An excerpt from this book was published in Wired magazine back in May:

There’s nothing wrong with absorbing information quickly and in bits and pieces. We’ve always skimmed newspapers more than we’ve read them, and we routinely run our eyes over books and magazines to get the gist of a piece of writing and decide whether it warrants more thorough reading. The ability to scan and browse is as important as the ability to read deeply and think attentively. The problem is that skimming is becoming our dominant mode of thought. Once a means to an end, a way to identify information for further study, it’s becoming an end in itself—our preferred method of both learning and analysis. (Wired: “The Web Shatters Focus, Rewires Brains” by Nicholas Carr, May 24th, 2010)

About Nicholas Carr:

Nicholas Carr writes on the social, economic, and business implications of technology. He is the author of the 2008 Wall Street Journal bestseller The Big Switch: Rewiring the World, from Edison to Google, which is “widely considered to be the most influential book so far on the cloud computing movement,” according the Christian Science Monitor. His earlier book, Does IT Matter?, published in 2004, “lays out the simple truths of the economics of information technology in a lucid way, with cogent examples and clear analysis,” said the New York Times. He is working on a new book, The Shallows: What the Internet Is Doing to Our Brains, which will be published in 2010. Carr’s books have been translated into more than a dozen languages. (Bio)

Three things: 1) It’s yet another good reason to try and differentiate between information and knowledge (one could say that information is to knowledge what grapes are to wine : its raw material); 2) It would be a mistake to think that gadgets or the Internet are changing our brain configuration. Not because it’s wrong, but because it’s an incomplete statement. What then, should one ask, caused the gadgets to change? What caused the Internet? 3) The form of this post can be understand as an illustration of what the content of the post is about.

Sen. Ted Stevens who died in a plane crash last Monday is known, among other things, for having coined the phrase “a series of tubes”

“The internet is a series of tubes!” This was the gaffe heard round the ‘net, igniting a response that spanned every news outlet from Fark to the New York Times. The phrase became a badge of pride. Stevens’s quote showed up on the Colbert Report and the Daily Show. Experts confirmed it. People remixed his speech. The “tubes” even have their own Wikipedia page. Google briefly incorporated them into a program as an easter egg. They took on a life of their own, ensconcing themselves in online lore. The Internet was not a big truck! It was a series of tubes! And it was proud. (more)

First spotted via Bifurcations, Sarah Choukah’s research blog. Learn more about her work here.

Here’s the original French version:

“A l’inverse des « primitifs » qui donnent un visage à tout ce qui bouge, — ou même des premiers Grecs, qui divinisaient toutes les faces et toutes les forces de la Nature, l’Homme moderne est obsédé par le besoin de dépersonnaliser (ou d’impersonnaliser) ce qu’il admire le plus. Deux raisons à cette tendance. La première est l’Analyse, — ce merveilleux instrument de recherche scientifique, auquel nous devons tous nos progrès, mais qui, de synthèse en synthèse dénouées, laisse échapper l’une après l’autre toutes les âmes, et finit par nous laisser en présence d’une pile de rouages démontés et de particules évanescentes. — Et la seconde est la découverte du monde sidéral, objet tellement vaste que toute proportion paraît abolie entre notre être et les dimensions du Cosmos autour de nous. — Capable de réussir et de couvrir à la fois cet Infime et cet Immense, une seule réalité semble subsister : l’Énergie, entité flottante universelle, d’où tout émerge, et où tout retombe, comme dans un Océan. L’Énergie, le nouvel Esprit. L’Énergie, le nouveau Dieu. A l’Oméga du Monde, comme à son Alpha, l’Impersonnel.”

Éditions du Seuil, Paris, 1956, p. 177. PDF.

Previously on Skandalon: Point Omega.

“Friedrich A. Kittler (born 1943 in Rochlitz, Saxony) is a literary scholar and a media theorist. His works relate to media, technology, and the military.” (wikipedia)

Derrida offers a similar analysis in his essay “Freud and the scene of writing” (1966)

The study “A Demonstration of the Transition from Ready-to-Hand to Unready-to-Hand” by Dobromir G. Dotov, Lin Nie, Anthony Chemero is available online (PDF).

The “fondamental concept” to which Chemero is referring is the concept of “readiness-to-hand”. Heidegger explains this concept in section 15 of his book Being and Time : “The Being of the Entities Encountered in the Environment” (see Google Books). To understand this concept, one can get help from Wikipedia, from an online Glossary of Terms in Being and Time (edited by Roderick Munday, last updated in March 2009) and from Dean Heckles’ blog (Heckle “is a social–cognitive scientist and a PhD student at Stanford” and he specifically chose to name his blog… “Ready-to-hand” : great introduction to the concept if you’re into technology or communication or media studies).

For a good overview of what’s at stakes today when it comes to our relationship to technology, one should read the “General Introduction” of the first book of the Technics and Time trilogy by Bernard Stiegler. The book has been translated from French by Richard Beardsworth and George Collins. The “General Introduction” which run from page 1 to 18 is available via Google Books.

Previously on Skandalon: cognition and media ecology.

Craig Mod is a “developer; writer; book designer; publisher; professional world-wide digital hobo”. Here’s what he has to say about books:

“I’ve always loved books. I’ve always loved computers. We are currently experiencing a very unique convergence point for things digital and analog. Because of this, I think that right now is a very exciting time to be involved with storytelling. The world is smaller than ever and the stories hidden in data and hitherto inaccessible cultures are just a few keystrokes or a plane ride away. I’m interested in engaging these stories, developing sustainable businesses that evoke thoughtful communities and finding ways to bridge cultures.” (more)

Check out the books he designed.