Cybernetics and Becoming Posthuman

Cybernetics, a theory that both Hayles and Turner touch on, can be defined in many different ways, but as I understand it, in cybernetics, a system’s changes affect its behavior. If we think of society as a system that runs on technological information and innovation as well as culture, then it can be seen as cybernetic. As breakthroughs are made in technologies that allow information to travel readily from one source to another, the system must change to accommodate the cultural and social implications that accompany this change. An example of this is the growing availability of the internet. Knowledge has begun to change due to the ability of a person to quickly access information in the thousands by using a simple search engine like Google. Thus, it can be said that the changes in the world directly affect developments in knowledge, technology, and society, but at the same time recreate the world by moving it in a new direction of development. Turner acknowledges this when he says that, “Networked forms of commerce, and the integration of information technologies into them, quickly began to seem like stages in a natural, rather than a socio-technical, progression. Suddenly mankind ha[s] entered a new stage of evolution: the scientists of the artificial-life movement, wrote [Kevin] Kelly, ha[ve] already shown that ‘evolution is not a biological process. It is a technological, mathematical, informational, and biological process rolled into one’” (203). Humanity is constantly evolving, and as Hayles points out, this is how we are becoming posthuman—individuals change with the system as well. A posthuman understands the world from multiple perspectives, and is willing to change perspectives. Hayles uses a sort-of Darwinian interpretation of how humans can become or are posthuman in this sense, when she says that, “Organisms respond to their environment in ways determined by their internal self-organization. Their one and only goal is continually to produce and reproduce the organization that defines them as systems. Hence, they are not only self-organizing but are also autopoietic, or self-making” (10). Therefore, not only can we adapt to a changing society by changing ourselves, we can change society so it will adapt to our changing knowledge and culture.

Hayek

Hayek claims that “By giving the government unlimited powers, the most arbitrary rule can be made legal; and in this way a democracy may set up the most complete despotism imaginable” (82-3). He contrasts this idea with that of the Rule of Law, which “implies limits to the scope of legislation: it restricts it to the kind of general rules known as formal law and excludes legislation either directly aimed at particular people or at enabling anybody to use the coercive power of the state for the purpose of such discrimination” (83). So, it appears that Hayek believes the government should be regulated by the Rule of Law, which protects the people because it never changes, the rules which are set out in it are “fixed” (72). Without a commitment to maintaining the Rule of Law, a government can create arbitrary laws whenever it sees fit, and this has the definite possibility of leading to public unrest. It’s hard to say where the US democracy falls in with Hayek’s philosophy. It’s been a while since I took government in high school, but it’s my general understanding that the government cannot just make and implement laws without a vote of the people—that’s pretty central to democracy. To do away with the Rule of Law, in my opinion, would be to do away with democracy, a government that is centered on the people. The scary thing about this argument that Hayek makes, however, is that the decline of the Rule of Law can be readily applied to the political situation in Germany when Hitler took over, which allowed him easy access to creating a totalitarian government.

I think the more exciting part of the Hayek reading was on economic control leading to totalitarianism. His theory that centralized control of the economy can lead to control in every aspect of an individual’s life is really interesting. Society is already set in a pattern of consumption, and big corporations already decide what it is that is consumed. The government plays a role in regulating what is consumed through agencies like the FDA, which looks out for the health of the people. The idea that if the government controls economic activities it will then be able to decide for us what is necessary is a crazy idea, but Hayek’s argument is surprisingly good.

Baudrillard and Debord

The problems that these men have with mass electronic media are problems that I can relate to. Baudrillard brings up the fact that the relationship between producer and consumer goes in one direction with little interaction. The model of transmitter-message-receiver leaves no room for conversational ambiguity and real socialization. Sitting at a TV or listening to the radio doesn’t allow the consumer/receiver the ability to respond, only to absorb and maybe interpret what they are seeing. Sure, mass media allows for mass communications and relations (by way of globalization), but still the model of transmitter-message-receiver alienates the receiver. In order to resolve this bias, Baudrillard suggests reciprocity between producers and consumers.

For Debord, the real issue with media is its ability to destroy reality. Spectacle is created in its place, where commodities take over and “having” is more important than living. Social life is heavily influenced by the media surrounding it, allowing for a society of want masquerading as need. Commodity, by virtue of the media and spectacle, is now “ruling over all lived experience” (26). Reality is left behind and replaced by spectacle, a world where nothing can go wrong as long as people have the means to represent themselves as “having”.

Modern electronic media has allowed human beings the ability to access anything they possibly want, while also influencing them to want what they do not, by any means, need. The world has become a place full of images rather than interaction. The populace is concerned with what they are shown and encouraged to have by media outlets such as television, rather than thinking and interacting with one another and developing their own form of reality. There is a huge disconnect between consumers and producers that is growing ever wider with the continued improvements of technology. The implications of such a great divide are ominous in relation to the future of culture and society.

Barthes/Foucault, and the media training our minds

Side note: Just saw this on NPR's website and had to share. We've brought in up in class before, so it's not completely off subject.

I’ve studied Barthes and Foucault in a Modern Lit Theory class, so a lot of what I have to say is probably less about media/communication and more about literature. Semiology, as I understand it, is all about finding meaning in a text without implying societal or cultural influences, and strictly focusing on the text itself, the differences that appear within it, and its “signs”. It is obvious that Barthes is a great proponent for this, based upon his extensive essay on the subject. He is heavily concerned with myth, which he separates from language. I guess this is where the argument about media influence comes in. The assumption that self is derived from media consumption is troubling to me. Foucault believes it is the author of a work, who must without appearing outright, describe and embody the cultural and historical aspects of that work to the audience. Rather than Structuralism, Foucault has been called a proponent of Cultural Poetics/New Historicism, which implies, “We must know...the societal concerns of the author, of the historical times evidenced in the work, and of other cultural elements exhibited in the text before we can devise a valid interpretation” (Bressler 219). Where Barthes believes the meaning in a text lies in the text itself through its signs, Foucault implies that a reader must look further to derive an interpretation. He states in his essay on the author that, “...the function of an author is to characterize the existence, circulation, and operation of certain discourses within a society” (bottom 452; 6). If we think about the author as the media, then they certainly do just that. Advertising companies target specific groups of people in order to appeal to a sense of cultural and societal understanding within those groups. Modern media messages, like those delivered through television, radio, and the internet, are widely influential on the kind of person someone can turn out to be. In the search for individuality, people tend to migrate between established groups that the media already acknowledges. Currently, it is becoming harder to find a space to call your own, when so many products are pushed as necessities that are otherwise unnecessary to living. I’m afraid we’re all becoming pre-packaged people that the media can manipulate into wanting and “needing”, even believing, things that we otherwise wouldn’t without their influence.

McLuhan

McLuhan is well known for coining the phrase, “the medium is the message” (7). By medium, he means “any extension of ourselves”, which could be a form of technology, newspapers, even a light bulb. He finds that the medium is the message because, “it is the medium that shapes and controls the scale and form of human association and action” (9). This statement leads McLuhan to break down medium into hot and cold. Hot medium he defines as high definition, high information, requiring low participation, and excluding the user (ex: TV, movies). Hot medium is specialized and repetitive, something that McLuhan believes “will serve to fragment a tribal structure” (24). On the other end of the spectrum is cool medium. Cool medium has characteristics opposite that of hot medium; it is low definition, low information, requiring high participation, and includes its user (ex: telephone, speech, and writing).

Along with this separation of mediums, comes a separation of culture. The hot medium can be readily associated with Western culture, known for its want of better, faster technology as soon as possible. Western culture embraces technological change that allows the user to sit back and relax. It is focused on entertainment and ease. McLuhan focuses his cool medium explanation on tribal cultures, which are concerned with oral traditions rather than alphabetic. The tribal culture is set on reacting and participating in action. On the other hand, “Phonetic culture endows men with the means of repressing their feelings and emotions when engaged in action. To act without reacting, without involvement, is the peculiar advantage of Western literate man” (86). Western culture wants involvement in actions, but instead is lost in a pattern of simple absorption and reaction. Unsurprisingly, Western culture has advantages and technologies that tribal cultures would never dream of needing. There is something to be said about the emphasis Western culture puts on constantly moving forward, reacting and never acting. We miss the consequences of medium by being lured away by its content, “For the ‘content’ of a medium is like the juicy piece of meat carried by the burglar to distract the watchdog of the mind” (18). By simply absorbing and reacting, Western culture is easily led astray by news media and corporations