My overall experience throughout the religious studies 245
course of Apple, Google, Facebook was absolutely innovating and revolutionizing
to say the least.This class had a
profound impact on my overarching use of technologyas a whole and truly led me to recollect on
my own personal level of self-awareness within my current use of digital
databases. Three subjects that had the most proficient impact on my overall experience
within the class consisted of reading Steve Jobs biography as well as listening
to both the TED talk of Sherry Turkle as well as the presentation by Dr. Larry
Rosen on the iDisorder. I will forever do my best to strive towards living a hungry, yet foolish lifestyle. As the saying goes, "to be old and wise, one must first be young and stupid." Dr. Larry Rosen and Sherry Turkle both helped me see ways to enhance and change my overall technological use of facebook, my cell phone, and all the other devices maintaining a priority amongst my life.
Ultimately, each action I take in the future regarding my use of technology will forever be changed by the tremendous impacts this class has had on my life as a whole. I have made a strong and conscious effort to be aware of what I am doing at every moment in time and will continue to take into consideration the effects technology has on the ability to not only impact my life, but too also the lives of all those around me. Both a self-awareness in myself has furthermore allowed me to be constantly alert in seeing what is going on throughout the world-wide and local community around me. In the same way as the video below, Apple, Google, Facebook has taught me to be more concentrated, to be alert, and has expressed to myself the need for me to wake up and smell the roses. I need to become liberated from the things hindering my experience as a human being and produce a more trusting lifestyle of habits via exploring the worlds of digital databases around me. I certainly hope my new found journey through the Twitterverse continues to help me through this process as well.
Thank you for following my journey through Apple, Google, Facebook! :)
In his latest book, You are Not a Gadget, Jaron
Lanier emphasizes the effects of the newly emerging “open culture movement” in
which ideology is dulling actual technological improvement. In today’s day and
age, Lanier expresses how different technology software’s like Facebook, etc.
help make us experience the world in particular ways; however, implying
whole-heartedly that Facebook has indeed lost the notion of individualism.
Overall, Lanier seems to be questioning the notion of the internet culture that
has immersed and articulated on the fact that human beings are leaving the
personal self and chaining ourselves to this world full of digital databases. Lanier’s
idea of the “hive view” consisting in part of ultimately the self and the
overall arching expression of the self as being most important, is sincerely
being lost and hindered in today’s day in age. This ultimate loss of the notion
of the self is largely in part contributing to the notion of aggregation and
the mob-like mentality that Lanier truly despises amongst the new open culture
movement that has immersed in the recent 21st century of which can
be seen on most social networking cites anyone encounters. However, I completely beg to differ with Lanier's ultimate perspective of who will be the most successful in the future of our world.
After reading chapters 4-8 in Lanier’s book, something that
struck me the most as a college student myself, consisted of his reference to
the peasants and lords of the clouds. Lanier expressed, “Rule the computing
cloud that routes the thoughts of the hive mind, and you’ll be infinitely
wealthy” (Lanier, 2010, p. 85) From this statement, he goes on to express that
in order to be successful or wealthy today, students need to master the
algorithm of turning away from something incredibly profound like the ideological
courses of philosophy to instead focus their efforts in trying to develop
perhaps something like “programing a hedge fund” (Lanier, 2010, p. 86). In this
winner-takes-all society he portrays, as a liberal arts student I was offended in regards to the fact that he thinks the only ones who will be successful
are those creative masterminds like Mark Zuckerburg, whose ability to create a profound social
networking masterpiece led to the plethora of success he maintains today. As the
video below portrays, the benefits of a liberal arts
education, in my own personal opinion, are truly important for the
student to achieve a well-rounded education and prepares them for a future of success focusing on a multitude of courses
introducing them to a plethora of knowledge and areas to explore.
Ultimately, the student with a vast array of knowledge in
multiple areas of expertise is going to be a better key to utilize in solving the puzzles
of life and the problems that erupt throughout the world versus someone who strictly focuses on one thing, in which that one aspect is
all they solely do period. I feel people like this are going to become bored
and burn out losing a passion for life and their purpose as a human being. As
Steve Job’s once said, we must “Stay hungry, stay foolish.” Jobs
(a computer prodigy Lanier would suggest to be a prime example of one of the winners
who took all in today’s society) advice
to others would be much different than Lanier’s in general. In Jobs
commencement speechhe instructed
the graduating students not to live a life according to other people’s
thinking, but to instead have the courage to follow their hearts and true inner
intuitions.
“Staying hungry and
foolish means never becoming complacent, to strive and work for what you
truly believe in, and to be “foolish” enough not to listen to so-called
experts and authorities when it comes to what can and can’t be done” (http://www.wealthlift.com/blog/8-steve-jobs-quotes-life-business/).
Jaron Lanier’s You Are Not A Gadget released in 2010 does
a remarkable job connecting with our in-class ideas of Self and Community in
accordance to technology. Lanier expresses a “locked-in” idea in which humans
now have the openness and freedom to permanently explore the unstructured vast
array of knowledge laid out throughout the World Wide Web. He speaks of the
development of the designs of things like web 2.0, MIDI, and Facebook in which he relates back to the experience
of what it ultimately means to be a person. Lanier’s “You Are Not a Gadget” emphasizes why
the most important thing to ask about any technology is how it changes people.
Overall, through the self, technology has the ability to both restrict and augment circles of
empathy that create a sense of community in the world in which we live.
Picture: Jaron Lanier's book, You Are Not a Gadget
Circles
of empathy Lanier describes as imaginary circles drawn by each person, “circumscribing
the person at some distance and corresponding to those things in the world that
deserve empathy” (36).His use of the
tone of empathy is overall used in purpose to show that some relationships
between humans and person to person cannot be solely understood or completely represented by a digital
database alone. Rather, these circles of empathy involve a larger controversy in
determining who will make the cut to lie just inside the circle versus those
who furthermore remain left outside of that rounding community of
empathy. The overall contents the person holds within the circle represent the self as a whole
and determine who one is by what they hold most important to themselves
indefinitely.Ultimately, Lanier
expresses that once the contents of the circle are changed, it is then when the
perception of the self must too change as well. Lanier expresses, “ The center
of the circle shifts as its perimeter is changed. The liberal impulse is to
expand the circle, while conservatives tend to want to restrain or contract the
circle” (37).
Lanier's "locked-in" analogy regarding the self and the community is quite evident today in explaining what happens when circles tend to become restricted. Many of those around us, including myself have had a high level of lock-in with Facebook itself. Facebook, the mere epitome of a container of the self, has the utmost profound ability to suck a person into a world of procrastination and lock them into the nature of the like-minded social networking beast itself. Crowds and data are overall becoming greater than individual beings and the true actual philosophical meaning of knowledge solely because of digital databases. While these digital databases may be doing a great job of forming lifestyle enclaves of like-minded people able to reconnect forming larger communal crowds all over the world, the individual and the self are ultimately being forgotten as too much time is being wasted behind a screen versus maintaining contact with one another via phone calls, face to face interaction, and ways of communication before the time of the World Wide Web that once promoted the well-being of our world. Lanier is ultimately underestimating the ability of a person to self correct and go back to old forms of communication once he or she becomes locked in to a specific data base. While technology and digital databases can truly help augment the self in terms of reconnecting with old friends in the past and aid in the efforts to connect with new people, Lanier emphasizes one must not become restricted within these circles, getting stuck in a digital platform in which they forget the original items that they once used in life to get by in the world.
Jaron Lanier author of: You Are Not a Gadget
To learn more about Jaron Lanier and his new book to be released on March 7th, 2013 visit his homepage below: http://www.jaronlanier.com
Exploring the role of
religion in America from the 1800’s through today’s day in age surely highlights
a dramatic change in organized religion and tradition within the church. A once
focused structural core of religion centered around uniform expectations and
specific beliefs in a Christian upbringing has surely delved into a liberating
freedom in which the individual has the ability to break away from the uniform
upbringing passed down from generation to generation to explore new
philosophies in which the amount of possibilities are limitless. Ultimately,
religion has progressed from a limited utilitarian individualistic perspective breaking
away from tradition instead moving towards an expressive individualistic
standpoint in life today.
From 1964 onward, after the promotion of civic rights and
the push for equal opportunities for all, a massive movement was seen
throughout American society pushing for the need to find oneself. A hippie sub-movement
emerged in which the art of love was drastically being pushed for versus the
dangerous world of war surrounding the individual. America was entering a phase
in which the need to find the independent, autonomous self was greatly being
explored. Americans born into the traditional organized groups of religion and
moral uniform expectations were branching out and going on their own way delving
into the dangerous and competitive world around. Americans would learn who they truly
were and what they indeed wanted to do with their life choosing which of the mores
they would continue to carry and withhold or drastically avoid from the family
values they once grew up with. As Robert Bellah once described, the traditional
art of religion was not being withheld as seen in the changing world around the hippie
movement: “For religion to have emphasized the
public order in the old sense of deference and obedience to external
authorities would no longer have made sense. Religion did not cease to be
concerned with moral order, but it operated with a new emphasis on the individual
and the voluntary association. Moral teaching came to emphasize self-control
rather than deference. It prepared the individual to maintain self-respect and
establish ethical commitments in a dangerous and competitive world, not to fit
into the stable harmony of an organic community” (222). Instead, religion in
the 1900’s was changing with the individual and the perspective outlook on that
time period in which they now lived varying greatly from the days of
Tocqueville in the 1800’s.
Picture: A picture from the Hippie Movement of the 1960's representing the important individualistic perspectives of Americans at the time to live a life full of love versus the war in the world around them.
Tocqueville’s
chronicles analyzing observations through religion and politics expressed a
major difference in religion from the 1800’s to what now exists today. According
to Bellah,“Tocqueville saw
religion primarily as a powerful influence on individual character and action.
Religions political function was not direct intervention but instead rather support of the mores
that make democracy possible. In particular, it had the role of placing limits
on utilitarian individualism, hedging in self-interest with proper concern for
others. The “main business” of religion, Tocqueville said, “is to purify,
control, and restrain that excessive and exclusive taste for well-being” so
common among Americans” (223). Tocqueville expressed religion to be based upon
a limited utilitarian individualistic perspective in which one would do the best they
could on their own to do what was in the best interest of themself and their
family, while simultaneously following the “Golden Rule” in which they would
treat others how they would want to be treated in return. Americans were
focusing on being pure and moral within their actions versus upholding
doctrines expressed by the Pope and bishops in the world around them. Instead the people were focusing
on their families and the support groups of local organized church communities
in which they could express morality and show themselves living a pure
lifestyle within the community. Emerging into the 1900’s the rational following
of doctrines within these church communities was being converted into a new
evangelical perspective in which people were focusing on their beliefs on their
own and branching away from the traditional church towards like-minded support
groups in which one could show their own expressive individualistic thoughts.
Expressive individualistic perspectives most commonly
seen today have resulted in accordance to the individual’s needs. The
individual has always needed care and a sympathy or support group from others
emphasizing the need for self-control, self-respect, and morals one needs to
live by to ultimately be happy. However, when those organic communities of
traditional religion no longer offered the warm and fuzzy feelings of empathy
and support the individual needed, breaking away from the church soon resulted.
These breakaways ultimately lead to the commonality of expressive individualism
we have today and the formation of the new lifestyle-enclaves. These enclaves are
full of people branching away from organized religion who have like-minded
thoughts and want to establish ethical commitments in which they do not have to
belong to a certain denomination and follow the doctrinal beliefs traditionally
bestowed upon them. Instead, the human being today has become much happier
attending non-denominational church groups in which they can believe what they
want freely and do as they please in a support group of like-minded people
centered around no expectations other than an overall self-governing belief in
God.
Picture: An example of a non-denominational church now existing today in which many people have turned to.
Most blogs we have
encountered thus far in Apple, Google, Facebook have consisted of our fellow
classmates whose personal writing styles reflect the multitude of topics and
sites we have been introduced to during class in correspondence to reflect
technology’s impact on society. However, when branching out further to a more
international level in regards to blogging, some might be surprised at the content in which they will be introduced to. An example of this consists of the "Egyptian
Chronicles", which portrays a much different approach in association to social
networking and overall blogging than what we have previously been familiarized
with in class. The "Egyptian Chronicles" is the epitome of what a social activist’s blog
might look like, or, rather merely consists of a blog in which one is trying to
inform the general public about a strong issue going on throughout the world
around them. An issue mainly focusing on the fact that the behind the scenes
knowledge and true background information of the actions going on in daily
life are not being revealed to the public eye properly or honestly.
Overall, the "Egyptian Chronicles" is a completely different
use of a social media site than what I have been previously used to in regards
to the social networking that has comprised of my life thus far.
The “Egyptian Chronicles” may take
on the same format and overall structural paragraph and graphical display that
many of our blogs have exhibited throughout class, but an overarching
difference can directly be portrayed within viewing the content of the “Egyptian
Chronicles” for the very first time. Upon just entering the site, the first
sentence one sees consists of the following statement: “Egypt that you don’t
know.” After seeing this quote and later on being introduced to video detailing
the life of a local townsman who was murdered, I quickly realized this blog
wasn’t the warm and fuzzy inspirational blog about the impact of society that I
was previously used to. The above statement merely implies that the general
public is being lied to and the author’s blog would indeed go on to tell the
people exactly how and when they have indeed been lied to by the government and
reining authority figures surrounding the nearby area of Alexandria. Each and
every blog has a purpose and takes on a specific perspective that the author
wants to stress and truly highlight to their public audience across the
inter-webs. Ultimately, the “Egyptian Chronicles” serves to be a catalyst for
change in which the author is merely trying to educate the public to know and
understand the rigorous circumstances and hazardous actions taking place all
around them. She wants to inform people in hopes by doing so to initiate a
physical means for everyone to stand up; if not for themself, to then make use
of their civic duty and do so in standing up for someone else.
Picture: Zeinobia, the author of the "Egyptian Chronicles" herself.
Overall, just like each and every
one of us, the author of “Egyptian Chronicles,” Zeinobia, is just a girl living
with a goal she wants to work her hardest to accomplish and achieve. She states, “I am just and Egyptian girl
who lives in the present with the glories of the past and hopes in a better
future for herself and for her country.” Although the ultimate content of our
blogs may infer a completely different perspective and serve a much different
purpose, both Zeinobia as well as our classmates in the end are seeking to
inform the general public about a key point they would like to be addressed and
better understood overall. Although her content might be much more critical for public knowledge in dealing with life or death situations and sometimes hard to take in completely due to the severity of its nature, the same goal of informing the public results within both of our blogs.
“If the
only way one makes a contribution to the community’s good is through
specialized application of a professional skill, one gets lonely. The company
of family and friends remains important. While mobile professionals in the
United States do indeed engage themselves in complicated networks of intimate
relationships, these networks are often not tied to a particular place. One may
maintain close friendships with a host of people scattered all across the
country.”
In the
above quote from Bellah’s Habits of the Heart, Bellah’s seen
reflecting on the mobile lifestyle of humans today in which small town
lifestyle enclaves have transformed into finding virtue and acceptance by
obtaining different values and styles of life as friends. When taking Bellah’s
perspective into consideration and reflecting upon Facebook, one can see
directly the social changes of our modern world via technology, directly
influencing the world in which we live. The
art of solitude and relationship building amongst the common social good has
unswervingly altered as a result of Facebook and other modern technological
networks and devices from Twitter to the iphone.
Sherry
Turkle’s, “Connected but Alone” video portrays how living a Facebook life, or a life behind a
screen, has changed the social mentalities and tendencies amongst many human
beings today as seen within the clip below.
As
human beings, she pointed out one of the key things we need consists of a
feeling of a sense of control over where we focus our attention. But often
times one has a hard time with this, because he or she only wants to pay
attention to the things that interest them and that they can maintain. This often
times affects one’s ability to communicate with another person face to face.
Facebook allows the average human being to surf the web, search for a new
friend they danced with at a party last night, and then proceed to discover
where that person is from, what their religion preference is, find out whether
or not they are single, and to potentially even obtain their phone number if he
or she has it listed and readily available before they even have a physical
conversation. Why talk to one of the people below face to face, when you could be a click away from knowing anything you might have ever needed to discover about them?
Today,
the art of relationship building has been especially lost as people do not know
how to have a direct conversation with one another. Our capacity for self-reflection
is being destroyed as today humans would rather text versus talk to each other
face to face. Why has the world become so lonely and afraid of intimacy with
each other?
Humans
use mobile devices to send a text or an inbox message because they feel the
need to have complete control over what they can say, versus the possibility of
saying something they might regret or can’t take back when someone is there in
the flesh, face to face right in front of them. Humans seek the attention of people
to be there to listen to them or show empathy towards them as they lose
confidence believing they are alone when no one is paying attention to their
life.
Surfing
the web and perusing the Facebooks of others allows one to experience the lives
of their so called friends, who are seen to provide the empathy and support fort
he or she is looking for as a whole. These
items of technology like Facebook and other social networks or even the iPhone,
destruct the art of solitude which helps a person reflect upon who they are as an
individual, disallowing them to learn from his or her mistakes, and above all to
know how to think for themselves. Facebook connects one to the outside world
virtually, leading one to believe they are physically never alone. It takes
away one’s anxiety,
and causes them to believe they are connected with those around them without
even leaving the room.
However this does not solve the walls and
barriers human beings are creating all around themselves on Facebook and in
daily life. By continually sharing how we feel and what our constant thoughts
are we grow to need to have the empathy and attention of others around us to
prove that we are indeed not alone. This is awful because today, humans are
finding virtue and acceptance via online comments and conversations they have
with another person. Satisfaction is coming from having a talk with someone over
the internet in short remarks that eventually accumulate into a rather large
chat versus from an actual face to face conversation of speaking to one
another. Ten minutes after a Facebook chat, two people could be in the same
room and fail to speak one word to each other as the social, physical barrier
has not yet been broken between them although they might know each other’s life
story and interests by the glance over of a page.
I find
it rather ridiculous and pathetic that a child these days may grow up without
the ability to have the necessary communication and personable skills needed to
talk to a human being face to face because they rely on having the professional
skills and overarching control of technology to utilize the ability to hide
behind a screen with editing possibility to make sure each conversation states
exactly what they want to say; versus, potentially saying something that they
could be judged upon or that could be taken the wrong way. As humans if we hide
behind a screen or take value in a conversation not face to face with another
person, we lose the possibility of permanent happiness with the physical real
life relationship with another human; rather we take comfort in the short term
satisfaction granted from text messages and conversations online that merely
show another person might be thinking about you or checked out your Facebook
page.
Although life feelings and emotions have the potential to be
controlled from behind a computer screen, these social networks will never
build the personal satisfaction that a real life physical relationship could
from the small town lifestyle enclaves humans used to have in the past.
When asked what the primary unit of Facebook might be, what would be your first answer? Some might say pictures, status updates, a source of communication and social networking, etc. Others however, might describe the primary unit of Facebook to be the self. With a personal page, a profile picture, and a town representing where you are from and where your story began, Facebook wholeheartedly tries to give value and meaning to you, the individual, personally. In correspondence with the self, Facebook addresses an on-going dilemma in deciding where one’s attention should be focused while perusing this worldwide social network.
In the ever popular film, “The Social Network” itself, Mark Zuckerburg’s story of pure genis and his journey in developing the creation of Facebook, directly shows the transformation society and the individual self has grown into and held on tightly to today. In the clip below one can see Zuckerburg’s character being questioned about the focal point of where he pays his own personal attention.
Video: "The Social Network-FACEBOOK-the BEST SCENE" as taken from a portion of the movie "The Social Network."
Stating the most minimal amount of his attention was being given to the lawyer, Zuckerburg expressed the majority of his personal attention and overall focus, was back at the office of facebook where his clients were creating something none of the lawyers men were capable of. Thus leading to what we know and love today to be Facebook timeline.
Picture: An example of a Facebook timeline page itself.
In today’s day and age Facebook’s creative and intuitive introduction of timeline directly calls attention to one’s self. With a plethora of options to display who one is and how to express details proving so, facebook is limitless when it comes to sharing the story of one’s self. Personal pages and timelines dating from birth to graduation all the way up through one’s 50th wedding anniversary are the memories and attention grabbers that are truly focused on throughout facebook that give value and meaning to who the individual is a whole and what life they are living.
Through the building of life stories, the self tries to join different groups based upon their likes, dislikes, and separating the grey areas few and far in between.
Just as these personal experiences of joy and celebration can be virtually experienced via the impeccable technology capabiliites of the “book” itself these days, it’s important to distinguish and realize just where all the attention might be truly directly focused. While the birth of new babies, weddings, and terrific vacations one might have embarked on might be highlighted throughout the social network timeline amongst friends, attention must also be focused on what is and is not appropriate for public viewing. The purpose of writing one’s own lifestory may indeed be to convey the meaning and value of life surely expressed by pictures displaying a thousand words to the public eye. Extreme caution must be regarded when venturing through this world of social networking as one picture accidentally misinterpreted by interviewers, coaches, or professors these days might indeed call attention to punishments and grave circumstances to be endured as a result of the misunderstanding behind one’s friendly dorm room party last night.
James Gleick’s “The Information’s” focus on Alan Turing’s perspective on logic
and symbolism directly correlates with much of the religious background I grew
up with as a child. Growing up in a pre-dominant Roman Catholic upbringing from
kindergarten through 7th grade, my elementary school’s focus
revolved around a major theme in the Catholic Archdiocese in which Catholic schools
were “An education you could have faith
in.” Entering the public school system in 8th grade, I was quickly
introduced to the vast array of opportunities and overall differences that
existed between public versus private schooling; however, one of the things
that continued to stick with me and my faith filled life, consisted of the core
values and symbolism my faith revolved around. Turing’s symbolic reasoning and
perspective truths through the use of numbers and “machines” created a paradox
much like that viewed by the outside world on faith and religion today.
On Steve Paikins, "The Agenda," James Gleick was interviewed to talk about his newest book The Information and a clip from that video below, (section 8:00-9:32) shows some of the paradoxical controversies going on between the world and religion today in regards to knowing what truths truly are these days.
It's indeed always been a struggle for religions to define things as truth or factual, but at the limits of providing proof comes the importance and emphasis of faith and believing and following what one wants to choose to be true on their own merits.
Faith as defined first on the Google homepage, consists of :
“A strong belief in God or in the doctrines of a religion, based on spiritual apprehension
rather than proof.” Growing up as a child, often times faith was a paradox to me because I needed to see things
in order to believe them to be true. However, when it comes down to religion, I
grew to take a new approach in regards to what I believed and the symbolism I
grew to know and understand as taught to me by my family and teachers genuinely
strengthened my faith to become what it’s grown to be today. Without much of that symbolism like the lessons I've learned from the Bible, weekly Sunday's of going to church, and overall religiously influenced teachings throughout my upbringing, who knows where my faith would lie today.
An example of this symbolism can be seen as a comparison between Turing’s machine trilogy
in terms of analyzing numbers and their outcomes, as outlined in the quote below, correlating with the religious symbolism of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit also known as
the “sign of the cross” or the triology, that is a profound symbol within the Catholic church from birth.
Picture: A Catholic baptism in which the priest is blessing the child with the sign of the cross.
“The Turing machine sets about examining every number to see
whether it corresponds to a computable algorithm. Some will prove computable.
Some might prove un-computable. And there is a third possibility, the one that
most interested Turing. Some algorithms might defy the inspector, causing the
machine to march along, performing its inscrutable business, never coming to a
halt, never obviously repeating itself, and leaving the logical observer
forever in the dark about whether it would halt” (211).
In Turing's analogy, or algorithm of the machine, either something will be proved computable, un-computable, or ultimately inconclusive potentially repeating on forever. As described be Gleick, "Turing encoded instructions as numbers mapping one set of objects onto another...using the play of symbols and the idea of mapping in the sense of finding a rigorous correspondence between two sets." Going on further to express that the machine in itself is paradoxical, but proved some numbers are un-computable. Ultimately stating that, "An un-computable number is in effect, an un-decidable proposition. Any formal system, therefore, must have un-decidable propositions. Mathematics is not decidable. Incompleteness follows from un-computability" (212).
Therefore although religion may appear to be a paradox to some people today, the play of symbols like that of the sign of the cross and the idea of mapping serve to be a tremendous influence on one's beliefs and the correspondence between faith as a formal system. Since the Catholic faith, or any faith for the matter is seen as a formal belief system, followed by a multitude of different people, there must be some un-decidable propositions. The symbolism much of the faith revolves around thus helps keep many of these formal belief systems going strong from generation to generation.
Google's recent addition of the new image search interface truly intrigued me as an active member of the inter-webs. Being the photo enthusiast that I am, I couldn't help but awe at the remarkable new abilities Google Images has allowed to it's audience members when they would like to look up a specific picture.
Picture: Google's new image search interface.
However, along the same lines of looking up images, one thing that intrigued me the most includes the Google search engine's ability to determine how many people search for one thing in particular. On January 8th, 2009 during the BCS National Championship football game between the Florida Gators and Oklahoma, the sole act of one quarterback, wearing one specific scripture verse, led to the national "googling" of John 16:3 more than 90 million times in one night alone.
"Tim Tebow’s passing yardage — the Christian quarterback threw 316 yards — sent commentators over the edge. The Associated Press reported that he also averaged 31.6 yards per completion. The religious connotations to John 3:16, a famous Bible verse, were too much for many to chalk up to chance.....The Bible verse quickly became the most searched Google term Monday. "
Picture: Tim Tebow after the BCS National Championship game seen with the ever popular scripture verse John 3:16 painted on his eye black.
American technology today has lead humans to have the profound ability to look up anything and everything they have ever questioned or wanted to know, receiving the answer in milliseconds by the efforts of the Google search engine alone. Google's incredible ability to determine the amount of "hits" each site or topic is looked up goes without saying beyond belief. However, after starting off the hit novel Google in the Plex some people indeed should be wary or take into respect Google's search tracking abilities these days. Everything and anything one looks up, posts, or tweets about, may very well come back to haunt them someday as the record is never lost.
When Google was only a few years old and just starting off
they set a precedent of “10 things they would always try to hold true
throughout their work as seen within the article below.
A profound
fascination lies in part with each of those 10 objectives in which every point, could possibly, in some form or another, be thought to influence the ways people think about religion.
The eighth objective stating: “The need for information
crosses all borders” truly spoke volumes to me in particular when I thought
about religion. Overall, Google’s mission consists of facilitating access to information for the entire world, and
Google does so through the use of more than 130 different languages nation wide. As a whole, Google
offers people the ability to restrict their search results to content solely written
in their own language, and aims toward providing applications and products in
the largest amount of "accessible formats" possible worldwide.
Through
the use of Google’s translation tools, the general public is able to discover
content written entirely in languages that they may not actually speak, but could be acquainted
with on the opposite side of the hemisphere by just a click away. This key 8th objective
by Google policy, precisely influenced my thoughts on religion in regards to the narrative passage of the tower
of Babel in Genesis 11.1-9 in the Roman Catholic Bible.
Picture: Artistic representation of The Tower of Babel by Van Cleve
As a child growing up
attending private Catholic school from kindergarten to 7th grade, I
was brought up in the strict traditional lifestyle in which religion class was
taught everyday with mandatory mass every Friday morning before school and
every Sunday morning as well. Often
times as a child I was always fascinated by the narrative passage of the Tower of Babel.
For those of you unfamiliar with the story itself, as seen in the
video below, the Tower of Babel is thought to have begun as a
result of some people wanting to build a tower reaching all the way to Heaven in
hopes to increase their fame and give themselves omniscient amounts of power
as their name was being spread throughout the land. As believed by the Catholic church, God the Father, the all-knowing and most
powerful of everyone, was thought to have
been angered greatly by this selfish act of the people and punished their
efforts by confounding the tongue of each family. Consequentially, this directly forced each family to speak
different languages so that they could no longer maintain communication with
the other families around them, eventually spreading families apart all across the world, resulting in people no longer trying to
conquer building the actual tower itself due to barriers in communication.
Video: "Bible Comic-The Tower of Babel"
Overall, as
stated in the article above, “Google’s tools and translators, have been able to
greatly improve both the variety and quality of services offered in even the
most far–flung corners of the globe.” I feel Google’s omniscient power in terms
of allowing access to knowledge of such multitudes all
across the world, truly influences the way people think about religion in
regards to a building block for the "cradle of civilization." The Tower of Babel shows a perspective in which individual people who speak particular languages spread all across the world, when united and working together properly, have an unlimited power of success. However, the need for this information crossing all borders amongst the land, must be used properly or else too much freedom to do as one wishes might lead to the downfall of society.
I have a profound love for taking photos and the iPad's incredible technological advances for editing pictures right at the touch of your finger are simply amazing. One of the most fascinating and phenomenal additions the iTouch has contributed to my life, consists of the advancements in photo editing and photo-sharing apps such as that of Adobe Photoshop and iPhoto itself. Although I do not own an iPad, when holding the virtual mini computer itself in my hands, the number one category I would search for on the iTunes apps website interesting me the most, would certainly revolve around anything having to do with photography. Photography apps on the iPad directly show the expressive individualism perspective Apple stands for.
IPad's are not a minimalist design. There is no Jewish iPad, African American iPad, toddler to kindergarten through first grade iPad, but rather a blank display screen with a blank slate just waiting to be filled up with details of who one is as a person. Expressive individualism as emphasized by Robert Bellah certainly focuses on the aspect of each individual having a unique personality and overall core of feelings and intuitions throughout the personal life in which he or she lives. However, that being said, the expressive individualist has the utmost capability to merge their life with the intuitions and feelings of others who have alternate similarities combining together to create a community. When picking up an iPad owned by myself in the future, one would surely see a multitude of photos, editing software, and numerous albums just waiting to be shared for my family and friends to see. This personal development of my own blank screen creation allows me to emphasize who I am and what's important to me because I think different than any other person around me.
Apple's ads certainly encourage the art of thinking different. It is this art that together combines via networking, app sharing, and communities like facebook that certainly brings the technological and social world together. Without apps the iPad would be boring. However, once one chooses what they want to play around with on the app site, and sets up their personalized items, a new community awaits to be discovered and ventured by all. As the iPhoto app directly implies, "all you have to do is touch it to believe it." The expressive individualism affinity sought for by Apple awaits to be embarked on by the touch of a finger itself. A multitude of apps of all genres have been created to allow each and every human being to do so. What more simplicity could one ask for?
They say a picture is worth a thousand words and my iTouch certainly reaffirms this via displaying the photo album journey in the expressive individualistic life of who I indeed am as a person. Everything is personal and my photos allow me to share that personal side to create a community I want others to know and love as well!
Video: The January 27th, 2010 unveiling of the Apple First Generation iPad.
“The last time there was this much excitement about a tablet, it had some commandments written on it.”
According the Wall Street Journal, the unveiling of the new Apple iPad almost exactly 3 years ago today, brought with it great suspense and an overall sense of profound expectation for the generation of technology and social networking enthusiasts around the world. This so called “Jesus Tablet” even had the publishers of the Economist transforming Jobs’s himself into an Old Testament figure resembling that of Moses, dressed from head to toe in robe carrying the newfound “law of the land” with the iPad in hand. Steve Job’s requirement for developing and instilling the purest possible simplicity within each of his works, allowed for the iPads “miracle-worthy” success today and set a precedent as Apple’s consistent “law of the land” design technique.
Picture: Front cover of the Economist
When contemplating the release of a new device, Jobs’s had to make sure each unit met his ideal standards of a magical work of art. When asked what the core essence of the iPad would be, Jobs’s made sure the general consensus would come up with a consistent reply regarding the display screen itself. But just how was Jobs’s going to develop this pure, simple, yet magical image he desired within all of his work for the iPad? Jobs’s would do so by generating a feeling of enlightenment to his consumers and empowering them the moment they began to unravel the box. Through a meticulously designed device, package, and overall display, upon unwrapping the iPad, one would surely see immediately the exemplification of total tranquility and peace Jobs’s captured and enhanced within the clean lines, simplicity, and beautifully packaged presentation of the new tablet itself.
“The bottom edge needed to be slightly rounded, so that you’d feel comfortable just scooping it up rather than lifting it carefully” (Jobs’s).
The sleek, thin, handheld web browser allowed for a manifold of uses and an unfathomable amount of success today. Jobs’s was a connoisseur advocating the importance of captivating individualism and sparking a catalyst for change in people to think outside the box. The iPad itself represented the sole vision of Jobs’s to simply, in the purest way possible, direct people to become their own artist with a new found work of magic in their hands with few rules needed to follow.
Jobs’s revolutionary user interface with the simplest display screen allows for even an “illiterate six-year old to use without instruction.”
The iPad device itself that could be manipulated with the touch of a finger empowers the handler to personalize their own life through a database of photos, to navigate the world via maps/satellite viewing, browse the web with unlimited wifi and 3G capabilities, while also holding the powers to design the next potential record breaking album on the virtual life-size keyboard right in front of them. An unlimited amount of user applications stored with the essence of pure simplicity not only empowers but enables iPad owners to “perform miracles” at the touch of a finger, to overall think differently, while enhancing the vision of Apple's “law of the land” to be simple, unique, slender, and sleek.
Seth Godin’s: "Stop
Stealing Dreams" “Ted Talk” exhibits a direct correlation with the ideas and
reflections expressed in Bellah’s Habits of the Heart.Bellah expands on the view of the
individualistic perspective in America focusing on two key aspects detailing
the difference between one having an expressive individualistic outlook in life
versus one getting stuck in a utilitarian world. In comparison, Godin
emphasizes two similar themes directly related to the workforce in which:
“The jobs of the future are in two categories: the
downtrodden assemblers of cheap mass goods and the respected creators of the
unexpected.”
For many, utilitarianism was seen as a form of material
success in which one must focus on the good, what actions are most useful in trying
to maintain an increase of the good, while simultaneously decreasing the bad. However,
this style focuses on a formula in which there is a need in the economy for
(fill in the blank), with a path to follow on how to get there.
In similarity to Bellah, Gordin relates this more so utilitarian
path to that of education in school today stealing students dreams everywhere.
Gordin implies students
today are measured based upon test scores, what they memorize, and their
ability to be obedient and not stray off the path by following “the downtrodden
assembly line” in which they go to school in order to find a hourly waged job
in which they have to obey the orders of someone higher up, etc. Gordin focuses
on the role of” Universal public education who’s soul intent merging forward
from the industrial revolution was being directed towards training people to
behave, to comply to the teachers commands, and to fit in ultimately developing
the skills needed to be able to work in the factory settings.”Education was revolving around creating a
system of interchangeable people because factories relied on the basis of having
interchangebale parts.
Gordin notes: “In 1960, the top ten employers in the U.S.
were: GM, AT&T, Ford, GE, U.S. Steel, Sears, A&P, Esso, Bethlehem
Steel, and IT&T. Eight of these (not so much Sears and A&P) offered
substantial pay and a long-term career to hard- working people who actually
made something. It was easy to see how the promises of advancement and a social
contract could be kept, particularly for the “good student” who had
demonstrated an ability and willingness to be part of the system.”
This obedient factory line approach of following a route
solely for the reason that it will lead to a particular job is not the approach
education systems should have today because people are putting their dreams
aside and avoiding all together what they are truly passionate about because
their ultimate focus right now is to just get a job. The art of individualism
and happiness is completely lost within this life format.
Today, a more so expressive individualistic approach is
necessary for students to adapt to the economy around them. No longer is there
a necessity for people to be forced to fall in lines of the “downtrodden
assemblers of cheap mass goods” of fifty years ago as detailed by Gordin.
Gordin’s second category of jobs for the future falls along Bellah’s
expressive individualistic approach in which there’s an emphasis on doing
things for your own personal enjoyment and leisure versus following the
obedient paths others construct around you. Expressive individualism and
cultivating the self to become a better person by doing the things one
personally wants to do, ultimately leads to a lifestyle enclave. Within the
lifestyle enclave Bellah reports a separation seen between the self directly
from certain groups like family, church, work, etc. in which one can fully
stand back and gauge who he or she is on a personal level based upon what their
preferences are and what desires/ passions they ultimately seek to fulfill by self-adapting
to and constructing their own moral environment in which they can measure what
is good to do and what roles to act on. Bellah reflects upon this self-chosen
enclave in which people gather together, with cultural similarities developing
circles based upon common interests in individualism. versus the
interdependence of collectivism often times seen within an inclusive community in
which one is shaped by following the norms of those around them in order to not
stand out.
“Here’s the alternative: what happens when there are fifty
companies like Apple? What happens when there is an explosion in the number of
new power technologies, new connection mechanisms, new medical approaches? The
good jobs of the future aren’t going to involve working for giant companies on
an assembly line.”
Ultimately, Gordin believes the new jobs of the future in
demand will be searching for those individuals who are prepared to embark on
their own path, offering insight, design, and their own unique creative
abilities to take the company where it’s never been before. The technology is
available offering plenty of different techniques in which one can help fully
develop the self and shape who they want to be based upon the personal habits
they choose to follow versus what they are measured via school standardized
test based settings.
I full heartedly concur with Gordin in that, “The future of our economy lies with the impatient. The
linchpins and the artists and the scientists who will refuse to wait to be
hired and will take things into their own hands, building their own value,
producing outputs others will gladly pay for. Either they’ll do that on their
own or someone will hire them and give them a platform to do it. The only way
out is going to be mapped by those able to dream.”
Video: "Sound vs. Noise" Chopped segment 16:20-17:57 of the original "Talks
of Shunryu Suzuki" Youtubevideo
Although, I am not extremely
familiar with the beliefs and overall structure of the Buddhist religion, in
the “Talks of Shunryu Suzuki” video, I observed a key element of Zen/Buddhism
directly relating to the lifestyle Steve Jobs lived himself. Suzuki spoke of a
blue jay analogy emphasizing the Buddhists understanding of a major difference
between what is considered noise versus what is considered sound. He defined
noise as being a bothersome object that disturbs or interrupts the human’s way
of thinking. Versus sound, which is to be considered more of a practice; or, a
primary objective matter that transforms into a subjective matter in which the
human is not disturbed by the noises they are hearing but rather believe those noises
to be coming from his or her heart. Ultimately, one is able to understand
everything about the noise because they have subconsciously transformed those
noises into the sound, and the sound is who they have become.
Steve Jobs exemplifies a deliberate
“sound” to his employees that he expects each individual to live up to. Jobs is
constantly seen throughout his biography creating a reality distortion field in
which Wozniack described to be, “…an illogical vision of the future, such as
telling me that I could design the Breakout game in just a few days. You
realize that it can’t be true, but somehow he makes it true” (Isaacson 118).
Jobs’s was able to get people to accomplish tasks solely because of his direct
business pursuing, blunt personality like approach.
As described by Debi Coleman (the early Mac
team manager who took over Apple manufacturing), “[Jobs created] a
self-fulfilling distorting….you did the impossible, because you didn’t realize
it was impossible” (Isaacson 119). Isaacson further emphasized that Jobs’s
categorized things via a perspective in which he held a world view (or
expressed a “noise”) where people were either “enlightened” or an “asshole” and
their work was either “the best” or “totally shitty” (118).
Jobs’s specifically gauged a person on where
his or her state of mind lied based upon who could take the vulgarities and
often mean things that he said as noise and use those words instead as a sound
or an inspiration to develop what they themselves thought to be
impossible.As portrayed within his
interviews of clients, Jobs specifically asked one interviewer in particular if
he was a virgin or not. To the average individual, this would be an appalling
noise to hear as well as quite disturbing and shocking at the same time.
Rather, digging deeper into the self-belief system of Jobs, one could say he
was solely doing so in order to reach in
and cultivate his new beginner (being the interviewee’s and potential
employee’s mind) to see his thought process and whether or not his mindset fit
the ideal standard Jobs’s was looking for to help run his company. The
interviewee himself directly stated to Jobs’s, “I guess I’m not the right guy
[for the job] (Isaacson 143). Jobs’s was trying to analyze the critical
thinking skills of his interviewees determining how they could think and react
in unexpected situations. Jobs’s tried to decipher whether these candidates for
the job were able to tap into his “sound “perspective,in which if one was disturbed, did they have
the innovation techniques and skills necessary to deal with their worst fears
and approach things as a beginner willing to develop a primitive understanding
of what needs to be done; versus, accepting the words coming out ofJobs’s mouth as an awful gesture disturbing
their mindset and ultimate approach to getting the job requirements done that
were being asked of them.
Jobs wanted employees who could overall follow his
sound. He wanted people who could be “hypnotized” by his reality distortion in
which they would become what he said they would and would accomplish what he
said that they could achieve. Jobs’s wanted his employees to run by the beat of
his own drum in regards to his conception that you are what you think greatly influenced by the Zen/Buddhist lifestyle that he pursued. If he
could get his employees to know they would achieve something, even though they
thought it to be impossible, they were no longer disturbed by thoughts of I
can’t; but, ultimately they gained the inner heartfelt feeling that they can, they
will, and there would be no other option but to accomplish that goal because they became the measurement of the goals success themselves.
