Saturday, August 28, 2004
From XXX to r.
Ok...if you'd have asked me a year ago, I'd have told you something brash...something to the tune of 'Japanese people (with rare exceptions like T. Usami) don't understand or care about things like philosophy or ethics, especially the kind that matters.' Well, if you were to ask me today, you'd get a slightly different answer. Some of them DO understand and care actually...the only thing is that they never hang out in 'cool' (as Jean for a definition) places, and they don't have good fashion (hi Audrey). They are kind of 'grub-like' and if you want to find 'em, you kind of have to root 'em out of their dark hidey-holes...Which is of course what I DID recently. I messed around and made a special new Japanese 'friend' (XXX) who is a PHD in philo at one of the Ivy League schools here in Tokyo. I've recently been picking XXX's brain on this and that, and it is both refreshing and compelling to hear XXX's (slightly non-Western) views on...well, everything under the sun. Here's a recent, almost unedited email that XXX sent to me. Enjoy. Oh, I'm sure XXX would want me to say that XXX wishes to be forgiven for any English mistakes (hi Mr. You Know Who You Are) that might be extant. I think that XXX and I will be having a discussion soon over a can of seasonal 'Aki Biru' in Setagaya Koen. See you there? Yawn...
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Hi Robert,
This is XXX. I promised you that I'm going to talk with you on the book 'Information Bomb' by Paul Virilio. I am very sorry that I was so slow. It's mainly because of my English, but partly because of the XXX I'm going to do this weekend. First of all, I would like to appreciate your introduction. Paul Virilio was worth reading for me. I got some suggestive ideas for my study from his book. To tell the truth, I didn't like his negative attitude at first. In the first ten pages, I got already bored with his critical-only way. He is not logical, nor theoretical, and he won't bring any alternative idea for our future. I couldn't have agreed to his way, because I usually try to be logical and theoretical as possible as I can. BUT, the further I went on, the more I felt he has something true. As I said, he's never logical nor theoretical, so we have to abstract his theoretical core to discuss and evaluate his work. I'm going to pick up Virilio's points I'm interested in and then make comments. O.K. Let me get into the main subject.
As for the first 2/3 part of the book (chapter I to VIII), I was actually not so impressed. He points out many of the bad side-effects of world wide spread of the Internet, for example, the end of space, loss of distance, perpetual feedback (cause accident or panic), destruction of culture, too much shift to sight sense, loss of the flesh, allover-informer's society, oppression of languages, declining of space exploration, childish-immature world, declining of analog comparison ability, and so on. These changes are the effects by 'Information Bomb' he calls. I can agree to most of his observations, but I can always say 'So what?' about all above effects. He is just indicating changes of the human world. However, human being is always changing. Even though the effects of spread of the Internet causes many changes on our life and somehow destructs our old traditions, we can't say it's harmful enough to be stopped, when it brings us great benefits on the other hand. In any case, every invention has changed our life once and forever, and they always have both dark and bright side.
Of course, as a scholar of philosophy, I always wonder if civilization has made human happy or not. It's one of the fundamental questions. But the computer and the Internet seems the last thing to harm the human life, comparing to other great material inventions, for example, steel tools, gunpowder, steam engine and atomic energy. The Internet can connect all humans each other and bring the fruit of civilization to all corners of the earth freely and instantly. Hasn't it one of the most beautiful dreams that humans had since dawn of civilization? Isn't it a brilliant victory of human intelligence? So Paul Virilio seemed have great disadvantages to prove the Internet is harmful for human beings, and actually he looked for me just a moaner looking only dark side of Internet's effects in the first 2/3 part of the book. He is actually able to make a lot of attractive metaphors, and that's all.
After around the chapter XII, however, I unexpectedly started to find some thought-provoking sentences because, I suppose, Virilio went further to state WHAT the Information Bomb is going to destroy, instead of HOW it explodes. I was really interested in his below seven statements .
1. The Internet tramples the historical IMPORTANCE OF LOCAL TIMES and the world time is preceded exclusively (Chapter XII).
2. Daniel Allevy knew that scientific progress destroy all kinds of time duration rather than complete and end of the history (Francis Fukuyama). " Today people abandon to understand THE POLITICAL TOTALITY in which their life is developed." (Chapter XIII).
3. We are narrowing the spread of the world. Because our body is going to make no action to move, any action to move or transfer itself is going to be nonsense. Then, we lose the value of THE FACT THAT THERE IS 'ACTION' BETWEEN SELF AND AIM, considering only instant interactions valuable (Chapter XIII).
4. Automatic management of knowledge is starting. Analogue information is transforming to digital information. After the age of 'The order of things' (Foucalt), the age of computer code language is starting. The numbers reigns claiming its mathematical omnipotence, the tools of numbers is absolutely getting superior to ANALOGY, that is, to everything which suggests similarity, relationships of similarity between life and things (Chapter XIII).
5. Once at the age of transport revolution, the time of travel, the thickness of physical movement was needed. Now at the age of communicative revolution, the time is unnecessary, the information is communicated instantly, and the arrival is whole spanned because the information flow is interactive. Interaction is superiority to ANY ACTION, ANY CONCRETE CONDUCT (Chapter XIII).
6. No event occurs in the true sense of the term anymore. THE DEPTH OF HISTORICAL OCCURRENCE is already knocked down by the undulation of instantaneousness (Chapter XIII).
7. The aim of reformation processing in this end of millennium is to change the all exchanges cybernetic, and the last obstacle still remaining is the only one, life, ISOLATED 'MICROCOSMOS OF HUMAN'.
So, the reformation is going to invade into this microcosmos and vanish it by the industrializatiton of life at any cost (Chapter XIV). Capitalized terms above are things being destroyed under the diffusion of Internet, Virilio think. With above statements of what are being destroyed, I could catch up his vision. From my point of view, studying Hegel, it seems the 'individuality' that Virilio's afraid of being destroyed. Individuality means what keeps things cohesive, independent, and distinguished. Individuality of persons, individuality of nations, individuality of body, individuality of climates, individuality of markets, individuality of cultures and arts, and so on. Virilio think that development of technology and spread of the Internet are going to destroy any kinds of individualities.
In my opinion, the individuality means the borderline, and the borderline permits modern human the sense of order and moral. That is the reason why Virilio's point of view seems a kind of ethical. That is, I think, natural consequence and he has a good insight into human condition. His problem is, however, that he stopped just at insight. I decide that he has to put more thought into the nature of individuality. What is the individuality? What brings us the individuality? I believe the individuality is a product of modern society. The system of modern society and capitalism gives us individuality and connect us together. It gives detachment and convergence all at once. That is the source of its energy and dynamics. Difference and integration at a time.
Actually, as Virilio says, the spread of the Internet will connect everything together and some kinds of modern individuality are going to be vanished, however, we can guess easily that other, new kinds of individuality should be going to be produced on the other hand to maintain movements of global economical and social system. This process should have continued since the birth of modern society, and the Internet just accelerates that. Virilio is definitely right, I see, in pointing correctly what is being attacked and the process is being accelerated, but he can' t stop the process nor solve problems only indicating that. It's my view that we have to consider what bring us modern individuality and what kind of construction it has. That should be Ethics of our age I believe. Our individuality has a dynamic and social structure, and some kind of 'medium', for example money or language, help it keep its structure and reproduction itself consistently.
In my study, I am trying to explain the construction of modern individuality freshly, applying thoughts of Hegel and J. Lacan. I want to make new drawings of modern human mind (especially modern Japanese mind in the future) considering the relationship among consciousness, medium, and unconsciousness. But, anyway, I might as well cut it out around here and give way to you. I would like to know your interests and then discuss matters in more depth or width. Please feel free to discuss things in your way and at your pace, and forgive me for being slow on occasion. I'm really looking for discussion with you and welcome any further development.
Thanks,
XXX
--------------------------------------------
Hi Robert,
This is XXX. I promised you that I'm going to talk with you on the book 'Information Bomb' by Paul Virilio. I am very sorry that I was so slow. It's mainly because of my English, but partly because of the XXX I'm going to do this weekend. First of all, I would like to appreciate your introduction. Paul Virilio was worth reading for me. I got some suggestive ideas for my study from his book. To tell the truth, I didn't like his negative attitude at first. In the first ten pages, I got already bored with his critical-only way. He is not logical, nor theoretical, and he won't bring any alternative idea for our future. I couldn't have agreed to his way, because I usually try to be logical and theoretical as possible as I can. BUT, the further I went on, the more I felt he has something true. As I said, he's never logical nor theoretical, so we have to abstract his theoretical core to discuss and evaluate his work. I'm going to pick up Virilio's points I'm interested in and then make comments. O.K. Let me get into the main subject.
As for the first 2/3 part of the book (chapter I to VIII), I was actually not so impressed. He points out many of the bad side-effects of world wide spread of the Internet, for example, the end of space, loss of distance, perpetual feedback (cause accident or panic), destruction of culture, too much shift to sight sense, loss of the flesh, allover-informer's society, oppression of languages, declining of space exploration, childish-immature world, declining of analog comparison ability, and so on. These changes are the effects by 'Information Bomb' he calls. I can agree to most of his observations, but I can always say 'So what?' about all above effects. He is just indicating changes of the human world. However, human being is always changing. Even though the effects of spread of the Internet causes many changes on our life and somehow destructs our old traditions, we can't say it's harmful enough to be stopped, when it brings us great benefits on the other hand. In any case, every invention has changed our life once and forever, and they always have both dark and bright side.
Of course, as a scholar of philosophy, I always wonder if civilization has made human happy or not. It's one of the fundamental questions. But the computer and the Internet seems the last thing to harm the human life, comparing to other great material inventions, for example, steel tools, gunpowder, steam engine and atomic energy. The Internet can connect all humans each other and bring the fruit of civilization to all corners of the earth freely and instantly. Hasn't it one of the most beautiful dreams that humans had since dawn of civilization? Isn't it a brilliant victory of human intelligence? So Paul Virilio seemed have great disadvantages to prove the Internet is harmful for human beings, and actually he looked for me just a moaner looking only dark side of Internet's effects in the first 2/3 part of the book. He is actually able to make a lot of attractive metaphors, and that's all.
After around the chapter XII, however, I unexpectedly started to find some thought-provoking sentences because, I suppose, Virilio went further to state WHAT the Information Bomb is going to destroy, instead of HOW it explodes. I was really interested in his below seven statements .
1. The Internet tramples the historical IMPORTANCE OF LOCAL TIMES and the world time is preceded exclusively (Chapter XII).
2. Daniel Allevy knew that scientific progress destroy all kinds of time duration rather than complete and end of the history (Francis Fukuyama). " Today people abandon to understand THE POLITICAL TOTALITY in which their life is developed." (Chapter XIII).
3. We are narrowing the spread of the world. Because our body is going to make no action to move, any action to move or transfer itself is going to be nonsense. Then, we lose the value of THE FACT THAT THERE IS 'ACTION' BETWEEN SELF AND AIM, considering only instant interactions valuable (Chapter XIII).
4. Automatic management of knowledge is starting. Analogue information is transforming to digital information. After the age of 'The order of things' (Foucalt), the age of computer code language is starting. The numbers reigns claiming its mathematical omnipotence, the tools of numbers is absolutely getting superior to ANALOGY, that is, to everything which suggests similarity, relationships of similarity between life and things (Chapter XIII).
5. Once at the age of transport revolution, the time of travel, the thickness of physical movement was needed. Now at the age of communicative revolution, the time is unnecessary, the information is communicated instantly, and the arrival is whole spanned because the information flow is interactive. Interaction is superiority to ANY ACTION, ANY CONCRETE CONDUCT (Chapter XIII).
6. No event occurs in the true sense of the term anymore. THE DEPTH OF HISTORICAL OCCURRENCE is already knocked down by the undulation of instantaneousness (Chapter XIII).
7. The aim of reformation processing in this end of millennium is to change the all exchanges cybernetic, and the last obstacle still remaining is the only one, life, ISOLATED 'MICROCOSMOS OF HUMAN'.
So, the reformation is going to invade into this microcosmos and vanish it by the industrializatiton of life at any cost (Chapter XIV). Capitalized terms above are things being destroyed under the diffusion of Internet, Virilio think. With above statements of what are being destroyed, I could catch up his vision. From my point of view, studying Hegel, it seems the 'individuality' that Virilio's afraid of being destroyed. Individuality means what keeps things cohesive, independent, and distinguished. Individuality of persons, individuality of nations, individuality of body, individuality of climates, individuality of markets, individuality of cultures and arts, and so on. Virilio think that development of technology and spread of the Internet are going to destroy any kinds of individualities.
In my opinion, the individuality means the borderline, and the borderline permits modern human the sense of order and moral. That is the reason why Virilio's point of view seems a kind of ethical. That is, I think, natural consequence and he has a good insight into human condition. His problem is, however, that he stopped just at insight. I decide that he has to put more thought into the nature of individuality. What is the individuality? What brings us the individuality? I believe the individuality is a product of modern society. The system of modern society and capitalism gives us individuality and connect us together. It gives detachment and convergence all at once. That is the source of its energy and dynamics. Difference and integration at a time.
Actually, as Virilio says, the spread of the Internet will connect everything together and some kinds of modern individuality are going to be vanished, however, we can guess easily that other, new kinds of individuality should be going to be produced on the other hand to maintain movements of global economical and social system. This process should have continued since the birth of modern society, and the Internet just accelerates that. Virilio is definitely right, I see, in pointing correctly what is being attacked and the process is being accelerated, but he can' t stop the process nor solve problems only indicating that. It's my view that we have to consider what bring us modern individuality and what kind of construction it has. That should be Ethics of our age I believe. Our individuality has a dynamic and social structure, and some kind of 'medium', for example money or language, help it keep its structure and reproduction itself consistently.
In my study, I am trying to explain the construction of modern individuality freshly, applying thoughts of Hegel and J. Lacan. I want to make new drawings of modern human mind (especially modern Japanese mind in the future) considering the relationship among consciousness, medium, and unconsciousness. But, anyway, I might as well cut it out around here and give way to you. I would like to know your interests and then discuss matters in more depth or width. Please feel free to discuss things in your way and at your pace, and forgive me for being slow on occasion. I'm really looking for discussion with you and welcome any further development.
Thanks,
XXX
