vivian shaw

Real life in analog

The New York Times recently published a four-page article about the quest to discover the effects of digital connectedness on brain psychology and social behavior. The article describes a particularly interesting approach as it witnessed a group of social scientists literally retreat into the wilderness of Utah to escape digital influence. The author of the article suggests that the group’s adventure into nature was intended as a form of research, examining the trauma of digital modernity upon a more authentic experience of living and socializing without such intrusion.

Appropriately, I learned about this story via a Facebook status update. There’s a reason people are sharing this article and why it might potentially be a contender for The New York Times’ Most-Emailed List. Aside from soft news often feeling more palatable than what seems like the media’s constant barrage of crises, for many Americans (merely a subset of the total population affected) digital life is an unavoidable reality. Our frustration with the digital shift ties in well with, what I observe, to be an older narrative about technology: that it perverts social exchange and human identity into some “false” kind of life. The real life vs. technology conflict is often portrayed as a hot new problem, despite having aroused cultural anxiety and speculation throughout the twentieth century and probably much earlier. Consider films Metropolis (1927) and Blade Runner (1982).

It may be time to consider our bias in studying the impact of digital technology. As it exists, the question tends to be: how does digital technology distort our real experience of humanity? We could frame this question a different way: Is it “still” plausible to seek our social origins and authenticity in analog?