Hooked and unable (to think further)

“thoughts are not dangerous, thinking itself is…” Hannah Arendt

“Why do so many people spend their lives sitting in front of a computer or television?…People are becoming more and more remote. We are becoming robots… is it the lack of humanity?” Ruminated a 89 year old retired school teacher from Switzerland, while waiting for her turn to commit euthanasia. She passed away quietly, perhaps happier and less disillusioned (April 2014). The old lady did not give a rat’s ass about the so called “emancipatory power” of technology.

In April 2013, Google invited a select group of 180 guests to the Grove Hotel in Hertfordshire, England. Intensely private, with little information about the speakers being released online, topics included “Our Legacy” and “Courage In A Connected World”. Former US presidents (many of them also mass murderers) had attended the event earlier, along with royalty, pop stars, tech-gurus and CEOs. Over the years, the list expanded to include heads of state and ministers, directors of the largest European corporations and former chiefs of NATO and the British armed forces. To underscrore this uber gathering of the powerful, Google directors and motivational speakers lead the ceremonies and presentations. Later that year, Google’s own CEO Eric Schmidt, would return to Hertfordshire to host the super secretive Bilderberg Plan. The agenda in a nutshell was: How to improve the world with technology?

So is there a common thread between Google’s annual event and the Swiss lady who committed euthanasia? The unknown lady raised motivating pertinent questions while Google does exactly the opposite. The world we live in today, is one where information, invasion of privacy and violence are inextricably linked. They tell us that “data is the new oil” and the irony of that callous little mantra could not be more profound, because of the humongous CO2 emissions that occur on both ends (extraction of fossil fuels and generation / use of data). Regardless of the subject, language or region ‘weaponization of information’ is accelerated by technologies and capitalized by those with the processing power, to assert even greater control over the world. Ignored, our relationship with the internet appears as problematic as our tryst with fossil fuels.

“I think we’re missing something,” (Eric Schmidt 2014) “…maybe because of the way our politics works, maybe because of the way the media works”. A year later, Schmidt added “we’re not optimistic enough ... the nature of innovation, the things that are going on both at Google and globally are pretty positive for humankind… we should be much more optimistic about what’s going to happen.. going forward…” Sounding more like a character out of Orwell’s 1984 (Ministry of Truth) folks like Eric Schmidt are resolutely utopian because they also happen to be the techno-political elite as of now. Like most techno-worshiping CEOs, Schmidt too is urging some of the most powerful people in the world to support charity initiatives (throw crumbs off the table) and seek their own happiness (take space rides, practice zen meditation etc).

For Schmidt the rapid penetration of cell phones and cameras is a great example to illustrate that “technology is improving the world”. However in reality what we see is devious. Google’s involvement in public surveillance and Surplus Behavioral Data, collaborating with the Chinese Govt. and the American military, both of which are violent brutal organizations, responsible for multiple human rights violations.

Via Google and Facebook Ads, we have seen the continuous proliferation of fake-news, conspiracy theories, racism and misogyny (online and offline) in countries like India, Rwanda, Nigeria, Mexico, Brazil, Turkey, Iraq, Myanmar, France, Germany and Greece to name a few. That Google’s global domination is extensively linked to it’s comprehensive violation of privacy (norms and laws) is well known by now (Soshana Zuboff Surveillance Capitalism). But almost ten years ago, Schmidt was heard on CNBC saying "If you have something that you don’t want anyone to know, maybe you shouldn’t be doing it in the first place." Schmidt as a pathetic technocrat, is just one enabler of the “Orwellian Nightmare” - an all seeing all knowing digital ‘Big Brother’. In this all pervasive exposure to technology, Schmidt is just another messianic visionary like Mark Zuckerberg, Elon Musk, Jeff Bezos etc.

Info-tech experts, journalists, activists, marketing gurus, media pundits, artists, sport stars, influencers etc etc believe that making something visible makes it better. And that technology is ‘the tool’ to make all things visible. Riding high on this assumption, we find ourselves hooked to the internet like we are hooked to energy of one kind or another. This frame of mind is widely predicated by Google, Facebook, Apple, Twitter, Amazon and a range of social media networks. That verdict which has come to dominate the world, is not only “fundamentally wrong; it is actively dangerous, both globally and in many specific instances…” (The New Dark Age by James Bridle).

Our obsession with ‘high-speed data’ bears an eerie resemblance to decades of ‘high-speed transport’ thanks to readily available fossil fuels, ever more airports, vehicles, freeways and highways, all equating to gigatons of CO2 and other deadly GHGs that we are emitting into the planet. Indeed ‘Data is the new oil’. Makes me wonder, as the extraction of fossil fuels pollutes and rapidly heats up our planet, the extraction, filtration and distribution of data pollutes and wrecks our capacity to think and act freely. Invisible specters of our troubled civilization on both ends!

There is an explicit link between the military, government and corporate interests on one side and the rise (popularity) of new technologies embraced by us on the other. The connection is neither new nor hidden (Giles Deleuze 1990 ‘Society Of Control’) yet as individual users we are increasingly caught up, consumed and invested in the myriad trappings offered to us by the “economy of attention”. The “Post Alpha Generation” according to Italian philosopher Franco Bifo Berardi is coalescing into “fractalized and momentary instances, of despair, joy, shock and uncertainty on a daily basis”. Neurologically coerced by systems, way more powerful and privatized than the 80s and 90s, present us a ‘sense of reality’ on a daily basis. Placing our faith on that information which in turn traps us, into cycles of speculation, anxiety, violence and even destruction and death, followed by a fleeting period of normalization.

Penned by Google’s Mohammad "Mo" Gawdat (and endorsed by the company’s founder Sergey Brin) a new book proffers something called a ‘Happiness Equation’. Engineer Your Path To Joy! A really ‘woke equation’ which requires “balancing our experiences and expectations”. Like most feel good reductionist babble that is fabricated by the high priests of Silicon Valley, this too is an oversimplified gateway to better lives. And how? The writer (Chief Business Officer at Google X) tells us that “when your experiences meet or beat your expectations happiness occurs… perceive your events, big and small, as equal to or greater than your expectations, and you’re happy!” Ah so cool! So lets perceive a world with no global warming, no pandemics, no threat of nuclear war? Lets perceive the forest are not burning, the ice is not melting and a mass extinction is not going? Lets also perceive, nurture or imagine a world with no hunger, no refugees, no disease and violence? That surely makes us very happy, yet in a totally absurd if not dishonest way.

Google deals with“digital well being” aimed especially at a generation, which now lives with the Internet on a forever basis. Thriving inside a global fiber optic “Panopticon”

Do you see happiness as a commodity? A formula? which can replace actual labor, empathy, kinship and a veritable connection with reality. This ‘bestselling book’ should not be dismissed but debunked, as oversimplified mockery, to falsely empower a highly attention deficient society. While social media by construct robs and sequesters our attention, it also causes fundamental changes in our mental makeup. Without which all the information technology corporations will not yield skyrocketing profits. ‘Paying attention’ to one thing equates to ignoring others. We find ourselves constantly navigating endless streams of validation. Similar to money, we exchange attention, trade comments, links, messages, likes etc. So you are reading this article right now, as duly suggested by Substack, yet probably ignoring the other work you have to do (sorry for bringing that up). “Information is not scarce, attention is…” Micheal Goldhaber, Physicist.

Talking about this ‘economy of attention and misinformation’ is easier than doing something about it. Yet, a few scientists are already at it, like Jevin West. A biologist and information scientist (University of Washington) has created a data literacy course titled “Calling Bullshit” (PNAS Open Source 2023). He says “It’s especially hard when you consider that much of the fight against misinformation has to take place on social media platforms, such as Facebook, Google, TikTok, Instagram, YouTube and Twitter, which are in private hands.. and which are profiting from misinformation and fake news.”

I am trying to remember the time when I quit using a smart phone and the internet (for a short period). Better, I am trying to remember what I felt missing with prolonged time on the internet? What did I earn or learn? I struggled to 'readjust' to things in daily life which remain non-digital. A ‘face to face’ interaction that was still enriched by pheromones, by hand gestures, by eyes that blinked intermittently. The underlying feeling was of a fundamental deviation, which had occurred in my mental makeup, and possibly in others too. Ditching smartphones or computers is not just about a temporary techno ‘detox’. The real challenge is about the space, time and our cognitive abilities outside the rectangular universe. What are we doing when not fluttering between phone-screen, tablet, desktop? Working? Splitting attention? Not so sure anymore…

I feel the ‘task at hand’ is not so simple. The resolution far from tangible. Nor can I suddenly exit online attachments, aspirations and duties, not without the necessary support structure, to fall back on, to re-imagine and redesign life. The smart phone as a mechanism of distraction to avoid facing ourselves, our problems and fears, is simpler to deal with. Simpler for the generations born before the 1990s. Instagram, YouTube, Twitch and TikTok is perfect to feed our vanity, compound the circles of agreement and streams of validation. Google to answer all our professional, casual and erratic pangs for raw information. Twitter and Facebook to ‘vomit’ all the fake-news, violence, political speculation and misinformation. Well done!

But there is no easy or direct substitute to the prevailing order. We cannot objectify the internet as one of the marvels of modern civilization anymore. “What we should be seeing is the network itself, in all of its entirety and complexity.” (The New Dark Age by James Bridle). That network and it’s host technology is not emancipatory. Instead it is constantly reminding us in hundreds of ways, how not to be seen sitting around idle, with our own thoughts (as crazy as that sounds).

If we fail to challenge (and reject) that core construct, not de-link from the pods of constant digital surveillance, the systems will sneak back into our lives, one way or another. Render us even more useless in terms of imagination, will and autonomous action. Something that Google or Facebook will never achieve, is to think and decide like we humans can. However faulty, we are real and not the information systems. Inspired by the words of Hannah Arendt - “thoughts are not dangerous, thinking itself is…”