Friday, April 15, 2016

Week 3 Robotics/ Industrialism/ Knowledge Production and Art

(One of the many electrical inventions of Nikola Tesla, the Tesla Coil,
 an induction coil that can produce alternating currents)
"The day science begins to study non-physical phenomena, it will make more progress in one decade than in all the previous centuries of its existence." -Nikola Tesla
( The movie poster for The Social Network, a film that tells the story of the rise of social networking
 and the impacts it has had on society and the human individual)  
With man's heavy reliance on machinery and the major influence of technology in every aspect of modern day life, it is evident that the "day" Tesla refers to in which science and, more specifically, technology works to enrich and improve not only the physical world around us, but our spiritual and metaphysical realities, as well, has come. This connection between the sciences and the arts has been made through the effects of technology on the human experience, specifically by way of the utilization of digital or mechanical mediums in the representation of art and emotion. Marshall McLuhan's perspective, "the medium is the message" reflects on the importance of not only the emotional content of the art itself, but also the way it is created. The value of technology in art can be evaluated by the changing mediums throughout history and time. If the invention of the mechanical Gutenberg Press created the revolutionary medium of printed type, then the invention of the computer can be considered the creator of a new revolutionary medium, the internet. 



(Scene from The Social Network: Zuckerburg creates website that allows Harvard
 students to rank their female peers on level of attractiveness, exemplifying the use of technology
 to affect the human social and emotional experience)
McLuhan's description on how the world has been contracted into a "global village" in which there is an instantaneous flow of information is conveniently showcased by another technological medium, film, in one of my favorite movies, The Social Network. Based on the true story of the creation of Facebook, The Social Network uses the medium of film to portray how the medium of the internet and social networks can influence the metaphysical aspects of the human experience. In the film, the creator of Facebook Mark Zuckerburg makes a website with the purpose to connect people. Ironically as the site becomes more successful,  Zuckerburg loses the real life connections he has with  his friends and makes some powerful enemies along the way. The New York Times describes the movie as, "a narrative of ambition, except instead of discovering his authentic self, Mark builds a database, turning his life — and ours — into zeroes and ones, which is what makes it also a story about the human soul." 





Works Cited

Dargis, Manohla. "A Facebook Creation Story With Mark Zuckerb." The New York Times. N.p., 23 Sept. 2010. Web. 15 Apr. 2016. <http://www.nytimes.com/2010/09/24/movies/24nyffsocial.html?_r=0>. 

McLuhan, Marshall. "The Medium Is the Message." Nature 253.5494 (1975): 689-90. Web. <http://web.mit.edu/allanmc/www/mcluhan.mediummessage.pdf>. 

Norman, Jeremy. "Relating the Rapidly Changing Present to the Distant Past as Far as Book History Is Concerned." Relating the Rapidly Changing Present to the Distant Past as Far as Book History Is Concerned. N.p., n.d. Web. 15 Apr. 2016. <http://www.historyofinformation.com/narrative/index.php>. 

Vesna, Victoria. “CoLE.” CoLE. N.p.. Web. 18 Oct 2012. <https://cole.uconline.edu/~UCLA-201209-12F-DESMA-9-1

Whipps, By Heather. "Nikola Tesla: Biography, Inventions & Quotes." LiveScience. TechMedia Network, 29 May 2014. Web. 16 Apr. 2016. <http://www.livescience.com/45950-nikola-tesla-biography.html>.

Photos
http://www.tesladownunder.com
http://www.visualinquiry.org/blog/?p=263
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/tvshowbiz/article-2826725/Mark-Zuckerberg-reveals-Social-Network-hurtful-tried-block-out.html
Pho

1 comment:

  1. You did a good job of relating the topic to different examples. I like how you ended it with the quote. You highlight the negatives in technology it seems like. I wonder what you feel against it.

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