The first week of the EDC15 course is coming to an end.
After setting up the lifestream and connecting it to twitter via IFTTT I started reading the course’s core literature, Vincent Miller’s chapter on The Body and Information Technology – an eye opening introduction into the field of cyborgs and posthumanism.
While delving into the material a relevant article about how industry leaders and scientists are warning of the potential dangers of artificial intelligence started to catch my attention. While this topic has in the past been firmly in the hands of science fiction authors, it is actually a quite serious matter worthy of serious discussion.
By accident I stumbled upon a truly awe inspiring video that fits right into this week’s topic – neuroscientist David Eagleman’s talk on the Future of Being Human – if his theroetical predictions hold up in practice, the future of human cyborgs might be closer than we imagine.
In fact, in some ways it is already here. This biohacker has implanted a magnet in his finger, allowing him to feel electromagnetic fields – effectively upgrading himself with an additional sense. While I do not see a practical use for such an upgrade it’s really cool regardless.
Lastly, the week’s second core reading, a critical examination of the term Technology Enhanced Learning by Sian Bayne, caused me to wonder whether “Digital Education”, or simpler yet, “Education” might be a more appropriate term for our field of study.
Thanks for this Mihael! Yes, I’ve been wondering if we are studying ‘digital education’ or really just ‘education’ too. (And as a person who wears glasses, I’ve been a cyborg for decades–and I often think about what might have happened to me if I’d been born before the invention of optic glass…)
Hi Mihael,
Fantastic to see you raise this issue of artificial intelligence, as it has been quite prominent in the media recently. This is a great topic to return to in block 3 when we consider algorithmic culture.
Something you might want to explore further in week 2 are the educational questions here. TEL, as discussed in core readings, seems to maintain a problematic idea of enhancement – but I wonder what that says about where we are drawing the line between ‘human’ and ‘technology’?
It is great to see some other written posts alongside this end of week summary. Adding comments is a great way to reflect on the contend, and show how you are relating feed items to the course themes and the literature. I also really like the way you are using different tags with your posts and feeds items – this will come in really handy as you build up content.
Something to bear in mind for future lifestream summaries is reflection on why you have added particular feeds and items. You do this well here I think, so keep it up! What we’re looking for is reflection on why you have added particular items, how the course themes and readings have influenced you to choose them, and how they might have shaped your understandings of the topics.
Great work so far Mihael!