EFTA02725505.pdf

"ONE OF THE YEAR'S Mcl.uhan was hospitalised after being operated on for the removal ofa brain BEST FILMS" tumour. "And all those years we thought about the brilliance and we thought it was just Marshall," Ted said. "But it was "STUNNINGLY ORIGINAL" the pills he was taking for symptomsof what turned out to be the tumour." 04 I noticed that Martin Rees and "DYNAMITE" r"r, "POWERFUL" Richard Dawkins avoided talking about themselves and wondered if there might be something cultural - is British - at work here? I'm an Irishman and so can say this! "EXQUISITE AND EMOTIVE. `Edge is not for everybody. It helps A MUST SEE" to know some stuff. But you won't sc"..±.„)'` find arrogance in "DARING AND STYLISH" the responses' 18 Actually not. In this regard, the "RIVETING" major challenge is to get ISO to 200 of the most brilliant people in the world to follow a simple set of guidelines. And one of the pronouncements this **GS* year is: "No anecdotes about spouses. significant others, kids, family pets." The reason for this prohibition is that Edge is a conversation - it's not a it*** John Brockman with Andy Warhol and Bob Dylan In t he magazine written for the public. The audience for the contributors to Edge "CAREY MULLIGAN IS is the other contributors. The readers Factory.1966. Below. four of the Edge members whose have the opportunity to look over the shoulders of some extraordinarily STARTLINGLY BRILLIANT" thoughts on the internet arc gifted individuals as they go back and included in Brockman'snew forth in the battle of ideas. And since book (horn lett): Brian Eno, the scientific method is central to our Freeman Dyson. Steven activities, I want to avoid the personal Pinker. Marina A b ramoViC and focus on evidence. IN I was pleased to sec quite a lot about the 'collective IQ" of the net - which is something that the mainstream media don't seem to understand at all. A passage in William Calvin's essay where he talks about the net enabling us to "stand on the shoulders of a lot more giants at the same time- reminded me of an older metaphor coined by, I think, DougEngelhart, who invented the mouse, windowing interfaces and a lot ofother seminal computing technology: "flower steering for the mind". 18 One of the concepts that people were talkingabout in the late 60s was `thecollective conscious". McLuhan made specific reference to it on many occasions. Cage used to talk about "the mind we all share". The cultural anthropologist Edward T Hall, who was this crowd and to the book. This met him during the 60s, his manner in that circle, and studied what he called is interesting because for more and the way in which he presented the silent languages ofrime and space, than a decade his name was barely himself were remarkable and never to once pointed out tome that our most mentioned. He certainly was an be forgotten. Sitting down at lunch, you significant, most critical inventions influence on me in terms ofmy would be faced with machine gun-like were not those ever considered lobe intellectual development and career. In expositions of facts and ideas ranging inventions, but those that appeared to one typical conversation, he recounted from medieval classical literature to be innate and natural. his ideas on how psychoanalysis had arcane scientific matters concerning His candidate for the most gone the way of the gods and we the aural space of the native North important invention was not the were in a new realm where we were American Eskimos. the focus of the capture of fire. not the printing press. looking at the evolution of patterns and work of his collaborator Edmund not the discovery ofelectricity, not information. A lot has been written Carpenter. the discovery of the structure of about the differences between atoms It was Carpenter who explained to DNA. Our most important invention and bits. but the first time I heard it me what he thought was the secret was.. talking. This was something was from Marshall. For anyone who behind Marshall's brilliance. At the time, considered innate and natural, or actually something that was probably never even considered, the internet, from John Brockman's new book until the first human rendered it visible by saying: "We're talking" - probably an important moment in know a few basic things about anindivklual competes for It witheverything else we our evolutionary past. beforemeethg him or her. Internet dating do. A lot of what It offers Khigh-purity The internet is such a new sites, chanowns,socialnetworkIng sites cornoetition But unfortunately a lot of invention, a code (or the collective provide these details.enabling the modern what It offers Is merely good at capturing consciousor "distributed networked human brain to pursue more comfort ably ow attention and provides us with little intelligence". The internet is our its ancestraimating dance. of long-term import — sugar-filled collective externalised mind. I think CAREY MULL IGAN Then there's the issue of privacy. carbonatedsodas for our mind. ofit in terms of the concept of feedback: Some are mystified by the way others, We, or at least I.need tools that will the infinite oscillation of our collective particularty the young, so frivolously provide us with the Diet-Internet. the conscious interacting with itself. reveal their intimate Ives on Facebook, version that gives us the intellectual adding a fuller, richer dimension to Twit ter.inemails and via other internet billboards. Yet for millions of years our forebears had almost no privacy. With the inter net. we are returning to this practice of shared communrty. caffeine that letsus achieve what we aspire to.but which doesn't turn us intohyperactive intellectual junkies. JUDITH RICH HARRIS what it means to he human. It's not about computers. It's not about what music your friends are listening to. It's about human communication. "We're talking." SHAME So for me. the Internet has only Independent Investigator and theoretician magnified — on a grand scale — what I How is the Internet Changing the Way already knew about human nature. The Internet dispenses info, motion the You Think?, editedby John Brockman. RODNEY BROOKS way a ketchup bottle dispenses ketchup. At first, there was tooIttle: now. there is too much. is published by Atlantic Books. John Naughton's From Gutenberg to Zuckerberg What You Really Need IN CINEMAS FRIDAY Panasonic professor of robotics. MIT Computer Science and Artificial In between there was a halcyon interval to Know About the Internet is Intelligence Lab of just-enoughness. For me, it tasted published by Quercus Books. To buy about 10 years. either riflefora special price with free The inter net is stealing our attention. It They were the best years of my life. UK pap call03303336847osgo to guardianbook.shop.co.uk The Observer MOW THE NEW REVIEW .1 EFTA_R1_02213011 EFTA02725505