago I would assume it was made out of wood, but my bow at home is made of a fiberglass composite, which shoots farther and faster than in the old days.  I claim that technology is the difference between an old wooden bow and the new ones.  I feel that Gehlen’s claims would hold true for prehistoric men and how they would have used a sharpened stick to kill animals.  This would still help compensate for the fact that they couldn’t kill some animals with their hands, which is how we are all still under determined.  The only difference between now and then is that now we use newer bows and arrows, and guns, to kill the animals instead of a sharpened stick.  I believe that Gehlen’s concept holds true, but that it actually doesn’t apply to technology at all.

I have had an incredibly hard time understanding why we need to talk about technology as we do, and that may be because I am not a philosopher.  To me, technology is what we use and how we invent new and more efficient systems.  In fact, it doesn’t really concern us how we define technology, but how we use it.  I don’t feel that technology is either a crutch or a shoe; I think it is certain objects that people use to interact with the world which should be defined as either a crutch or a shoe.  The internet is where I run in to some problems classifying in my head.  By this I mean, I see the internet as a series of computers and servers connected by wires, and the concepts that were used to construct the internet are the actual technology.  This means that how we interact with the internet isn’t based on the hardware used to construct the internet but the material placed online by users.  Hence, this material isn’t a technology, but a product of humans.  Hopefully this shows why I am so confused on the concept of technology and why people are addressing it as such.  Then again, the definition of technology could change, and my argument would be false, but this would only show that these discussions on technology are based on an assumed definition (application) of the word.

The article we received in class about Wikipedia really caught my eye.  I use Wikipedia often when doing research for class or to just simply learn about different topics out of curiosity.  Wikipedia is an open source for public to post entries and edit entries as well.  The article focuses on comparing the accuracies of the entries in Britannica and Wikipedia.  In each set of testing, Wikipedia had a greater number of inaccuracies than Britannica, although not by much.  In the first one, 42 entries were tested and only 4 inaccuracies were found.  That number is very impressive considering that these entries are not posted only by scholars or experts, but just normal people.  It was mentioned by a former Britannica editor Robert McHenry that with open editing process, reliability cannot be ensured.  Unless one is searching through a valid source such as an online version of a journal, errors are going to be present everywhere.  The internet is a world wide web without any restrictions, but it is our responsibility to judge which information to trust for its validity and what not to.  Of course a student will not be allowed to cite wikipedia in his paper because it is not a valid scholarly post.  This does not mean that same student cannot gain an overall understanding of the topic through it, and then further research through books or journals. 

This point goes back to Dreyfus’s argument that computers will be inferior to libraries since the internet does not post the relevance of articles in a hierarchy.  I agree with Dreyfus in that we should be more concerned with quality and not quantity, but with millions of articles posted, we should be intelligent enough to trust one article over another just by looking at who or what site posted it.  Although Dreyfus would completely disagree with the idea of Wikipedia, I believe that it has become a very useful tool mainly because of its efficiency.  In a way, it can just be looked as a more reliable source since it is edited and updated so frequently.  Encyclopedia’s are updated every year which makes them more outdated than just using Wikipedia.  With us being completely relied on the internet as not only a knowledge resource, but a communication resource, it would be difficult for us to avoid sources like Wikipedia. 

I’ve been thinking about Dreyfus’ notion that information overload becomes a bad thing. The fact that people may change their opinions on any number of topics based on the introduction of new information should not be considered a negative consequence. If people were so stubborn in their ways and stuck with their opinions regardless of what information they used to form them, where would we be as a society today? I believe in the gathering of knowledge. The Internet provides an endless amount of information on any topic imaginable. Utilizing those sources to form an opinion only makes sense. The more information we have on a subject, the better chances we have of finding the truth or forming the best opinion. This is not to say the Internet is foolproof. It is our responsibility to sift through the information when forming our opinions. This is true with any source of information. In the modern world, all information is biased. News companies have political and commercial ties which force them to display news in ways that doesn’t necessarily reflect what actually happened. Just as France would portray their role in World War II differently than the rest of the world, information can and will be biased depending on the source. Using the most resources available helps us to look past the bias of others and form our own opinions. I don’t believe the information overload Dreyfus describes to be a valid argument. If we didn’t use the information available to us, our society would not advance and thrive as we do today.

I am still puzzled by the idea that people are still siding with Dreyfus in the debate about the Internet and technology. I mean no offense to anyone who is sided with him, but I find flaws in any and all arguments that he makes. The entire first chapter covers the idea of Hyperlinks and their poor functionality on the Internet. Dreyfus argues that Hyperlinks are a threat to the way we live and the way that we get our information. He brings up the point that libraries are well organized and pieced together in groups according to what they are about, and that Hyperlinks are randomly assembled and have no real interconnection. However, Dreyfus states that the organization of Hyperlinks on the Internet is a threat to the way that we ind information,but he never states exactly how. Dreyfus merely expresses his frustrations with the way that the Internet works. Furthermore, the use of any noteworthy search engine eliminates the need for any sort of organization.
An argument that has been brought up in class and also in other posts that I have read is that over use of the Internet causes isolation and an increasing lack of need or want for human interaction. I agreed that this was possible to a certain extent for a while and could see it in examples of kids playing games online and doing nothing else. Clark makes a very strong argument against this in chapter 6 when he states “According to a University of Warwick (UK) study, heavy Internet surfers are more likely not less to belong to some real-world community group, and less likely to spend time passively watching TV. Talking to others on the Internet encourages, it seems, the appreciation that we can get together with like-minded folk and actually make a difference in the world. This goes directly along with the idea of the Internet as a shoe and not a crutch.

Wikipedia was brought up in class the other day in regards to the discussion on the internet and the readings by Clark and Dreyfus. Since I do not know that much about wikipedia, I decided to research it a little more. According to their website, wikipedia is a “multilingual, web-based, free content encyclopedia project.” The word ‘project’ throws me off a little in that it is something that is done for fun on someone’s spare time, but it has gotten to be very well-known. Since it was introduced in 2001, wikipedia has grown to be one of the largest reference websites on the internet. However, the content is completely written by volunteers and can be edited at any time someone decides they don’t like what’s on there. This possibility that any certain article could be completely false makes me question the authority of this website. However, after the article that was given in class entitled, “Internet encyclopedias go head to head” was very eye-opening. Encyclopedia Britannica has experts in given fields that help write and edit the entries but and wikipedia is done by volunteers. However, the accuracy is much better than I thought it would ever be. The study that was conducted for the two encyclopedias showed that the average entry in wikipedia contained just around four inaccurate statements but in Encyclopedia Britannica had three per entry. This is astonishing, and it definitely changes my mind in regards for me trusting it. I always disregarded wikipedia as an actual legitimate source, but now I am thinking twice. I doubted the information that was on the internet (with the exception of electronic journals) but wikipedia is changing my mind around. The internet is actually allowing people to express their knowledge in any subject they feel close to, and surprisingly aren’t as wrong as I thought.