an informed critique based in both an understanding of technology and of human consciousness."
—Howard Rheingold, author of The Virtual Community and Smart Mobs.
“Ivo Quartiroli is mining the rich liminal territory between humans and their networks. With the integrity of a scientist and the passion of artist, he forces us to reconsider where we end and technology begins. Or when.”
—Douglas Rushkoff, Media Theorist and author of Cyberia, Media Virus, Life, Inc. and Program or Be Programmed.
“You might find what he writes to be challenging, irritating, even blasphemous and sacrilegious. If so, he has proven his point. The Internet, Ivo suggests, might just be the new opium of the masses. Agree with him or not, no other book to date brings together the multitude of issues related to how the seductions of technology impinge upon and affect the development of the self and soul.”
—Michael Wesch, Associate Professor of Digital Ethnography, Kansas State University
“The Digitally Divided Self is a refreshing look at technology that goes beyond the standard, well-worn critiques. Ivo Quartiroli charts new territory with a series of profound reflections on the intersections of computer science, psychology and spirituality.”
—Micah White, Senior Editor at Adbusters magazine
It is nearly half a century since Marshall McLuhan pointed out that the medium is the message. In the interim, digital technologies have found an irresistible hook on our minds. With the soul’s quest for the infinite usurped by the ego’s desire for unlimited power, the Internet and social media have stepped in to fill our deepest needs for communication, knowledge and creativity – even intimacy and sexuality. Without being grounded in those human qualities which are established through experience and inner exploration, we are vulnerable to being seduced into outsourcing our minds and our fragile identities.
Intersecting media studies, psychology and spirituality, The Digitally Divided Self exposes the nature of the malleable mind and explores the religious and philosophical influences which leave it obsessed with the incessant flow of information.
Ivo Quartiroli has been a software programmer, publisher of Italian technology and spirituality books, and computer science book author. Complementing his professional accomplishments in information processing, his interest in consciousness processing has led him to spiritual explorations. He shares his perspective on the intersection of media studies, psychology and spirituality on his blog www.indranet.org and writes for Italian magazines about technology and society. He sits on the Italian Club of Budapest’s science committee.
The Digitally
Divided Self
Relinquishing our Awareness to the Internet
Ivo Quartiroli
silens
Milano – www.silens.org
Copyright © 2011 by Ivo Quartiroli
All rights reserved
No part of this book, whether in physical, electronic or other form, may be copied, reproduced, distributed, transmitted, publicly performed or displayed without the prior written consent of the copyright holder. Nor may derivative works such as translations be produced.
Published in eBook format by Silens
Converted by http://www.eBookIt.com
Cover design and page layout by Moreno Confalone
Editor: David Carr www.MovingWords.us
Copy editor: Dhiren Bahl www.WordsWay-Copyediting.com
ISBN-13: 978-8-8972-3301-5
silens
Milano – www.silens.org
To Angelo,
Carmen,
Christian,
Jiab,
Leo
List of permissions
The author gratefully acknowledges permission to reproduce copyright material from the following journals, books, authors and web sites:
Advaita Press for permission to reprint from Ramesh Balsekar, A Duet of One (Advaita Press, 1989), p.15, from Ramesh Balsekar, Consciousness Speaks (Advaita Press, 1992), p.16, 28 and from Ram Tzu, No Way for the Spiritually ‘Advanced’ (Advaita Press, 1990), p. 57.
Alan Wallace for permission to reprint from Alan Wallace, The Taboo of Subjectivity, (Oxford University Press, 2000), p.41 and The Attention Revolution, (Wisdom Publications, 2006), p. 37.
Alliance for Childhood for permission to reprint Alliance for Childhood, Fool’s Gold: A Critical Look at Computers in Childhood, (Alliance for Childhood, 2000), p.4, 22, 32, 62, 97. www.allianceforchildhood.org
Anthony Aguirre for permission to reprint his answer for “The Edge Annual Question 2010”.
Douglas Rushkoff for permission to reprint from Digital Nation, Interview with Clifford Nass, from Digital Nation, 1 Dec 2009: and from an interview with Sherry Turkle on Digital Nation, 2 Feb 2010, www.pbs.org
Evgeny Morozov for permission to reprint from “Texting Toward Utopia: Does the Internet Spread Democracy?” Boston Review, March/April 2009, www.bostonreview.net and from “Wrong Kind of Buzz Around Google Buzz,” Foreign Policy, 18 Aug 2010, www.neteffect.foreignpolicy.com
Frederic Lowen for permission to reprint from Alexander Lowen, Bioenergetics, (Coward, McCann & Geoghegan, 1975), p. 328.
Gary Small for permission to reprint from Gary Small and Gigi Vorgan, iBrain: Surviving the Technological Alteration of the Modern Mind, (William Morrow, 2008), pp. 31-32.
Standpoint Magazine and the author for permission to reprint from Gerald Block, “Out of this World,” Standpoint, August 2008, www.standpointmag.com
HarperCollins Publishers for permission to reprint from James Hillman and, Michael Ventura, We’ve Had a Hundred Years of Psychotherapy: And the World’s Getting Worse, (Harper
