TEDWomen 2010
Amber Case: We are all cyborgs now
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Technology is evolving us, says Amber Case, as we become a screen-staring, button-clicking new version of homo sapiens. We now rely on "external brains" (cell phones and computers) to communicate, remember, even live out secondary lives. But will these machines ultimately connect or conquer us? Case offers surprising insight into our cyborg selves.
Amber Case - Cyborg Anthropologist
Amber Case studies the symbiotic interactions between humans and machines -- and considers how our values and culture are being shaped by living lives increasingly mediated by high technology. Full bio
Amber Case studies the symbiotic interactions between humans and machines -- and considers how our values and culture are being shaped by living lives increasingly mediated by high technology. Full bio
Double-click the English transcript below to play the video.
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I would like to tell you all
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that you are all actually cyborgs,
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but not the cyborgs that you think.
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You're not RoboCop, and you're not Terminator,
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but you're cyborgs every time you look at a computer screen
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or use one of your cell phone devices.
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So what's a good definition for cyborg?
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Well, traditional definition is "an organism
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to which exogenous components have been added
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for the purpose of adapting to new environments."
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That came from a 1960 paper on space travel,
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because, if you think about it, space is pretty awkward.
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People aren't supposed to be there.
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But humans are curious, and they like to add things to their bodies
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so they can go to the Alps one day
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and then become a fish in the sea the next.
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So let's look at the concept of traditional anthropology.
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Somebody goes to another country,
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says, "How fascinating these people are, how interesting their tools are,
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how curious their culture is."
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And then they write a paper, and maybe a few other anthropologists read it,
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and we think it's very exotic.
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Well, what's happening
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is that we've suddenly found a new species.
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I, as a cyborg anthropologist, have suddenly said,
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"Oh, wow. Now suddenly we're a new form of Homo sapiens,
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and look at these fascinating cultures,
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and look at these curious rituals
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that everybody's doing around this technology.
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They're clicking on things and staring at screens."
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Now there's a reason why I study this,
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versus traditional anthropology.
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And the reason is that tool use,
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in the beginning -- for thousands and thousands of years,
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everything has been a physical modification of self.
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It has helped us to extend our physical selves,
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go faster, hit things harder,
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and there's been a limit on that.
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But now what we're looking at is not an extension of the physical self,
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but an extension of the mental self,
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and because of that, we're able to travel faster,
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communicate differently.
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And the other thing that happens
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is that we're all carrying around little Mary Poppins technology.
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We can put anything we want into it, and it doesn't get heavier,
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and then we can take anything out.
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What does the inside of your computer actually look like?
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Well, if you print it out, it looks like a thousand pounds of material
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that you're carrying around all the time.
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And if you actually lose that information,
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it means that you suddenly have this loss in your mind,
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that you suddenly feel like something's missing,
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except you aren't able to see it, so it feels like a very strange emotion.
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The other thing that happens is that you have a second self.
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Whether you like it or not, you're starting to show up online,
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and people are interacting with your second self
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when you're not there.
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And so you have to be careful
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about leaving your front lawn open,
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which is basically your Facebook wall,
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so that people don't write on it in the middle of the night --
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because it's very much the equivalent.
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And suddenly we have to start to maintain our second self.
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You have to present yourself in digital life
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in a similar way that you would in your analog life.
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So, in the same way that you wake up, take a shower and get dressed,
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you have to learn to do that for your digital self.
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And the problem is that a lot of people now,
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especially adolescents,
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have to go through two adolescences.
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They have to go through their primary one, that's already awkward,
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and then they go through their second self's adolescence,
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and that's even more awkward
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because there's an actual history
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of what they've gone through online.
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And anybody coming in new to technology
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is an adolescent online right now,
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and so it's very awkward,
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and it's very difficult for them to do those things.
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So when I was little, my dad would sit me down at night and he would say,
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"I'm going to teach you about time and space in the future."
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And I said, "Great."
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And he said one day, "What's the shortest distance between two points?"
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And I said, "Well, that's a straight line. You told me that yesterday."
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I thought I was very clever.
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He said, "No, no, no. Here's a better way."
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He took a piece of paper,
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drew A and B on one side and the other
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and folded them together so where A and B touched.
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And he said, "That is the shortest distance between two points."
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And I said, "Dad, dad, dad, how do you do that?"
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He said, "Well, you just bend time and space,
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it takes an awful lot of energy,
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and that's just how you do it."
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And I said, "I want to do that."
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And he said, "Well, okay."
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And so, when I went to sleep for the next 10 or 20 years,
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I was thinking at night,
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"I want to be the first person to create a wormhole,
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to make things accelerate faster.
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And I want to make a time machine."
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I was always sending messages to my future self
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using tape recorders.
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But then what I realized when I went to college
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is that technology doesn't just get adopted
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because it works.
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It gets adopted because people use it
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and it's made for humans.
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So I started studying anthropology.
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And when I was writing my thesis on cell phones,
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I realized that everyone was carrying around wormholes in their pockets.
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They weren't physically transporting themselves;
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they were mentally transporting themselves.
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They would click on a button,
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and they would be connected as A to B immediately.
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And I thought, "Oh, wow. I found it. This is great."
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So over time, time and space
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have compressed because of this.
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You can stand on one side of the world,
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whisper something and be heard on the other.
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One of the other ideas that comes around
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is that you have a different type of time on every single device that you use.
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Every single browser tab gives you a different type of time.
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And because of that, you start to dig around
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for your external memories -- where did you leave them?
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So now we're all these paleontologists
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that are digging for things that we've lost
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on our external brains that we're carrying around in our pockets.
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And that incites a sort of panic architecture --
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"Oh no, where's this thing?"
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We're all "I Love Lucy" on a great assembly line of information,
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and we can't keep up.
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And so what happens is,
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when we bring all that into the social space,
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we end up checking our phones all the time.
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So we have this thing called ambient intimacy.
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It's not that we're always connected to everybody,
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but at anytime we can connect to anyone we want.
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And if you were able to print out everybody in your cell phone,
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the room would be very crowded.
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These are the people that you have access to right now, in general --
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all of these people, all of your friends and family that you can connect to.
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And so there are some psychological effects that happen with this.
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One I'm really worried about
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is that people aren't taking time for mental reflection anymore,
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and that they aren't slowing down and stopping,
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being around all those people in the room all the time
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that are trying to compete for their attention
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on the simultaneous time interfaces,
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paleontology and panic architecture.
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They're not just sitting there.
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And really, when you have no external input,
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that is a time when there is a creation of self,
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when you can do long-term planning,
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when you can try and figure out who you really are.
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And then, once you do that, you can figure out
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how to present your second self in a legitimate way,
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instead of just dealing with everything as it comes in --
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and oh, I have to do this, and I have to do this, and I have to do this.
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And so this is very important.
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I'm really worried that, especially kids today,
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they're not going to be dealing with this down-time,
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that they have an instantaneous button-clicking culture,
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and that everything comes to them,
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and that they become very excited about it and very addicted to it.
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So if you think about it, the world hasn't stopped either.
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It has its own external prosthetic devices,
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and these devices are helping us all
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to communicate and interact with each other.
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But when you actually visualize it,
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all the connections that we're doing right now --
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this is an image of the mapping of the Internet --
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it doesn't look technological.
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It actually looks very organic.
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This is the first time in the entire history of humanity
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that we've connected in this way.
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And it's not that machines are taking over.
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It's that they're helping us to be more human,
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helping us to connect with each other.
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The most successful technology gets out of the way
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and helps us live our lives.
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And really,
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it ends up being more human than technology,
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because we're co-creating each other all the time.
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And so this is the important point that I like to study:
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that things are beautiful, that it's still a human connection --
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it's just done in a different way.
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We're just increasing our humanness
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and our ability to connect with each other, regardless of geography.
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So that's why I study cyborg anthropology.
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Thank you.
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(Applause)
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ABOUT THE SPEAKER
Amber Case - Cyborg AnthropologistAmber Case studies the symbiotic interactions between humans and machines -- and considers how our values and culture are being shaped by living lives increasingly mediated by high technology.
Why you should listen
Amber Case is a cyborg anthropologist, examining the way humans and technology interact and evolve together. Like all anthropologists, Case watches people, but her fieldwork involves observing how they participate in digital networks, analyzing the various ways we project our personalities, communicate, work, play, share ideas and even form values. Case founded Geoloqi.com, a private location-sharing application, out of a frustration with existing social protocols around text messaging and wayfinding.
Case, who predicts that intensification of the human-technology interface will quickly reduce the distance between individual and community, believes that the convergence of technologies will bring about unprecedented rapid learning and communication. Dubbed a digital philosopher, Case applies her findings to such fields as information architecture, usability and online productivity. She’s currently working on a book about using anthropological techniques to understand industry ecosystems.
Amber Case | Speaker | TED.com