Alone Together

Metadata

• Author: Sherry Turkle
• Full Title: Alone Together
• Category: #books

Highlights

• As this happens, we remake ourselves and our relationships with each other through our new intimacy with machines. People talk about Web access on their BlackBerries as “the place for hope” in life, the place where loneliness can be defeated. A woman in her late sixties describes her new iPhone: “It’s like having a little Times Square in my pocketbook. All lights. All the people I could meet.” (Location 289)
• I believe that in our culture of simulation, the notion of authenticity is for us what sex was for the Victorians—threat and obsession, taboo and fascination. (Location 318)
• Loebner Prize, widely regarded as the world championship for conversational software. (Location 335)
• Love and Sex seems to celebrate an emotional dumbing down, a willful turning away from the complexities of human partnerships—the inauthentic as a new aesthetic. (Location 360)
• We can heal ourselves by giving others what we most need. But what are we to make of this transaction between a depressed woman and a robot? (Location 410)
• I find people willing to seriously consider robots not only as pets but as potential friends, confidants, and even romantic partners. We don’t seem to care what these artificial intelligences “know” or “understand” of the human moments we might “share” with them. At the robotic moment, the performance of connection seems connection enough. We are poised to attach to the inanimate without prejudice. The phrase “technological promiscuity” comes to mind. (Location 419)
• Sociable robots serve as both symptom and dream: as a symptom, they promise a way to sidestep conflicts about intimacy; as a dream, they express a wish for relationships with limits, a way to be both together and alone. 14 (Location 445)
• Yet, suddenly, in the half-light of virtual community, we may feel utterly alone. (Location 462)
• As we distribute ourselves, we may abandon ourselves. (Location 463)
• But when technology engineers intimacy, relationships can be reduced to mere connections. And then, easy connection becomes redefined as intimacy. Put otherwise, cyberintimacies slide into cybersolitudes. (Location 544)
• Overwhelmed by the volume and velocity of our lives, we turn to technology to help us find time. But technology makes us busier than ever and ever more in search of retreat. Gradually, we come to see our online life as life itself. We come to see what robots offer as relationship. The simplification of relationship is no longer a source of complaint. It becomes what we want. These seem the gathering clouds of a perfect storm. (Location 570)
• Decisions about whether something was alive would no longer turn on how something moved but on what it knew: physics gave way to psychology. This set the (Location 588)
• Winston Churchill said, “We shape our buildings and then they shape us.”23 We make our technologies, and they, in turn, shape us. So, of every technology we must ask, Does it serve our human purposes?—a question that causes us to reconsider what these purposes are. Technologies, in every generation, present opportunities to reflect on our values and direction. (Location 609)

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title: Alone Together longtitle: Alone Together author: Sherry Turkle url: , source: kindle last_highlight: 2012-02-22 type: books tags:

Alone Together

Metadata

• Author: Sherry Turkle
• Full Title: Alone Together
• Category: #books

Highlights

• As this happens, we remake ourselves and our relationships with each other through our new intimacy with machines. People talk about Web access on their BlackBerries as “the place for hope” in life, the place where loneliness can be defeated. A woman in her late sixties describes her new iPhone: “It’s like having a little Times Square in my pocketbook. All lights. All the people I could meet.” (Location 289)
• I believe that in our culture of simulation, the notion of authenticity is for us what sex was for the Victorians—threat and obsession, taboo and fascination. (Location 318)
• Loebner Prize, widely regarded as the world championship for conversational software. (Location 335)
• Love and Sex seems to celebrate an emotional dumbing down, a willful turning away from the complexities of human partnerships—the inauthentic as a new aesthetic. (Location 360)
• We can heal ourselves by giving others what we most need. But what are we to make of this transaction between a depressed woman and a robot? (Location 410)
• I find people willing to seriously consider robots not only as pets but as potential friends, confidants, and even romantic partners. We don’t seem to care what these artificial intelligences “know” or “understand” of the human moments we might “share” with them. At the robotic moment, the performance of connection seems connection enough. We are poised to attach to the inanimate without prejudice. The phrase “technological promiscuity” comes to mind. (Location 419)
• Sociable robots serve as both symptom and dream: as a symptom, they promise a way to sidestep conflicts about intimacy; as a dream, they express a wish for relationships with limits, a way to be both together and alone. 14 (Location 445)
• Yet, suddenly, in the half-light of virtual community, we may feel utterly alone. (Location 462)
• As we distribute ourselves, we may abandon ourselves. (Location 463)
• But when technology engineers intimacy, relationships can be reduced to mere connections. And then, easy connection becomes redefined as intimacy. Put otherwise, cyberintimacies slide into cybersolitudes. (Location 544)
• Overwhelmed by the volume and velocity of our lives, we turn to technology to help us find time. But technology makes us busier than ever and ever more in search of retreat. Gradually, we come to see our online life as life itself. We come to see what robots offer as relationship. The simplification of relationship is no longer a source of complaint. It becomes what we want. These seem the gathering clouds of a perfect storm. (Location 570)
• Decisions about whether something was alive would no longer turn on how something moved but on what it knew: physics gave way to psychology. This set the (Location 588)
• Winston Churchill said, “We shape our buildings and then they shape us.”23 We make our technologies, and they, in turn, shape us. So, of every technology we must ask, Does it serve our human purposes?—a question that causes us to reconsider what these purposes are. Technologies, in every generation, present opportunities to reflect on our values and direction. (Location 609)