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paolo
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21 Nov 2007, 4:22 pm

Technique makes some things easier: to move, to transport information, to kill, to build, to destroy. Let’s take for now information: which kind of information can be transported by technical means? A kiss is not only information, is often enjoyment, but contains also information, about desire and sincerity. A hug is mainly information about how much you care for someone, how long you will stay away, if you are leaving. If, contrary to your will, you know you will never again see the person, the hug may, in a sense be a resumé of all your relationship. A desperate resumé sometimes. How much this kind of information may be transmitted by technical means. A surcharge of rhetoric emphasis? Emoticons eventually? Interflora?


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lelia
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21 Nov 2007, 7:14 pm

Um. Interflora? Ok, I got that a hug is communication, though in my mind it seems imprecise, but I could not follow what, uh, followed that.



korppi
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22 Nov 2007, 2:42 pm

Hmm, I guess that in Italy you have the same thing as in Finland: a different usage for the word "technology". If I've understood correctly, that's used in English in this context and "technique" has more narrow meaning: the way to do something, as with sports or arts.

But back to the topic. In future, there might be devices that properly transmit tactile (sense of touch) information, and probably they will be used for perverted actions first...
Until then, it's really hard to emulate a hug. It's very hard to lie with a hug, and very easy with words. Of course, we Aspergers may be totally clueless getting the true meaning. And so we may have an advantage at Internet, compared to the "real life".



paolo
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22 Nov 2007, 5:42 pm

In Italy the word technology is used with an extraordinary profusion and as a reassuring ingredient of any speech, when in fact what is meant is technique. Technology is much more fashionable for various reasons, one being that it is part of a social cult. All problems will be solved by way of technology. Technology is a universal panacea and at worst a useful placebo. We live now under the totalitarian sovereignty of technology, when tech is employed to the most futile enterprises, like going on the moon or Mars at the same time that our planet is on the verge of catastrophe. It’s easy to class me as a technophobe. If things, tools and machines are put between us, encumbers the space between us, the chances to find some harmony and coexistence diminish. Put a man into a car and you easily transform in a monster. Tarantino's recent film Death proof might represent a good methaphore.


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yesplease
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23 Nov 2007, 3:17 am

paolo wrote:
Put a man into a car and you easily transform in a monster.
I think you're going a bit far here. Put a man into a car and you easily transform him into a man in a car. If you put a man who transforms into a monster when in a car into a car, then he easily transforms into a monster. ;) Individuals display different characteristics in different situations. Tools are tools. How we use them is just an extension of ourselves...

P.S. Have you ever been to Caggiano?



paolo
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24 Nov 2007, 5:01 pm

yesplease wrote:
Tools are tools. How we use them is just an extension of ourselves...


If it is easier to blow a horn than to smile. you blow the horn.



yesplease
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24 Nov 2007, 5:19 pm

O rly? I haven't used my horns intentionally in years... :)
Like I said, people are people, tools are tools. What someone does w/ a tool is an extension of their behavior.