Technology and How it Affects Communication

    There was an interview last night on the Colbert Report with Sherry Turkle who came on and bemoaned the alienation we are now experiencing as a result of the rise of technology like smart phones, texting and things of that nature.  I felt that this was a remarkably idiotic position to take that really showed her lack of insight into human behavior and communication.  Yes, it is annoying that everyone can text at anytime, regardless of the social situation.  Guess what?  People were inconsiderate assholes long before the advent of Twitter.  The same people who tweet at a funeral, are the same people who would do something inconsiderate like arrive late to a play, chew with their mouth open, and dress casual at a formal event.  Technology does enable inconsiderate behavior and makes it easier to behave callously sometimes.  At the same time, poor behavior has existed for quite some time and technology does not seem to be making it somehow worse than it was in the past, just different from what it used to be.  Turkle talks about children being ignored while their parents text, is this fundamentally different from when parents ignored their children by reading the paper at meals, listening to the radio, or just flat out telling them to shut up?  Technology has changed a variety of behaviors in humans in the fields of science, business, politics, social interaction, why not rudeness?

    Furthermore, Turkle seems to ignore how human interaction takes place very much the same way with or without technology, just slightly different.  She talks about Facebook and how we behave differently on Facebook then we do in the rest of our lives.  OK, I'll give her that.  We also behave differently among friends then we do among distant relatives.  I behave differently at a party where I know most of the people versus when I know none of the people.  Facebook is simply a different social milieu that has its own special kind of behavior, like any other kind of social setting.  If I hold things back or keep to superficial topics at a party where I know very few of the people, does that somehow I am alienated from my fellow human beings?

    Turkle also makes the claim that technology like e-mail, twitter, and texting has altered how we communicate.  While true, I fail to see why this is a big need for concern.  Any advance in communication technology is going to alter how we communicate.  She says that our communication has been stultified due to the shear volume of texts, e-mails and such coming in.  Imagine how terse our communication was in days past when Morse code was used?  Or when messages were memorized to make up for the fact that vast swaths of the population were illiterate?  It is the case that we no longer have the long form styles of communication that were common when people engaged more frequently in epistolary communication, but given the rise of video technology like Skype or Apple's Face-to-Face it may be the case that communication will revert back to being more expansive. Technology has changed a number of things about humans, but in many instances it allows us to pursue the same kinds of behaviors just in new and more exciting ways.