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Jaron Lanier: technology humanist

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Today in the L.A. Times’ book pages, Ben Ehrenreich looks at a new manifesto from Jaron Lanier. Lanier, the technology visionary credited with coining the term ‘virtual reality,’ has published his first book, ‘You Are Not a Gadget.’ Ehrenreich writes:

At the bottom of Lanier’s cyber-tinkering is a fundamentally humanist faith in technology, a belief that wisely designed machines can bring us closer together by expanding the possibilities of creative self-expression. ... ‘The hive mind is for the most part stupid and boring,’ Lanier wrote [in 2006]. ‘Why pay attention to it?’ ‘You Are Not a Gadget’ extends that analysis, adding thoughts and observations -- many culled from his column in Discover magazine -- on everything from Stravinsky to giant Australian cuttlefish. The problems spawned by anti-humanist software design, Lanier argues, don’t stay online: ‘It is impossible to work in information technology without also engaging in social engineering.’ Facebook, he writes, confines creativity to preestablished fields, reducing our oceanic complexities to ‘multiple-choice identities’ that can be sold to marketing databases. Cyber-reductionism, Lanier has it, actually shrinks us.

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Even if Lanier’s take on Facebook and Wikipedia seems a bit curmudgeonly, Ehrenreich writes, ‘His mind is a fascinating place to hang out.’

-- Carolyn Kellogg

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