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@cyborgdrala-blog
Hey You
Want to get together, Have one of our Saturday nights? Get drunk enough to like each other? We come home, I suck your dick You fuck me on the couch We move to the bed You fuck me from behind until you come In the morning I suck your dick until you come We have coffee And as soon as you leave I take the beer shit Iâve been holding in all morning?
Wealthy individuals in the middle ages owned portable images of Christ that could travel with them or be worn as jewellery, so that they could be constantly looked at and touched, much as we carry around our iPhones and laptops. What medieval subjects experienced when they joined themselves to Christ was directly analogous to our sensation of oneness in being closely joined to our technology â and to our sense of being bereft when that technology goes missing or breaks down because it has, profoundly but almost imperceptibly, become a part of ourselves.
Surviving in an Alien Environment: Human + Christ as Medieval Natural-Born Cyborg (Ruth Evans @ Quiet Babylon)Â (via bravenewwhatever)
I think this is off and I want to think about why.
Technology and Meditation
My dissertation research focuses on the intersection of meditation practices and technology use. Over the last year and a half of field work in the Tibetan Buddhistâinspired secular [sic] meditation community, Shambhala, Iâve been realizing that (and seeing glimpses of how) technology can play a role in what some Buddhists might call âwaking up,â or seeing reality as it truly is. The fuzzy ideas I have about how technology can be a part of our waking up come from a quite different view, though, than the instrumentalist view of technology implicit in tools like smartphone apps for meditation or personal, at-home EEGs. It is also the complete inverse of what motivated my research to begin with, which was a sense of disconnect between the philosophical underpinnings of the design of technology to support mindfulness and meditation and the philosphical underpinnings of mindfulness and meditation practice itself. In saying âthe philosophical underpinnings of the design,â I am building on the classic (in technology studies) notion that artifacts have politics; app design canât be disentangled from the philosophical assumptions about the self and existence held, however consciously or unsconsciously, by the designers/purveyors of the technology. Before, I saw these technologies as ways of continuing the same old patterns--reification of ego, materialism. Now, while I still think that is true for apps for meditation (and social media in general, which is a separate issue), I see technology, and its relationship to our waking up, and our relationship to it, from a broader (?), more subtle view. This is what I want to explore with this series of posts.
My good friend Rose, a fellow PhD student as well as spiritual friend, sent me a link to a 21-Day Mindful Technology Challenge on kindspring.org. Itâs related to one of the contributions Iâd like to be able to make with/after my dissertation--contemplative practices (meant to help us wake up) that explicitly involve technology. I donât quite know what this means yet, so, for the next 20 days (it started yesterday), I plan to write a brief analysis of each of the Mindful Technology Challenge prompts as a way to explore my own ideas about the presence and role of technology in contemplative activities (such as mindfulness and mediation). Here is Day 1.
DAY 1: TAKE MINDFUL SCREEN BREAKS
Accompanying text: âScreens have a way of hijacking our time without our knowledge or conscious consent. When we login to our computers we can get sucked into a digital world and forget to come up for air. The body and mind are revitalized by mindful breaks. Today, whether you are tackling a stream of emails, editing a voluminous document or creating a PowerPoint presentation, make sure to take regular screen breaks. Set an alarm for every hour, and when it rings, make a practice of turning away from your screen for a few minutes. Maybe you'll do a mindfulness exercise, connect with someone, or reorganize your desk. Perhaps do some deep stretches, or take a quick walk around the block. At the end of the day, notice how your energy and productivity levels are impacted by this simple practice of taking conscious breaks.â
This challenge doesnât have much to do with technology specifically. We can take mindful breaks from anything. Screen time is constant, yes, but so is eating. In fact, this challenge undermines mindfulness in a way--rather than suggesting we practice mindfulness no matter what we are doing, screen or no screen, it suggests we have to take âmindful breaksâ from some activities in order to practice mindfulness. It suggests screen time is not, cannot be done mindfully.Â
It does, however, involve technology a bit more directly in the exercise via the suggestion to set an alarm. Regular or random alarms throughought the day can be a good way to remind ourselves of our intentions to be mindful, to live mindfully. Breaks from work can be good, too. And we can get lost on our computers and out of our bodies when using computers. But a better exercise--âbetterâ meaning one that accommodates all aspects of life--is to set the alarm as a reminder to be mindful of whatever you are doing when it goes off, a clunky exercise meant to provide scaffolding for a more all-encompassing life practice: living mindfully moment by moment. Yet, even in this revision to the exercise, technology is more a separate instrument than an integral component of the exercise.Â
Finally, the irony of reading about this practice on my computer screen, complete with a comments thread where participants are encouraging one another, disqualifies it for me. But, it could be a koan!--How do you solve this design problem? The communication of the challenge (i.e., the design) undermines the challenge; this challenge to screen time is ontically anchored in screens. I have more thinking to do about this. Â
HOWEVER! The recognition of the ubiquity of screens and screen time IS technology playing a role in our waking up. A revised version of this challenge wherein technology is an aspect of contemplative practice would be practice letting screen time prompt mindfulness.
Taking conscious breaks is a fine practice. It just doesnât have much to do with technology. And mindfulness is possible whether weâre taking breaks to do it, or weâre using our computers--or, in really seeing our computers, letting them, like all other things, remind us to be mindful and present.Â
Do you tie your tennis shoes with a single knot or a double knot?
Technology as mirror. This kind of thing is going to become (is becoming) as much a part of how we know ourselves as mirrors, scales, bank statements.Â
UXanalysis: University of Washington Library System online catalogue search
How I Got Here: Iâm on this page looking for the e-copy of this book the library appears to have, based on this e-copy logo (1). Thereâs a problem with recursivity here: When I click on the âView all editions and formatsâ link (2) that I hope will take me to the e-copy version so I can actually view it, Iâm taken to a list, as expected, of the print and e-copies (see second image). When I click on the e-copy list item (3), it brings me back to this page. My best guess is that UW Libraries does not have an e-copy, so, as with print copies, instead of a UW Libraries listing (because there is none), the system provides only a link to other libraries from which I may borrow it on loan through UW Libraries. In short: It doesnât really make much sense to the user.Â
What I Donât Like About It: âUser-contributed reviewsâ (4). While I may be using this website, what I am trying to do is check out a book from the library. I am a library patron. I am a reader. This is a problem the dominant (though not only) view of humans interacting with computers, and of a lot of mediocre UX: that people are there to use the system. They are there to do something else. I am not here to use this online catalogue search; I am here to get a book to read. This âBe the firstâ flag (5) also smacks of attempts at âInternet cultureâ or, vaguely, of gamification. Certainly of manipulation, like the Dollar Menu at Burger King. But I am not here to be on the internet. I am here to get a book to read.Â
Etc.: I kinda like this many-linked footer (6), though the âLanguages,â âYou,â âWorldcat,â and âLegalâ categories have a sense of one-of-these-things-just-doesnât-belong about âem.Â
Are those really the only related subjects, though?
Technologies and scientific discourses can be partially understood as formalizations, i.e., as frozen moments, of the fluid social interactions constituting them, but they should also be viewed as instruments for enforcing social meanings. The boundary is permeable between tool and myth, instrument and concept, hitsorical systems of social relations and historical anatomies of possible bodies, including objects of knowledge. Indeed, myth and tool mutually constitute each other.
Donna Haraway, "A Cyborg Manifesto," 1985
Attention without feeling, I began to learn, is only a report. An openness â an empathy â was necessary if the attention was to matter.
Mary Oliver, on something she learned from her partner, Molly Malone Cook. via
M. had will and wit and probably too much empathy for others; she was quick in speech and she did not suffer fools. When you knew her she was unconditionally kind. But also, as our friend the Bishop Tom Shaw said at her memorial service, you had to be brave to get to know her.
Mary Oliver, on her partner, the photographer Molly Malone Cook. via
No brain (or heart!) required!
Sold with the white savior rhetoric of design
A Special Font to Help Dyslexics? More Like Snake Oil on i09
I'm sure
Do we say each others' names less now, because we don't greet each other on the phone so frequently? Sometimes when I'm dating someone I met online, I feel nervous or embarrassed or self-conscious about saying his name. It's almost like a shift in level of intimacy -- in the past, saying one another's name regularly was one of the very first new, personal exchanges/activities we had to do in order to enter into a new ongoing relationship. It barely even registered as a level. Now, saying a new boyfriend's name, to him, to me feels like an actual checkpoint -- "You are sufficiently accomplished in this relationship; you may progress on to the next level. You have acheived Candidacy."
A message from THE Ray RomanoÂ
Have a good weekend, Tumblr.Â
Want to see this video in another light? Watch Miram Ross's Vertical Framing Video Essay for a brief explanation of the symbolic meaning inherent (currently, before capitalism appropriates it) in vertically framed videos, as opposed to horizontally framed, the institution-defined aesthetic.Â
Syfy has announced that itâll be giving certain viewers the option to let the network take control of their homeâs lighting systems during broadcasts of its upcoming series 12 Monkeys. The new showâbased on the 1995 Bruce Willis film, and set to debut on Jan. 16âwill come with a âlight trackâ ...
Internet of things
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"ZenPayroll"?? BARF!
