How bout that, I generated agreement amongst you two.

I am quite proud of myself. That was a MAJOUR accomplishment. In fact, I am exhausted.

; o )
David Jon

Matthew, it is totally obvious that you have issues with Vince. Why? You seem to take pleasure in a ‘belittling’ stand towards him. One that I don’t think Vince deserves. That is MY observation. And I suspect it is NOT ONLY my observation.

I also suspect it has to do with Vince being a sort of surrogate for Ken Wilber. Again, that is MY observation… one which I don’t think is off the mark completely either.

So, yeah, take it all with a grain of salt, if you prefer. I stand by it, though. (wink-wink)

This Precious Life,
David Jon

P.S. Are you ‘too good’ to admit being a prick? Do you NEVER wake up on thw wrong-side of the bed? Are you IMMUNE from psychological issues and complications most of us mere mortals deal with? And if so…. can I be your disciple!! ; o )

All apologies for my own dick-headedness at any time in the past, present, and/or future. I totally respect each of you tremendously. And enjoy everyone’s voice/flavour very much–be it cinnamon or cumin.

Keep On Rockin’ In The Free World,
David Jon

although cellular and landlines are not hierarchical, it just so happens that the development of cellphone is. first there was phone. then bam! cellphones. even the language makes that obvious.

but i think we’re beating and overcomplicating this too much. we can look at it different perspectives, philosophize, and analyze it to death. but it’s premise simple: “Leapfrogging is a theory of development in which developing countries skip inferior, less efficient, more expensive or more polluting technologies and industries and move directly to more advanced ones.” leapfrogging enables this technology to be tested more, improved more, and give way to “exponential” development of technology (not just vertical and horizontal). go read Kurzweil and let me know what you think. of course, just like Wilber, not everyone agrees with his idea. but just like Wilber, i think he’s on to something.

Thanks for the continued discussion about this, and thanks for the links. I have no doubt that phone service has revolutionized the Philippines. Really, there is no arguing that, or making a case against that. And I’m quite happy to now know about this, so thanks on a personal level.

The truth is, I wasn’t. My argument has to do with leapfrogging. I’m not convinced it really means anything. I’m impressed with the Philippines and cellphone adoption, but not impressed with leapfrogging as an argument. And I think this argument misses a media studies perspective, and suggests steps are skipped when in fact these were not. Take the definition offered in a link in Vincent’s opener:

poorly-developed technology or economic bases can move themselves forward rapidly through the adoption of modern systems without going through intermediary steps

And my point is that there is no step skipping in the example of cellphones, at least worthy of note. This notion of leapfrogging, as I understand it, is a “distinction without a difference”. For the same reason we don’t say a high school grad “leapfrogs” when she purchases a flat-screen LCD television as her first TV instead of, in sequence, all the versions of television going back to its introduction into culture, we don’t say that the Philippines “leapfrogged” land-line phones by going instead with cell phones.

The country simply grew to adopt the current technology, in whatever form it is when the conditions were right for that growth. To say, as the “leapfrog” proponents argue, that this is cause for commentary on growth through steps/stages misunderstands what it means to grow through stages.

And I think it misunderstands what is really going on with land-lines vs cellphones. The end result of each is the same — a phone, with a person on the other end in real time. But as of course you know, what goes on beneath the surface is actually two different technology bundles, two different technologies altogether. One used dedicated physical wire connections; the other generally uses radio signals, or satellite transmissions. Both get you to the end result, but take different tracks with different technology altogether.

This is why I suggested that the difference between land-line phones and cellphone is not vertical but rather horizontal. One doesn’t require the other. Thus this isn’t a technological hierarchy. Thus no leapfrogging with a move from no phones to cellphones. This is not A to C skipping B, but simply A to B1 or A to B2. Our ability to innovate presents new technologies that require no further paving of roads in order to enact adoption, so to speak.

And thus no reason not to call it simply what it is — growth. Important, transformative, far-reaching, even revolutionary. But it is growth, from conditions without a phone to conditions with a phone. That a seeming heirarchy is not actually a heirarchy is exactly why I feel that the Leapfroging argument is missing a media studies, that is to say, deeper, perspective.

And I’m going to continue to challenge your arguments (this isn’t personal, if you were wondering) and move on to this statement:

the network and the computer belong to the same “IT/ITS” domain.

I understand why you say that — as a general comment, influenced by Wilber, to ground the overall perspective — but actually I don’t think this says much. Rather, it is far better, I argue, if you draw a new four quadrant diagram, with either technology at the center, around which are four perspectives upon it, two of which are objective (the materials, the architecture) and two of which are subjective (designer intention, user-response). That is both a far more revealing manner to understand computers, networks, or any technology (and artwork production, see “Polysemy”) as well as more intellectually rigorous.

To use the other conception, that technology is It/Its, is another form of (sorry to repeat a pattern) a distinction without a difference. No one in their right mind would characterize computers/networks as anything but objects. This is not high philosophy, but elementary observation. Imposing the “It/Its” part of the quadrant map, ala Wilber, isn’t shedding any real light on anything in this case. You could cut it out and not lose any of your argument. I suggest you do that, and consider the approach I advocate on how to better use the concept of the quadrants.

With regard to Mr. O’Reilly, I’ll have to dig deeper on his perspective, but I’ll say now I’m skeptical of the real benefit of that claim that “the network is the computer”. Very McLuhan, on the surface, I might add. But that doesn’t mean it holds water. For simply saying the network is the network and the computer is the computer implies no less a claim of wonder and awe at the power contained in both technologies. Networks allow us a lot of really cool shit, so no need to call it a computer.

(Though doing so does confirm, yet again, McLuhan’s incisive observation that we define new technologies through specific words that relate to older technologies. I have already mentioned this, but if we define the newer network by terms of the older computer, there seems be something solid about McLuhan’s observation, taken for what it is worth.)

And I don’t see how the substitution of “$100 dollar laptop” for “open source” helps the concept of leapfrogging, for reasons already revealed. More participation is indeed extraordinary, but it doesn’t mean steps are skipped. It rather means that the next step has been taken, for all its glory and its challenges.

The point of all this is to be clearer and more accurate when we are talking about real steps, real stages, and real growth. Terms such as “revolutionary” are thrown about far too carelessly when it comes to technology. This has entirely to do with market forces, and marketing communications. I would add to this list of overused and abused terms: worldviews, consciousness, and even levels of both/either. We have to be careful about what we mean when we use these terms, because it is so easy to manhandle what, upon close inspection, are breathtaking conceptions, the products of hundreds and thousands of years of philosophical development.

And I can’t recommend McLuhan’s Understanding Media strongly enough, for it sheds light on the discreet patterns of perception at play in various media, up to and including the television with plenty of foreshadowing of networks and computers, which McLuhan has been acknowledged to have predicted long before each’s time.

If you don’t want to read him, then check in with my writings occasionally, because McLuhan will likely continue to be front and center (along with a couple other thinkers, such as Paglia and Housen) of my writings on art philosophy, which I’ve already suggested can be construed, in part, as a kind of media studies, though of a decidedly intuitive and creative kind.

F over C,
md

well… maybe you’re not impressed because you haven’t been to the Philippines yet. i would argue that the cellphone is one of the most (if note the most)important technological leapfrog that happened to my country in recent generation. it has even outdone the pc and the laptop, and heck even the internet. consider this: aside from connecting thousands of segregated islands, an almost impossible feat if we depend on freakin’ landlines, cellphones almost single-handedly put everyone in touch with each other, literally by a flick of a finger. not everyone in the Philippines can a afford a computer and a broadband connection, but almost everyone there can afford a cellphone. and if you want a more concrete example, how about a revolution which had overthrown a corrupt government via cellphone? if this is not leapfrogging, i don’t know what it is.

and about “the network is the computer.” the network and the computer belong to the same “IT/ITS” domain. there’s no collapsing of quadrants here. yes, the network and the computer are dumb (from “our” perspective that is) but “we” make it intelligent (e.g. perform basic logical process in hyperspeed that no human being is capable of). but then again “the network is the computer” as Tim O’reilly expounded is deeper than that. and yes, it includes multiperspectivity as well.

“The real power of open source is that it lowers the barriers to entry, allowing people to participate more easily in development and invention. In the age of the network, which distributes the power of participation to anyone in reach of a computer, not just the people on your own development staff, the technology that makes it easiest for anyone to join in moving things forward will ultimately win.”

now on the above Tim O’reilly quote, just replace “open source” with “$100 laptop” and you’ll appreciate the idea of leapfrogging (aka. exponential technological growth

Chicago is cold. Good news is that Wilco’s album was released to temper the winter chills.

Yes, that is Wilber’s interpretation of Marx’s insight. I’ve had that soundbyte in mind quite a bit as I’ve thought through this topic, in part to see whether I agree with it. Seems fine as a soundbyte, as is the case with so much of Wilber’s recent work.

Questioning the assumption, I’m not sure that it is phrased as good as it could be, Marx aside (and it is quite likely that Wilber got superficial with Marx, if Wilber’s M.O. holds in this case, so I’ll have to check that out).

Anyway, it seems more accurate to reduce the emphasis upon ‘consciousness’ and rather concentrate upon ‘perspectives’. That is, perhaps retool the statement as “a determinant of the average mode of perspective exchange” or something like that. I suggest this change, or something like it, because technology means media, and what media present/channel are perspectives. Consciousness is an overused term, fast becoming meaningless. It might already be meaningless, especially in the integral ™ circle.

To your “development into what?” question, I forward now (as I forwarded above, in case you missed it) that it is a development into multiperspectivity. And if multiperspectivity already existed in the cultures (as is likely), then I’ll further qualify to say a development into the particular kind of multiperspectivity fostered by the computer. Contrary to the public dogma, the television has fostered great depth of perspective, which is why the long speech or sermon is so off-putting for most; by the mere television image, we are intimate and within its message.

Computers, an evolution beyond television that includes much of its qualities, have so many previous media wrapped into it, some directly, some indirectly, going back at least to the Gutenberg printing press, if not the invention of the phonetic alphabet itself. (Transcends and includes, yes). With new media comes, sometimes, the facilitation of new perspectives through the irrigation provided in the media. I have written previously about the ‘planet-centric iPod’ and that little box can provide perspectives on the entirety of recorded music from anywhere, a startling portal. The computer is a similarly startling presentation.

Media extend consciousness, following McLuhan’s reasoning (which I agree with completely as a metaphor), so what the computer media extends into form is the human body/mind’s capacity for multiple perspectives amidst simultaneity (or perceived simultaniety). The computer, in its programming, transcends sequentialism (commonly the ‘assembly line’ approach) in favor of the total, “all at once” quality suggested by electricity itself.

This is not about the content of the media (what is actually on the computer is not the point, in our long-computerized culture as well as any other). It is rather about the mental reconciliation of “so much in such a small box” that is the computer. We are basically talking about giving people the equivalent of LSD — a “post-mosaic” mesh of perspectives upon life, perspectives user-friendly and encouraging of participation. A likewise, very bewildering at times. And tiresome.

To your next point, actually, I think the network is the network and the computer is the computer. The collapse of the two seems provocative, able to sell books, acquire speaking fees, but really meaningless in practice. A network is as dumb as the box, and visa versa; but it seems silly to attach terms of intelligence (dumb, smart) to technology, qualifiers of context/usage aside.

Look deeper; which is to say, unfold at the roots of it. The network, for all its bells and whistles, facilitates transfer of data; it is a modern day pony express, which was an improvement upon transfer by foot, or by sail, but no different in essential transportive function. Whereas, as I have suggested, the meat of the real impact of the laptop proposal is that the computer fosters multiperspectivity. This happens regardless a network (though is supported by it when present), if provided with certain programming, software, or functionality, which is the case for what Negroponte’s proposal includes.

Finally, I haven’t been impressed thus far by the merits of “leapfrogging”, at least as how presented in my relatively short research of it. To say that societies “leapfrog” because they adopt cellphones without first implanting landlines seems a distinction without a difference. Sounds translative rather than transformative. A landline and a cellphone are both still phones. Technological improvement is required for both. Cellphone towers are more complicated than landline towers, perhaps, but the difference is far smaller than a comparison between cultures without phones and culture with. THAT is enormous.

Furthermore, to expect that cultures go through all the intermediary technological steps to get from A to B seems aloof to history, not informed by it. A phone is a phone, no matter the bells and whistles; a home is a home, no matter if on the ground or in a tower. Clothes are clothes, no matter how many zippers or folds. Again, the real comparison is with what was previous to having clothes at all. Being naked vs the first fig leaf is an enormous advance; what follows after that far less enormous and incremental.

Please provide a link if you can to a succinct but thorough explanation. (I read the Leapfroggingg 101 piece.) Right now, the concept sounds elementary, but I’m quite open to a change of that assessment provided a good read about it.

Thanks for continuing on another track. I’ll probably revise these comment on my blog.

Also, on my blog, check out today’s entry called “WI-FI COMPUTERS IN THE REPUBLIC OF MACEDONIA” for more on this topic.

md

like i mentioned earlier the $100 laptop is just another step towards what Ray Kurzweil calls the Singularity. and “leapfrogging” is just another fancy term for the exponential growth of technology.

integral theory aside, i think KW hit the bulls-eye when he said that “The techno-economic mode is the single strongest determinant of the average mode of consciousness in a culture….” take note that it didn’t say “the only determinant.” the $100 laptop is just one way of making it easier for developing nations to have a lower barrier of entry into what the developed nations have been enjoying (and ignoring) all along. of course this will not automatically pull entire cultures into the upward spiral of consciousness development overnight. but this step will certainly help in making information available to more people and speed up learning, hence development. but the question is, development into what? the utopian answer is of course developing into “higher” modes of consciousness. but a more honest answer is, nobody really knows. we can only hope and guess. and all bets are off once we hit the singularity, whatever that is.

the laptop is just a dumb terminal. the network is the computer. the $100 laptop will enrich the network, and us, because we are the web.