Authors: Sherry Turkle

Alone Together (60 page)

3
On Domo, see Sandra Swanson, “Meet Domo, It Just Wants to Help,”
Technology Review
(July/August 2007),
www.technologyreview.com/article/18915
(accessed August 6, 2009). Unless otherwise referenced, all citations to Aaron Edsinger are from an interview in March 2007.

4
Swanson, “Meet Domo.”

5
A similar experience is reported by Lijin Aryananda, a graduate student at MIT’s Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory, who has done her thesis work on Mertz, the robot to which Pia Lindman hopes to merge her mind. I spoke with Aryananda in March 2007, as she was about to graduate and take a fellowship in Germany. She said she would miss the robot. Her feelings for it, she said, began with a “technical bonding.” She described how she was the person who could interact with the robot best: “I can understand the timing of the robot. I know what sorts of things it can be conditioned to respond to. It would be an understatement to say that I look at this robot and see thirteen degrees of freedom. There is more than that.” Aryananda described feeling that the robot was not at its “best” unless she was there, to the point that it almost felt as though she was “letting the robot down” if she was not around. And then, one day, these feelings of “technical missing” became “just missing.” She said, “It [Mertz] has been such a big part of your life, its ways of responding are so much a part of the rhythm of your day.” For her dissertation work on how people responded to Mertz in a natural environment, see Lijin Aryananda, “A Few Days of a Robot’s Life in the Human’s World: Toward Incremental Individual Recognition” (PhD diss., Massachusetts Institute of Technology, 2007).

6
Alan Turing, usually credited with inventing the programmable computer, said that intelligence may require the ability to have sensate experience. In 1950, he wrote, “It can also be maintained that it is best to provide the machine with the best sense organs that money can buy, and then teach it to understand and speak English. That process could follow the normal teaching of a child. Things would be pointed out and named, etc.” Alan Turing, “Computing Machinery and Intelligence,”
Mind
59, no. 236 (October 1950): 433-460.

7
This branch of artificial intelligence (sometimes called “classical AI”) attempts to explicitly represent human knowledge in a declarative form in facts and rules. For an overview of AI and its schools that explores its relations to theories of mind, see Margaret Boden,
Artificial Intelligence and Natural Man
(1981; New York: Basic Books, 1990).

8
Hubert Dreyfus, “Why Computers Must Have Bodies in Order to Be Intelligent,”
Review of Metaphysics
21, no. 1 (September 1967): 13-32. See also Hubert Dreyfus,
What Computers Can’t Do: A Critique of Artificial Reason
(New York: Harper & Row, 1972); Hubert Dreyfus with Stuart E. Dreyfus and Tom Athanasiou,
Mind over Machine: The Power of Human Intuition and Expertise in the Era of the Computer
(New York: Free Press, 1986); Hubert Dreyfus with Stuart E. Dreyfus, “Making a Mind Versus Modeling the Brain: Artificial Intelligence Back at a Branchpoint,”
Daedalus
117, no. 1 (winter 1988): 15-44; Hubert Dreyfus,
What Computers “Still” Can’t Do: A Critique of Artificial Reason
(1979; Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 1992).

For another influential critique of artificial intelligences that stresses the importance of embodiment, see John Searle, “Minds, Brains, and Programs,”
Behavioral and Brain Sciences
3 (1980): 417-424, and “Is the Brain’s Mind a Computer Program?”
Scientific American
262, no. 1 (January 1990): 26-31.

9
Dreyfus, “Why Computers Must Have Bodies.”

10
Antonio Damasio,
Descartes’ Error: Emotion, Reason, and the Human Brain
(New York: Gosset/Putnam Press, 1994).

11
For an introduction to this phenomenon, see David G. Myers,
Exploring Psychology
(New York: Worth Books, 2005), 392. See also Robert Soussignan, “Duchenne Smile, Emotional Experience, and Autonomic Reactivity: A Test of the Facial Feedback Hypothesis,”
Emotion
1, no. 2 (2002): 52-74, and Randy J. Larsen, Margaret Kasimatis, and Kurt Frey, “Facilitating the Furrowed Brow: An Unobtrusive Test of the Facial Feedback Hypothesis Applied to Unpleasant Affect,”
Cognition & Emotion
6, no. 5 (September 1992): 321-338.

12
See, for example, Stephanie D. Preston and Frans B. M. de Waal, “Empathy: Its Ultimate and Proximate Bases,”
Behavioral and Brain Sciences
25 (2002): 1-72, and Christian Keysers and Valeria Gazzola, “Towards a Unifying Neural Theory of Social Cognition,”
Progress in Brain Research
156 (2006): 379-401.

13
On the New York exhibition of the Lindman/Edsinger/Domo project, see Stephanie Cash, “Pia Lindman at Luxe,”
Art in America
, September 2006,
http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m1248/is_8_94/ai_n26981348
(accessed September 10, 2009).

14
On fusion with the inanimate, there are other expert witnesses, although their experiences are outside the scope of this book. See, for example, Michael Chorost’s
Rebuilt: My Journey Back to the Hearing World
(New York: Mariner Books, 2006), a personal account of receiving a cochlear implant. Other relevant testimony comes from Aimée Mullins, a double amputee who uses prosthetic legs to remake herself. See “Aimee Mullins and Her 12 Pairs of Legs,”
Ted.com
,
www.ted.com/talks/aimee_mullins_prosthetic_aesthetics.html
(accessed September 11, 2009). In both Chorost’s and Mullins’s cases, there is evidence that merging with technology results not only in a purely instrumental gain in functionality but in a new prosthetic sensibility as well.

15
Lévinas, Emmanuel, “Ethics and the Face,” in
Totality and Infinity: An Essay on Exteriority
, trans. Alphonso Lingis (Pittsburgh, PA: Duquesne University Press, 1969), 197-201.

16
Lindman uses continental philosophy and psychoanalysis as a referent. I see two themes in the work of French psychoanalyst Jacques Lacan as touchstones of her thinking. First, there is always something that cannot be represented, something that Lacan calls “the real.” Second, the self is structured by language and society. There is no ego apart from language and society. See Jacques Lacan,
Ecrits: A Selection
, trans. Alan Sheridan (1977; New York: W. W. Norton & Company, 2002), and
The Four Fundamental Concepts of Psychoanalysis
, ed. Jacques-Alain Miller, trans. Alan Sheridan (1973; New York: W. W. Norton & Company, 1998).

17
See, for example, Sherry Turkle, “Authenticity in the Age of Digital Companions,”
Interaction Studies
8, no. 3 (2007): 501-517.

18
The tendency for people to attribute personality, intelligence, and emotion to computational objects has been widely documented in the field of human-computer interaction. Classic experimental studies are reported in Byron Reeves and Clifford Nass,
The Media Equation: How People Treat Computers, Television, and New Media Like Real People and Places
(New York: Cambridge University Press/CSLI, 1996); Clifford Nass et al., “Computers Are Social Actors: A Review of Current Research,” in
Human Values and the Design of Computer Technology
, ed. Batya Friedman (Stanford, CA: CSLI Productions, 1997), 137-162; Clifford Nass and Yougmee Moon, “Machines and Mindlessness: Social Response to Computers,”
Journal of Social Issues
56, no. 1 (2000): 81-103. See also Salvatore Parise et al., “Cooperating with Life-like Interface Agents,”
Computers in Human Behavior
15 (1999): 123-142; Lee Sproull et al., “When the Interface Is a Face,”
Human-Computer Interaction
11, no. 2 (June 1996): 97-124; Sara Kiesler and Lee Sproull, “Social Responses to ‘Social’ Computers,” in
Human Values and the Design of Technology
, ed. Batya Friedman (Stanford, CA: CLSI Publications, 1997). A review of research on sociable robotics is T. Fong, I. Nourbakhsh, and K. Dautenhahn,
A Survey of Social Robots
(Pittsburgh, PA: Carnegie Mellon University Robotics Institute, 2002).

19
Nass et al., “Computers Are Social Actors,” 138.

20
Nass et al., “Computers Are Social Actors,” 158.

21
Nass et al., “Computers Are Social Actors,” 138.

22
Rosalind W. Picard,
Affective Computing
(Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 1997), x.

23
Marvin Minsky,
The Emotion Machine: Commonsense Thinking, Artificial Intelligence, and the Future of the Human Mind
(New York: Simon & Schuster, 2006), 345.

24
See “affective,”
Thesaurus.com
,
http://thesaurus.reference.com/browse/affective
(accessed July 6, 2009).

25
Raymond Kurzweil believes that it will be possible to download self onto machine. For an overview of his ideas, see Raymond Kurzweil,
The Singularity Is Near: When Humans Transcend Biology
(New York: Viking, 2005)
.

26
Current research at the MIT Media Lab aspires to such computationally enhanced environments. See, for example, research groups on Fluid Interfaces and Information Ecology,
www.media.mit.edu/research-groups/projects
(accessed August 14, 2010).

27
Starner discussed his ideas on growing a robot by using sensors embedded in his clothing in a January 2008 interview. See “Wearable Computing Pioneer Thad Starner,”
Gartner.com
, January 29, 2008,
www.gartner.com/research/fellows/asset_196289_1176.jsp
(accessed April 3, 2010).

28
For an overview of robots in medical settings, focusing on research on Alzheimer’s and autism, see Jerome Groopman, “Robots That Care: Advances in Technological Therapy,”
The New Yorker
, November 2, 2009,
www.newyorker.com/reporting/2009/11/02/091102fa_fact_groopman
(accessed November 11, 2009).

29
In Japan, robot babysitters offer lessons, games, and child surveillance as their mothers perform household chores. Androids in the form of sexy women are marketed as receptionists and guides. They are in development to serve as hostesses and elementary school teachers. In a related development in Japan, a lifelike sex doll, anatomically correct and enhanced by sphincter muscles, is publicly marketed and seen as a good way for shut-ins to find pleasure and, more generally, to control the spread of sexually transmitted diseases.

In a new development, there is now a “real,” physical vacation resort where Japanese men can spend time with their virtual girlfriends. Although the men check in “alone,” the staff is trained to respond to them as though they were in a couple. Daisuke Wakabayashi, “Only in Japan, Real Men Go to a Hotel with Virtual Girlfriends,” August 31, 2010,
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748703632304575451414209658940.html
(accessed September 7, 2010).

CHAPTER 8: ALWAYS ON

1
This chapter expands on themes explored in Sherry Turkle, “Tethering,” in
Sensorium: Embodied Experience, Technology, and Contemporary Art
, ed. Caroline Jones (Cambridge, MA: Zone, 2006), 220-226, and “Always-On/Always-on-You: The Tethered Self,” in
Handbook of Mobile Communication Studies
, ed. James E. Katz (Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 2008), 121-138.

2
These statements put me on a contested terrain of what constitutes support and shared celebration. I have interviewed people who say that flurries of virtual condolence and congratulations are sustaining; others say it just reminds them of how alone they are. And this in fact is my thesis: we are confused about when we are alone and when we are together.

3
See “The Guild—Do You Want to Date My Avatar,” YouTube, August 17, 2009,
www.youtube.com/watch?v=urNyg1ftMIU
(accessed January 15, 2010).

4
Internet Relay Chat is a form of real-time Internet text messaging (chat) or synchronous conferencing. It is mainly designed for group communication in discussion forums, called channels, but also allows one-to-one communication via private message as well as chat and data transfers. It is much used during academic conferences, now in addition to Twitter. See, for example, this note on a conference invitation for a conference on media literacy: “Conference attendees are encouraged to bring their laptops, PDAs, netbooks or Twitter enabled phones, so they can participate in on-line social networking that will be part of this year’s conference. Directions on how to obtain Internet connectivity and where people will be talking, will be provided in your attendee packet. For those who can not attend, tell them they can backchannel with us on Twitter at #homeinc.” See “Conference Program,” 2009 Media Literacy Conference,
http://ezregister.com/events/536
(accessed October 20, 2009).

5
Hugh Gusterson and Catherine Besteman, eds.,
The Insecure American
:
How We Got Here and What We Should Do About It
(Los Angeles: University of California Press, 2009).

6
See, for example, Robert D. Putnam,
Bowling Alone: The Collapse and Revival of American Community
(New York: Simon and Schuster, 2001); Gusterson and Besteman, eds.,
The Insecure American
; Theda Skocpol,
Diminished Democracy: From Membership to Management in American Civic Life
(Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 2003).

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