Author: Mikey

In chapter 27 of A Deadly Wandering, technology is compared to food. Technology is a necessity for cultural and social lives, however, just like food, technology (mainly interactive media) in large amounts can be unhealthy.  There is a joyful feeling one gets when receiving text messages and likes from peers on social media sites. This euphoric feeling we experience is due to a chemical reaction in the brain. Each time we receive a text message or a notification from our phone dopamine is released into our brain. Dopamine is a chemical that plays a major role in a reward-motivated behavior. Many addictive drugs increase levels of dopamine in our brain as well. This increased level of dopamine in brains may be the reason why certain drugs are addictive. In the same sense, if we receive shots of dopamine from interactive media, we may also become addicted to it. When we become accustomed to receiving shots of dopamine frequently we may lose the ability to be satisfied for long periods of time without it. Because we received dopamine from interactive media on our phones, we learn that social media is what we do when we want more dopamine.  This frequent desire for dopamine is destructive to our attention span because we are not content focusing on something while not receiving dopamine. I find this true to my life as well. Often times when I am trying to direct my attention towards homework, I begin to get the urge to check my phone for messages or notifications. When I do check my phone, I often stay on it for much longer than I had intended. I find it difficult to focus on other aspects of my life for long periods of time without frequently being distracted with my social media. This constant distraction often causes me to make unnoticed mistakes on the other thing I am trying to focus on. This is because I lack the ability to multi task. Because we crave our phones so frequently, our attention span has shortened becoming less than a goldfish’s.

Studies in The Deadly Wandering done till 2001 showed that cell phone use was the number one cause each year in distractions leading to car accidents. I think that the reason that the legislation was still rejected was because cell phone companies profit off cell phone usage and so those big businesses fought to make sure the legislation was rejected. Without unlimited talk and text people are charged by these phone companies for each text and call that they send and make so less texting and talking meant less money these cell phone companies make. I agree that the best legislation would be banning of all non hands free devices while driving because then people can still text and talk while driving, but they don’t have to look away from the road and drive one-handed. This way phone companies don’t lose business and people aren’t dangerously driving.

Mikey Curry

1. Turkle explains by the goldilocks effect that people can’t get enough of each other if and only if they can have each other at a distance in amounts they can control.
2. The reason people don’t want to have a conversation is because it takes place in real time and you can’t control what you are going to say. Texting allows us edit and present ourselves as we want to be to keep moderation.
3. We sacrifice conversation for mere connection. We only get discrete bits of conversation and we don’t get to learn about and understand each other and so we compromise capacity for self reflection.
4. She thinks robot copanionship is tragic because  robots can only offer pretend empathy. They can’t empathize and they don’t have any knowledge about life. Robots aren’t really there for us as we feel.
5. Three gratifying fantasies we get from technology are: 1. that we can put our attention where we want it to be. 2. we will always be heard, and 3. that we will never have to be alone

I feel that what Turkle is arguing is in fact true, that technology is blocking our ability to have real conversations with each other. It’s the mess ups and wrong choice of words that reveal who we truly are. I experienced this many times. One of the many times that I experienced this is when I talked to this guy over text for a few days. He seemed pretty cool and nice. I had never met him in real life so we decided to meet. When we finally met, he was so different than what I was expecting. He presented himself much different through texting than how he was in reality. He was much meaner and less caring than I had perceived through text.

Another occasion much like this one but reversed was with the guy I am currently dating. I had met this guy very briefly before we started to text each other but I hadn’t remembered. When we texted he seemed to have a dull personality, just like there wasn’t much to him. The simplicity of his personality was something I found unattractive. After a while of texting, we decided to meet. I didn’t actually want to meet though, because I didn’t think that I would like him. We had been texting for weeks and I felt that his personality was boring but after only a few days of hanging out with him in person, I found that this was quite opposite. He was very interesting and funny. When we had been hanging out for two weeks  I felt like we had a very good connection. The edits that he made with our conversation before I met him didn’t allow me to truly see him as himself. I saw a version that so cleaned and edited that it didn’t even portray the same person as I had came to know later. If we had never gotten the chance to have real conversation with each other then I would have completely missed out on one of the most amazing people I’ve ever met.  All those mistakes and too muches and too littles painted a picture of a much more caring and complicated person. I saw the happy and sad and angry that he would have viewed as over emotional; if he would have had the chance to delete those emotions then he might have. but because he was unable to, I was able to see the true person he was.

These type of situations have happened to me very often.  I knew this girl named Janette. We had played volleyball and junior year had many classes together so we saw each other every day. By the end of junior year we had created so many memories and such a thick bond that just being in each other’s presence was enough to make us happy. Senior year however, I’m sad to say wasn’t the same. We had no classes with each other at all so once volleyball was over, we no longer saw each other in person as often. In fact, we rarely saw each other at all. It was heart breaking to feel the string connection we had slowly fade from existence.  Those edited texts that we sent back and fourth to each other was not even close to enough to feed and grow the delicate relationship that we once had. Technology was far from able to allow us to make the same connection we once had been able to make in person.

Game night was pretty intense! We played this game that goes by a couple of names. The game goes by Egyptian War  and Rat Slap. The rules are quite simple but it takes a while getting used to it.                                  

               The objective of the game is to get all of the cards. It can be played with either a couple of people or a ton of people. It goes around in a circle starting with the last person that won some cards. If a Jack is put down then the next player must put down one card. If a queen is put down the next player must put down two cards and if a king is put down then three and an ace is four.

               For example, If I put down a queen the next person has to put down two cards unless the first card she puts down is a face card or an ace. If she puts down a jack on her first card then she doesn’t have to put anymore down and it becomes her chance to win all the cards in the middle. The player following her has one chance to put down a face card, if that player fails to put down a face card and for example, puts a four down, then the player before that wins my queen, her jack and the four.  But If that player succeeds in putting a face card down in the one try then that player gets the chance to win the cards. This goes on until someone fails to put down a face in the amount of tries determined by the previous card. Another twist to this game is that any time in the game, if there is doubles or a sandwich then any player, even someone that doesn’t have any cards can slap the cards on the table and win them all. A double is when two of the same cards are put down in a row and a sandwich is when one card is put down and is followed by a different one and then the same is put down after. For example, I put down a four, someone puts down a six and then the next player puts down a four. The cards can be slapped and whoever slapped the cards first, wins them. It’s quite a fun game that uses memory and agility.

I won a game and someone else won the other!

Bottom Up and Top Down Attention

 

Bottom up attention refers to attention by stimuli. THis is important to human survival in the case of a danger. For example, If i was reading something and I heard the sound of something hitting the ground, my attention would respond to the noise stimuli and would be focusing on the noise. This is super important because if you hear a threat, it allows you to respond to the threat which could save your life. This type of attention has saved me many times. One time my sister was in the living room and I was in my room reading. My mom had yelled for us to leave the house because a big fire had started on the kitchen stove. If I hadn’t heard her yell because I was focused on my book I would have been in big trouble

Top down attention describes attention by knowledge, this is important because it allows you to focus on what you want and not be distracted by all the other information in front of you. This is especially important in school because when I am reading something in a book and my teacher asks me to find something, I can find it quickly in a lot of information.

On Wednesday we estimated the speed of the bus. To calculate the speed of the bus we would need to distance divided by the amount of time taken. An estimation is rough calculation . It is meant to be near the calculation but not exact. Assumption and data play a huge role in estimation and calculation. Data is facts and statistics collected for reference or analysis. Data is needed in order to make a calculation. In order to calculate the true average speed of the bus we would have needed to have recorded the amount of travel time . We would also need to find the exact distance we traveled. These two factors would be the data we use to calculate the true distance. To estimate that speed of the bus we would have had to make an educated guess on the amount of time we were going to be traveling for. That educated guess would be an assumption. We would be making an assumption of how long it would take the bus to travel from where we started, all the way around and back. In the discussion I brought up a question regarding the amount of time the bus was traveling. I assumed that what they wanted with the average bus speed was the speed the bus was traveling at most often. In that case to calculate the average speed would have to pause the travel time every time the bus comes to a a stop because then its not traveling.

The first three chapters of the book A Deadly Wandering portrays a story of  a tragic fatality of two rocket scientists on their way to work. This automobile accident occurred at the fault of Reggie Shaw, a young mormon man. The accident also involved a farrier by the name of John Kaiserman. The novel implies that Reggie was on his phone texting while he was driving causing him to fall into the left lane. This loss of attention to driving resulted in two deaths of beloved rocket scientists. This makes them wonder whether multitasking is possible or not and if further understanding of multitasking could help prevent any similarly caused  accidents. I have recently learned that multitasking is not possible, your attention can only be directed to one thing if you want to attain information and be fully alert. We learned that texting and driving is even more dangerous than drinking while driving and often includes more than one car in the crash because it is usually during the daytime while there are more cars out. I once encountered a driving situation in which me being distracted almost resulted in a crash. I was driving to my boyfriend’s house. I was just learning to drive and we were coming to a 15 mile an hour turn. I was in a conversation with him while i was going 30 miles per hour. I totally forgot to brake so I had to take the sharp turn at 30 miles per hour to avoid a giant tree straight in front of us. While doing this I went completely into the left land and drifted around the corner. There was a ditch on the far side so I had to turn very sharply to avoid going into the ditch. This incident was super scary and kept me much more focused in my next driving experiences. It just goes to show how important paying attention can be. Even looking away or even thinking of other things can result in severe consequences