Connected, but alone?

Connected - attached, joined, united

Ms. Sherry Turkle, year 1996, she just written a book that celebrated our life in the internet (they are
experimenting with chat rooms and online virtual communities)
Exploring different aspects on themselves and then apply the idea of what they have learned in virtual
world about themselves and to live better in the real world.

“We’re letting it take us places that we don’t want to go.”

“Plugged in lives” stories

1. 50 year old - no time to talk with colleagues but has time to do stuffs with his phone
2. 18 years old - do not know how to communicate with others… In the process of learning how to
have real communications.

ANALYSIS: “Getting disturbed” “BEING UNINTERESTED IN REAL CONVERSATION”

-People text or email during board meetings.

-Parent do emails while having dinner
-But then children do the same way

Nowadays,
Me: Children are more into gadgets than playing outside.
Me: Going out or having meetings with friends but not totally talking, “being together while not being
together” ALONE TOGETHER

Me: “Lack of communication skills and ethics in communicating in the real world slowly fades away”

HOW TECHNOLOGY CHANGES OUR LIVES PHYSICALLY, MENTALLY, EMOTIONALLY

ANALYSIS: Technology changes our lives physically, mentally and emotionally.
PHYSICALLY - “We get to edit, we get to delete. We get to retouch everything in our body, not too
little not too much, just right.” Changing our appearance through technology. This gives pleasure and
contentment to us. -Cleaning every flaws through technology

“But, our little devices in our pockets are also psychologically powerful.”

MENTALLY - You can control what you are going to say, again we get to edit, we get to delete.
Through texting or chatting, you’ll be able to say words clearly.
-Control over they put their attention. Paying attention to the bits that interests you.

EMOTIONALLY - We remove ourselves from grief. Hiding our real emotions. Some messages that put
into words aren’t all came from real emotions. Like saying I love you through texts. No learning to
each other, really understanding each other.

Parang kailangan perfect lahat kaya pinipilit natin maging perfect when facing ourselves in media.
Pretending that we are okay. Maayos na family, pero di naman pala. Greeting friends in their birthday,
pero d okay in real life. NAGSE-SET NA RIN NG STANDARS KUNG ANO YUNG PERFECT TO TALK WITH.
Sa online communication, walang sincerity, idadaan na lang lahat sa words.

“That they don’t only change what we do, they change who we are”
 GRATIFYING FANTASIES OF TECHNOLOGY
1.We can put our attention wherever we wanted to be
2.we will always be heard
3.we will never have to be alone
-changing our mentalities, “People tries to solve loneliness by connection.
-It expresses but not solve a problem
-We use technology to share are thoughts and feelings as if we have feeling that way.
“PRETENDING”

GOLDILOCKS EFFECT:
- We want to keep in touch to people but sometimes, we want to be distant to each other so that
they can control the situation. That is what we called the “Just right status” WE’RE LONELY BUT
WE’RE AFRAID OF INTIMACY
-Just like how we retouch our appearances to look better.

ANALYSIS: Technology gives pleasure and happiness that we want to have, without knowing that we
are pretending to escape in reality. But the consequence is, we sacrifice the essence of real
conversations and this let us take away our real companions.

“Plugged in lives” stories

A mother who lost a child - sharing is grief with a companion, not a human but a robot. (Example:
Black mirror, Miley Cyrus) No one is listening in real life. So there’s machines that seem to care about
us. Many people found this amazing, but it doesn’t make at all. There’s no emotion, they didn’t
experience what we experience. “PRETEND EMPATHY”

POWER OF SOLITUDE
People tend to depend in virtual comfort and less from each other. That’ where trust slowly fades
away.
Connection - isolation
Solitude: the ability to separate, to gather yourself. This is where you can find yourself so that you can
reach out to people and form real attachments.
When we don’t have the capacity for solitude, we turn to other people in order to feel less anxious or
in order to feel alive. When this happens, we are not able to appreciate who they are, we are using
them as spare parts to support our fragile sense of self.

Being connected makes us less alone. THAT IS WRONG.

“IF WE DON’T TEACH OUR CHILDREN TO BE ALONE, THEY WILL ONLY KNOW HOW TO BE LONELY”

OVERALL LESSON:
‘RECOGNIZE OUR VULNERABILITY’
Listen to each other, including the boring bits because it’s when we stumble or hesitate or lose our
words. Afraid to reveal ourselves to each other
THIK SOLITUDE AS A GOOD THING. FIND WAYS TO DEMONSTRATE IT AS A VALUE FOR CHILDREN.
RECLAIM CHILDREN FOR CONVO, ALSO IN CIRLCE OF FREINDS

INTRODUCTION - about saan yung talk

FINDINGS - 3 points( about sa discussion nya)
ANALYSIS - ung mga diniscuss nya, anong supported principle or other ideas dun
CONCLUSION - sumarrization ng analaysis
RECOMMENDATION - ano pang pwede maidiscuss or idagdag
“I have written a book that celebrated our life in the internet”. That is what Ms. Sherry Turkle
accomplished in the year 1996 as she explores the bright side of emerging technology. However, as
the world started to get in touched with the modernization, “this let ourselves take us in places that
we don’t want to go.” According to