Making Sense

I found Donna Haraways writing A Cyborg Manifesto made very little sense. She seems to be confused through out the work as to what she is writing about. She travels from topic to topic. Is she trying to write a serious piece on science, technology or socialist- feminism; a serious piece on politics or science fiction and fantasy. Does she want to write about sex or religion?
Her first four paragraphs are like a template for her whole piece. The first one she tries to compare politics to religion. She starts our by talking in circles about blasphemy, saying “more faithful as blasphemy is faithful (p516),” and never getting away from the subject of blasphemy. This causes confusion for the reader from the start because this first paragraph has no connection to the title of the work.
Her second paragraph she tells us that reality is fantasy/fiction, stating that the “boundary between science fiction and social reality is an optical illusion (516).” She says that a cyborg is both fiction and social reality and that “social reality… is our most important Political construction, a world –changing fiction” this whole statement is contradictory, how can reality social or political be fiction (not real). That’s like saying you hand is a figment of your imagination. Not only is this impractical it is non-sensical.
From this reality is fiction subject she jumps to the subject of sex and dreams shown by her statements “modern war is a cyborg orgy” and “modern production seems like a dream” in her third paragraph. In this paragraph she attacks heterosexualism saying, “Such nice organic prophylactics against heterosexism. (516)”
Her fourth paragraph is comparing fantasy to politics and talks about utopian traditions. Here in this paragraph she states “the late twentieth century … a mythical time, we are all chimeras, theorized and fabricated hybrids … we are cyborgs.” I see no connection between these Fantasy creatures, chimeras and cyborgs, to politics or myself. As for the utopian traditions we have none there has never been utopia so there can not be utopian traditions.
These four paragraphs give us a good snap shot of what Donna Haraways work is about in its entirety. She should have picked a single subject to seriously write about. It is hard to make sense of what she is trying to say about her topics, when she does not seem to know what she is talking about she supplies no evidence. She only compares, attacks and makes contradictory statements.

These are some of the ways a blog enhances me.

My blog page enhances me by allowing me to express my views on any topic, to respond to other peoples views and to respond to the readings for this class. This page allows me to not only express my views but to do so in the comfort of my home or any where I have access to the internet. I do not have to stand up in front of a group of people I do not know and give an address, which cause me and many other people great anxiety. I am able to gather feed back from those that I wish and whose opinions I value such as class mates, friend and professors as well as others who are studying in the same field that I am in. I can add links to other sites that pertain to the topic being discussed giving credit to my view points as well as information that may help others with understanding the topic more clearly. I can also use these links for people to e-mail me or find out about other people who are studying in the same field. I can also use the pictures to portray some aspect of my self such as my personality and my favorite things.

Click here to see my fiance's home page.

how we will think in 50 years

We will have electronanized almost every aspect of daily life. Computers will be combined with the television to form one major electronic. We will have unlimited digital storage. Things will go from voice activated to thought activated. We will be able to manipulate every thing from locks on doors to turning on the lights. There will be no more fighting over the remote control the television control will go by thought with parent over ride of course.

One day we will be able to write papers by thinking of the words. Our entire daily tasks we will be able to control by thoughts through the electrodes placed on the sides of our heads. It may be a time when people do not have to speak anymore. People just think of what they are going to say and it is wirelessly transmitted to the person they want to say it too, possibly even over thousands of miles. Who knows, after awhile of communicating in this manner we may forget how to actually speak.

As for watching television there may be a digital paint to use on home interior walls that is able to quickly change for viewing movies, videogames, and television shows. Video games themselves will not even use controllers to control them. People will just think about what they want the character in the videogame to do and the character will do it. Scientists have already started to experiment with this method of gameplay. They have connected a paralyzed person to a computer with electrodes and other equipment to monitor certain brain activity. With this they were able to let the person move an object slightly on the computer screen. This is a very large step towards controlling a videogame, computer, and the television just by thinking it.