Viktor Frankl says you don't find meaning; meaning finds you. Develop a thesis and write an essay to explain what Frankl means using passages from his book, personal observations, and personal examples.
One. What is so
pathological about needing to be tethered? See page 171 in which we see the
compulsion to see contact updates (being tethered or connected to smartphone)
is so strong many sacrifice driving and walking safety, resulting in bruises,
chipped teeth, even death.
In addition, people want to be interrupted. They are waiting
for it.
There is no downtime.
Everything is rapid response without reflection.
Emoticons simplify who we are and strip us of nuance and
complexity.
We lose the boundary between public and private life,
sharing smartphone photos around the room.
The adolescent is denied alone time, a necessary rite of
passage for independence.
We have new emotional expectations. I know a young man who
is mad at Facebook because his Facebook friends were either not commenting at
all or enough at his posts.
We develop an unbalanced need for the validation of others
rather than from our inner strength. See page 176
Being tethered makes us narcissistic as we read on page 177:
“. . . one speaks about narcissism not to indicate people who love themselves,
but a personality so fragile that it needs constant support. It cannot tolerate
the complex demands of other people but tries to relate to them by distorting
who they are and splitting off what it needs, what it can use. So, the
narcissistic self gets on with others by dealing only with their
made-to-measure representations.”
The technology encourages the above description.
More and more young people are only “speaking” online at the
exclusion of everything else.
We see on page 179 that when the self is compartmentalized
or fragmented in so many online spaces, it does not mature but stays juvenile,
immature, narcissistic.
We’re open to Facebook annihilation. One of my friends broke
up with his girlfriend of 5 years. They shared dozens, perhaps hundreds of
Facebook friends. He decided it was too awkward to keep his Facebook account
and engaged in “Facebook annihilation,” deleting his account to avoid the
awkwardness. This kind of thing didn’t happen a hundred years ago.
Minute preferences—for books and movies to name a couple of
examples—become blown out of proportion in terms of one’s profile. Do the
others approve of these preferences? Too much is at stake for these minute
choices.
People are “always on” for their Facebook friends, so their
life becomes a never-ending avatar performance.
This “Second Life” on Facebook takes over their real life.
See page 193.
Two. What Are the Causes of Phone Fatigue?
People feel more protected “on the screen,” that is to say
texting or IMing.
People feel more in control of their image communicating “on
the screen.”
People are too tired for phone conversation after all their
multitasking.
Calling others might be looked at as “too demanding” and
needy.
Calling might be perceived as urgent, pumped up to a level
that is not true.
Calling violates the rules of efficiency.
Calling has “insufficient boundaries,” that is the call
could get messy, complicated, dramatic, time-consuming, in short an unappealing
prospect.
Calling others requires full attention and we’ve become
accustomed to having only partial attention.
Examining
Facebook Addiction
The 10
Signs That Facebook Has Become a Self-Destructive Chimera and You Should
Probably Delete Your Facebook Account
1. You start
“sharing” increasing gradations of meaningless trivia with your “friends” like
what kind of dog food you purchased, what kind of nail polish you’re using
before vacationing in Maui, how taking Omega-3 fish oil capsules makes you
burp, etc.
2. You’re spending 18
hours a day “managing” your friends’ comments ("No one has commented on my
juicy entry that was posted almost 30 minutes ago. Damn them all!") and
losing more perspective on what’s important in your life like getting out of
the house, making real friends, and embarking on something truly creative.
3. You become
paranoid as to why a “friend” deleted you from his or her friends list and
start losing sleep over why more and more Facebook people are deleting you from
their existence.
4. You become jealous
and resentful when you see a “friend” commenting on someone’s “boring” post but
that same person ignored your more “interesting” post.
5. You start
competing with your other Facebook “friends” for amassing more and more
friends and comments.
6. You fret when none
of your Facebook friends wish you Happy Birthday.
7. You obsess over
the fact that one of your lifelong friends is engaging in more Facebook
activity with a new Facebook acquaintance who has demoted your friendship
ranking.
8. You lose Facebook
friends because you don’t reciprocate their offers to play Bubble Shooter,
Pokemon Tower Defense, Trollface Launch, Whack Your Boss, and other games that
require too much time for anyone who is gainfully employed.
10. You become a
Facebook elitist only accepting friend invitations from people who have a bare
minimum of a Masters Degree, share your political beliefs, and have published
or produced a work of art that was reviewed by a major publication.
Write an extended definition, based on Sherry Turkle’s
Alone Together, of the New Solitude
and profile someone whose life embodies this definition.
One.
How does technology allow us to fall in love with the idea of life while
disdaining the reality of life? “We are lonely yet fearful of intimacy.” See
page 1. Consider the avatars from Second Life.
We begin to prefer archetypal forms, in simulated
form, which conform to our preconceived ideas about what the object should be
rather than reality. See the museum example on page 3. At Disneyland real
creatures were not, people complained, “as real” as the animatronic ones.
In an age dominated by simulation, authenticity
becomes the new forbidden, the new taboo. See page 4.
To conclude, we fear the loss of control we enjoy in tech life, we fear the give and take and compromise of real intimacy, and we prefer the simulated "real" over the real. These preferences make us more and more alone.
Two.
What are the contradictions of a networked life? See page 1. And see page 3. “We
romance the robot and and become inseparable from our smartphones.
The robot and the smartphone indulge us, massage our narcissistic side and as a result we don't do well in real relationships, which require compromise and suppression of our Inner Narcissist.
As this happens,
we remake ourselves and our relationships with each other through our new
intimacy with machines. . . . The network is seductive. But if we are always
on, we may deny ourselves the rewards of solitude.”
Also see the “flattened personae” and using “emoticans
for feelings” on pages 18 and 19.
Using emoticans to communicate makes us lazy and kills intimacy and soulful expression.
Three.
What is the source of Sherry Turkle’s displeasure with the book Love and Sex with Robots?
There is a
huge philosophical disagreement here. Are robots, that is to ask is “robot love” part of a
healthy evolution or are a robot relationships a sign of our dissolved humanity? See pages 5-7. We
control the robot but we don’t give and take like real humans. Control is not
the same as intimacy and empathy. Control is part of a narcissistic character.
In fact, narcissism may be the most brutal byproduct
of virtual reality fetishism.
Four.
Describe the dependency and panic people have regarding their smartphones. See
page 16. People feel disconnected and anxious and can't live "off the grid."
Five.We make our technologies and they make us; they
shape us. In what way? That would make a good thesis. The technologies must
indulge us, make us the center of attention, and give us a sense of control and
high esteem; also they give us the illusion of intimacy without responsibility,
empathy, and compromise with other humans (the very essential ingredients of
real friendship and intimacy); they spare us the possibility for
disappointment, rejection, and loss; and we begin to prefer these fake
friendships to real ones. Thus we become fake, we become narcissistic, we become controlling, we become simulation-mongers (over the real) and we become tech addicts and we become partial attention bots.
Six.
How do smartphones make us cyborgs living in a perpetual adolescence? See 151
and 152. We live in a “world of continual partial attention.” See page 161. We’ve
all become “pauseable,” meaning people can “pause” us and get back to us when
them want to.
Seven.
How do distinctions blur between the “real” world and the cyber world? 153. We
are “absent but tethered” at the same time.
Eight.
What does Pete, and his avatar Rolo, say about Pete’s life? 159. He craves a “life
mix,” going in and out of Internet, mixing the two worlds. We can take private
party conversation and post it on blogs so we can “appear on a larger virtual
stage.” See 162.
Nine.
What is the slippery slope of Facebook described on page 160? We begin with using Facebook to supplement friendship but then eventually Facebook becomes the core source of a weakened friendship and is preferred over spending real time with our friends (perhaps now former friends)
Ten. Does having a Twitter, Facebook, and blog presence, required for many people to appear "current," enhance or detract from the job? See page 165. Many people feel spread thin. Good luck taking a vacation because your Twitter, Facebook, and blog interaction have to remain current or you could lose business by appearing "inactive."
Eleven. What is the false magic trap of texting? It feels like magic, we read on page 164, that we can text while doing something else so we feel that magic has taken place: time has been added to our busy lives, but in reality we fragment our attention and become the lesser for it.
Twelve. What antisocial behaviors result from smartphone addiction? No hello, no engagement with parents, no safety rules during driving. See page 164.
Thirteen. What is the "always-on culture" and how does it affect us? We constantly feel behind, inadequate, anxious, and unable to enjoy solitude and intimacy. There is this fear that if I go off the grid, for even a week or two, I may return irrelevant and forgotten. This is a sort of psychosis.
Fourteen. Why are young people drawn to smartphone culture or a "networked life"? One, because the Net is something larger than they are and they can become of this Larger Thing. Two, they feel they are stealing time by multi-tasking. Three, they can play roles they can't play otherwise because they can control and embellish their online "profile." Four, being networked gives them a sense of independence from their parents (though parents can keep tabs on them with software).
Review Lexicon
1. New Solitude: We are mentally absent (partially attentive at best) but tethered to others in a degraded way through the "Network," Twitter, Facebook, texting, etc.
2. Avatar: a created persona that becomes our Network identity. This identity lacks complexity and as such becomes a "flattened personae."
3. New Taboo : Authenticity, the messy real becomes loathed in place of preconceived archetypal forms.
4. emoticon: a pictorial representation of an emotion such as a happy or sad face.
5. New Pseudo-Intimacy: We are massaged and caressed by our Network relationships, which indulge our narcissism and we feel in control of these relationships so we avoid real intimacy,which requires compromise and give and take.
6. Off the Grid: going off the Network and disappearing for a while.
7. Technological Narcissism: Our gadgets make us feel like we're the center of attention and this feeling of being at the center (cynosure) becomes an addiction making us addicted to our Network.
8. Perpetual adolescence: living a life of "continual partial attention" as we multitask from one network to another. We toggle ourselves into adolscent multitasking.
9. Pausable: Anyone can be put on pause as we navigate our Network, which makes us feel supreme and in control. This feeling is valued over real relationships.
10. Life Mix: Navigating between our real and avatar selves.
