The Null Concept
Undergraduate Thesis Adrianne Lee
a-h-l.net hi@a-h-l.net
Preface This undergraduate thesis project began from wanting to create a positive impact via negative emotions, a concept from a design research paper about emotional design. It is called, “Ten Ways to Design for Disgust, Sadness, and Other Enjoyments: A Design Approach to Enrich Product Experiences with Negative Emotionsâ€? by Steven F. Fokkinga and Pieter M. A. Desmet. The concept would seem contradictory to the practice of design at first glance. Should design not provide pleasurable experiences? As Fokkinga and Desmet demonstrate through their paper, and I through my project, not all experiences are compelling through pleasure. The experience I sought to design is personal growth. Personal growth is an enticing experience to some (in fact readings on personal growth are a source of inspiration for many). However it is bookstore shelves upon shelves of too many happy and inspiring clichĂŠs and motivational quotes that do not cause enough of a punch to an individual. Hence, I wanted to use negative emotions to make personal growth more compelling.
Image 1: Visual example of perceived contrast
In creating an experience around personal growth, I came across one particular concept which seemed the pinnacle of growth: self-actualization. Self-actualization means to make one’s potentials a reality, especially through a holistic understanding of one’s self. However, as various social theories suggest, it seems an individual’s ability to holistically understand his/herself is hindered in modern society. In this book, the term “curation” describes this misunderstanding of the self. In modern society, an individual’s self is curated, rather than clearly reflected, to the individual. This means the individual perceives one’s self in a selective view. This view has been curated either by the individual or by society. For optimal personal growth and self-actualization, a need to make an objective view of the self more accessible was present – even if an objective view may not result in a pleasurable experience. This project aims to create an experience that unveils to individuals an objective view of their world. Technology has had a long relationship with objectivity, especially in its ability to create records. This project seemed most appropriate to produce through emerging technologies, such as Big Data and the Internet of Things (IoT). IoT is the world of connected mobile devices, devices collecting data about the user to use in a service. As these functions of the Internet of Things leave a record based on technological, and very likely objective, observation, it has great potential to reveals to individuals the most accurate representation of themselves. Replacing the curated nature of our identities with a crisp and clear mirror may result a painful and distressing experience. However, in reflection of Fokkinga and Desmet’s design concept, I am curious in these negative emotions bringing about a more interesting and lasting way to understand our selves. To provide access to this bitter yet rewarding experience, I am presenting in this book a concept called The Null, an anti-social non-network, a platform which allows individuals to use technology to understand themselves. This project explores how we may sincerely grow within a society that is quickly changing with technology. The application book that follows, Self-actualized Workforce, outlines a possible business application to this concept.
Table of Contents
06-09
Introduction 10-17
Obstruction of Growth 20-25
Opportunities for Growth
26-35
Growth through Technology 36-39
The Internet of Things: the empowered future 40-47
The Null
48-49
Conclusion 50
Bibliography 51
Image Source List
The Null: Concept
Introduction
Image2: Six Dimensions of Wellness graphic from the National Wellnesss Institute
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Introduction
T
oday, 54 percent of the world’s population lives in cities. This statistic is projected to grow to 64 percent by the year 2050. With the world population estimated to reach 9.6 billion in the same year, the cities of our future will likely be larger and denser than today. Furthermore, advancement of technology will continue to increase the influence of cities over different parts of the world. Just as globalization shrunk the world to a ‘village’, the influence of cities over the global population will continue to reach far and wide. It is crucial to consider the impact of such a growing yet shrinking environment upon an individual: what happens to the wellbeing of someone who grows up as part of this future population? Wellbeing refers not only to the absence of illness, but positive health. As seen with the copious variety of self-tracker products available, there has been a great deal of development surrounding the physical wellbeing of individuals. There are however, many other aspects to an individual’s positive health. The Six Dimensions of Wellbeing, developed by Dr. Bill Hettler, cofounder of the National Wellness Institute, defines the other aspects: Social wellbeing is living in interdependence of one’s environment and society; the individual’s activities are contributive to the welfare of his/her surroundings. Occupational wellbeing is the pursuit of activities, especially of work, that brings gratification to the individual. For occupational wellness, the individual’s activities are meaningful and rewarding to his/ herself. Intellectual wellbeing is cherishing intellectual growth and stimulation in life; the individual pursues personal interests alongside current issues and ideas. Spiritual wellbeing is the consistency of an individual’s actions with his/her values and beliefs, and the individual is observant and appreciative of his/her
surroundings. Emotional wellbeing is maturity dealing with feelings, which includes accepting and being aware of one’s own feelings, as well as of others’, and the realistic assessment of one’s capabilities. Physical wellbeing is the understanding and caring of one’s physiological condition, including exercise (flexibility, cardiovascular and muscular activities) and a nutritional diet to one’s lifestyle. Wellbeing is not an attained status, and is more a continuing process. As the National Wellness Institute describes, it is “an active process through which people become aware of, and make choices toward, a more successful existence.” The continuative process for wellbeing is called personal growth. Growth in this context is inclusive of both improvements and changes in the self. For example, some would identify advancement in career as personal growth, while others may indicate an exploration of interests as growth. In the process of improving and exploring one’s self, opportunities to understand one’s self are visited. True personal growth is hard to come by for many of us living in urbanized societies. As theorized by Guy Debord, society obstructs the growth of individuals because it creates desire around superficial growth. It is superficial because society’s influences outweigh an individual’s own nature. Thus, our ‘personal’ growth is not personalized enough. Furthermore we are unaware how our growth is possible for personalization and we are unaware of how we want to grow. Both sources of unawareness stems from the lack of challenge in questioning growth, in questioning our perception of self, and the growing desires and dreams that come with this perception. Why do we want the things we want, and is it what we want truly? This project aims to un-obstruct personal growth by providing individuals a better understanding of how they perceive themselves. 7
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This project does not prescribe the de-development of society, or primitive living to personalize growth. Instead, in the Age of Information, it suggests a way to capitalize on emerging technologies and data pools to provide growth autonomous from society’s influences and constructs. In terms of the impact of urbanization on an individual’s wellbeing, much attention has been given to provide individuals a physically healthy place to live in. Most notable is the field of sustainability and ‘Green’ design. This project brings attention to individuals needing a holistically healthy place to live.
The project does not prescribe de-developing society, or individuals living without a society to un-obstruct personal growth. Instead, in the Age of Information, it suggests a way to capitalize on emerging technologies and data pools to provide personal growth to individuals, provide growth that is autonomous from society’s influences and constructs. Along with the environmentally conscious attention to urbanization, which seeks to provide individuals a physically healthy place to live in, this project considers the ecology of the human psyche of individuals as the root to a socially healthy environment for living. There are many researched works that examine happiness, wellbeing, and society in much more scientific, academic means. As a design project, this project is an appropriation and interpretation of these works through an experience and concept, to imagine a future with an introspective and individually personalized society. 8
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Obstruction of Growth
June had a cheese sandwich for lunch, packed from home. She looked at the standard slices of cheese between the standard pieces of white bread. Chewing, she gazed up from her sandwich and spotted Marissa and her friends eating their cafeteria lunches. They picked up their fries piece by piece with their well-manicured hands, taking small bites and laughing about something (probably) hilarious. June stopped her gaze before anyone noticed her staring. She felt her phone buzz in her hoodie pocket. She turned on the display to find Instagramer ‘som12’ had double-tapped a picture of hers. She skimmed through som12’s Instagram profile, double-tapping a few posts in return. She finished eating her sandwich and headed for class. She took out her binder for 3rd period, and wrote on her hand with a ballpoint pen, a reminder for herself to paint her nails tonight.
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Obstruction of Growth
Even in the future, cities will continue to encourage
a curation of identity. This chapter categorizes this curation through the limitations of the human experience - limitation by society and limitations by the self. The first is derived from city living, which promotes a socially connected environment. Limitations by the self are conjured by our own selective memory. Technologically more advanced and socially more connected, individuals may be more susceptible to them selves being curated. Living within urbanized societies, the identities of individuals will be curated by society, and also by the individuals themselves. The personal growth of individuals will be obstructed by their lack of access to an honest view of themselves.
Society vs. Self The urbanized society involves much more than just a collection of people living within close proximity. It also involves sharing customs, laws and – most obstructive to growth – influences. Scholars, through concepts such as the ‘spectacle’ and ‘discovery’ explain how society herds individuals. Influences take shape through society’s curation of our desires and societal constructs. In the Society of the Spectacle, Guy Debord states that the things we intrinsically value as humans are perpetually abstracted to become tools for living. He calls this abstraction the ‘spectacle’, largely referring to mass media’s success in creating desires. He writes, “It is not a supplement to the real world, an additional decoration. It is the heart of the unrealism of the real society. In all its specific forms, as information or propaganda, as advertisement or direct entertainment consumption, the spectacle is the present model of socially dominant life.”1 The spectacle so widely encompasses the society it abstracts, it distracts us from what is ‘real’ to consume the 1 Ibid., 8.
John Carpenter’s They Live (1988) - Nada, a wanderer without meaning in his life, discovers a pair of sunglasses capable of showing the world the way it truly is. As he walks the streets of Los Angeles with these sunglasses, Nada notices that both the media and the government are comprised of subliminal messages meant to keep the population subdued, and that most of the social elite are skull-faced aliens bent on world domination. Image 3 (top) and 4 (bottom): Still from They Live
‘unreal’ of society. Abstraction is what lets us make sense in our lives. For example, money is an abstract representation of the things we can purchase with money. We then associate money to intangible values, such as stability and luxury. Abstractions are tangible things to which we can directly commit our lives. However, the abstractions are what detract us from living fully, as they encourage superficial living, living for the sake of existing, and not for living. The abstractions create societies that do not ultimately serve the intrinsic value they were based upon. The cliché, but true, phrase goes, ‘money doesn’t buy happiness’. Why is happiness, in its purest form, not what creates sense and life to our existence? These abstractions are what 11
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create the constructs of society, and deters individuals from growth that is personal to them. Debord’s concept of a spectacle is a veil, which the individual must lift to see true desire. Carl Jung in Undiscovered Self also speaks of societal influence as concealment of the self. But unlike lifting a veil to see externally, Jung advises individuals to ‘discover’ their consciousness to seek their true inner nature. Carl Jung states that an undiscovered self is a self that is unawake in the midst of societal constructs. But maintaining our inner nature undiscovered is tempting because, as he explains: “Where the many are there is security; what the many believe must of course be true; what the many want must be worth striving for, and necessary, and therefore good”.2 A favourable environment, one that is secure, conventionally necessary and good, is like the paradise of parental care. It is without effort and suffering, but also without the self. With this secure environment is the individual’s loss of power, and loss of autonomy in choosing life according to his/her inner nature.
nology changes the logistics in the determination of desires, our interests still remain to be curated. Like the curation of our desires by society, technology also plays a role in obstructing personal growth by curating our desires. A research paper called “Bias in algorithmic filtering and personalization” by Engin Bozdag, critically examines the different ways information is curated to users in the digital age. Methods such as personalization through algorithms allow individuals to choose what interests to consume through their actions on the web. More autonomy is provided to the individual, as they generate their own interests. However, this may create a closed-loop system, what Bozdag calls “mono-cultured” interests4, where the individual is prevented from being exposed to divergent interests. No new discoveries are made about the self, other than reaffirmation of the self ’s current interests.
The spectacle and the undiscovered self amongst the spectacle, leads to an unawareness of self-construction. We are sold to the comforts and security of belonging to a group, and we lose the ability to be insecure, curious, and open to the things outside what the society feeds to us. We grow up in society without realizing the things that influence us.
Because society may obstruct our growth as it changes our worldview, we intentionally and, more often, unintentionally, change our perspective of self by curating our lives. The curation of the self is not a curation of desires and constructs from an external source; rather, the desires and constructs are deter-
Self vs. Self
Information Technology 15, no. 3 (09, 2013): 211. doi:http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/
Curation by Technology (automation) In terms of media, galleries, TV shows and storefronts have determined what we place our interest in for generations. With the emergence of Internet, internet-equivalents to these mediums replaced many of the traditional outlets of media. Today, after much maturity of the Internet, our interests are determined in a much more automated and decentralized fashion due to algorithms and social ‘up’s.3 Although tech2 Jung, C. G. The Undiscovered Self. Boston, Massachusetts: Little, Brown, 1958. 59. 3 Bozdag, Engin. “Bias in Algorithmic Filtering and Personalization.” Ethics and
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s10676-013-9321-6. http://ezproxy-library.ocad.ca/login?url=http://search.proquest. com/docview/1434119921?accountid=12991. 4 Ibid.
3 seconds ≈ 1 moment = 1 point 1 day ≈ 20 000 moments = 20 000 points
70 year life ≤ 500 000 000 moments = 500 000 000 points* *dimensions do not fit onto page.
mined by an identity we curate to ourselves. This curation is a story we tell ourselves, and this story impacts our daily decisions – how we govern our lives. We curate our experiences into a story, a memory, and disengage ourselves from the experiences themselves. We are obstructive to our own growth because we lack the ability to introspect beyond retrospection. How could we know what we want, if we don’t know who we are? In describing the dichotomy between introspection and retrospection, David Kahneman, a Nobel-prize winning psychologist, defines the two selves: the experiencing self and the remembering self. He describes life as a series of moments, each lasting about 3 seconds. The experiencing self is the self that is constructed by each moment, in the flesh. The remembering self is an accumulation of the most emotional moments of your experiencing self.5
How little of our experiencing self is assembled to a remembering self?
When making decisions, the remembering self is in control. Kahneman says, “We make our decisions in terms of our memories and basically, we maximize remembered utility, not the actual total utility …”6 As he writes in his book Thinking, Fast and Slow, we as a society also base more value on the remembering self than the experiencing 5 Kahneman, Daniel. “Daniel Kahneman: The riddle of experience vs. memory.” Speech, TED2010, Long Beach, February 10, 2010. 6 Chernoff, Naina. “Memory Vs. Experience: Happiness Is Relative.” Observer 15, no. 5 (2002). Accessed March 3, 2015. http://www.psychologicalscience.org/index.php/unc ategorized/memory-vs-experiencehappiness-is-relative.html
Graphic 1
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EXPERIENCING
REMEMBERING
quantitative empirical senses the mundane living detailed reporting
qualitative story: beginning-middle-end emotional thinking evaluative abstraction
“how IS your vacation?”
“how WAS your vacation?”
“how happy are each of your moments?”
“how happy are you about your life?”
who you are
who you think you are
Obstruction of Growth
Christopher Nolan’s film, Memento (2000), tells a story of a man who uses polaroid pictures and small notes to compensate for his anterograde amnesia. The film demonstrates our ability to manipulate our memories to a story of our lives we desire. Image 5 (top) and 6 (bottom): Stills from Memento
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self because we “care deeply about the narrative[s] of [our] life”7. We place a greater value on the remembering self, because the remembering self is not only the story we tell us about our selves, it is the story we tell to those around us. The issues with the remembering self is that often times, it does not reflect the quality of the actual experience. We equate the success of this story to the level of happiness in our lives. As Kahneman emphasizes in his book, the remembering self is a consequence of happiness, while the experiencing self is the determinant. The experiences of each moment should determine the way we live, rather than the story we tell ourselves. Our storytelling nature’s emphasis on the remembering self is the root cause of our misunderstanding of self. Of the two selves, the experiencing self is the more blatant description of who we are because it is the self in the moment, rather than an interpretation of the self. In Carl Roger’s terms, the experiencing self is formed from a more direct internalization of the phenomenal field. The curation of self leads to an unawareness of who we are. ‘Knowing the self ’ isn’t an absolute state, just as the state of wellbeing is a continuing process. But having awareness of this curation is integral to an honest personalization an individual’s growth.
Curation by Technology (self-deception) Unlike the remembering self, social networking platforms such as Facebook allow individuals to intentionally create a remembering self. The individual decides who they want to be according to external factors, such as “what do I want other people to think of me”. Your Facebook presence is a version of yourself that you want other people to identify as you. The remembering self, in Facebook’s platform, is manifested through status updates, likes, comments, follows, and pictures. The identity made on Facebook is an identity that is made ‘outside-in’, meaning your identity is more dependent on the opinion of others than your own. Facebook is a leading platform for identity creation. But it is perhaps not the truest identity because it is content directed to an audience. Curation of the self is made easier and more intentional through technology, and growth is obstructed by the disfiguration of identity.
7 Kahneman, Daniel, and Jason Riis. “Living and Thinking about It: Two Perspectives on Life.” In The Science of Well-Being, edited by N. Baylis, Felicia A. Huppert, and B. Keverne, 289. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2005.
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Obstruction of Growth
An individual and the things s/he perceives through the senses
Sense of self curated through the things perceived.
An individual and the things s/he perceives through the social media
Sense of self curated through perceived social media.
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Opportunities for Growth
Julia had always had an interest in learning languages. This was her third week learning Icelandic: halló ég heiti Julia! She sat on her bed, with a laptop playing Icelandic language lessons from Youtube. Those around her advised her to learn a more ‘useful’ language, like Mandarin or Spanish. But Julia planned to go hiking in Iceland this summer, before starting university. It wasn’t like learning Icelandic would help her with her hike (most Icelanders speak almost perfect English, after all). The intricate grammar and beautiful words were good enough reasons for her. She walked about her room, contently practicing her rolled ‘r’s.
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Opportunities for Growth
Jeremy Rifkins, an advisor to
the European Union, and many heads of state around the world, is the author of The Third Industrial Revolution. He writes about our present society approaching a new industrial revolution. Just as the first industrial revolution was characterized by the lives of individuals being changed by machines, the Third Industrial Revolution is characterized by new technology enabling new behaviour in individuals. Rifkin identifies two types of technologies: new energy sources (renewable) and a new communication system (the Internet). He argues these new technologies are likely to distribute resources, power, and information.8 The world of business goes a step further, and proclaims a fourth industrial revolution, in consideration of the Internet of Things.9 If an industrial revolution is a part of the urbanized future, the individual is bound to possess increased autonomy. These kinds of insights provide a context to imagine social solutions. The previous chapter examined the ways individuals were obstructed in their growth by society and themselves. In order for the individual to personalize
8 Rifkin, Jeremy. The Third Industrial Revolution: How Lateral Power Is Transforming Energy, the Economy, and the World. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2011. 9 Bosch. “Capitalizing on the Internet of Things: How to succeed in a connected world”. Bosch: Software Innovations. April, 2014. (Accessed September 19, 2014).
their growth, the individual needs to actively pursue self-awareness. Self-awareness involves being able to identify the one’s influences in a reflexive manner, and being comfortable with one’s self. Thus, the relationship that was “society versus self ”, and “self versus self ” changes to a much more fluid and congruent relationship.
Society and Self A deceiving relationship between “society versus self ” is beneficial only to society because it creates a uniform body of individuals. To counter this, the individuals need to be more aware of their relationship with their society. This involves possessing a genuine awareness to their external environment to gain a genuine awareness of their selves. Carl Rogers was an American psychologist, acclaimed as the 6th most influential psychologist of the 20th century for his work in the ‘humanistic’ approach to psychology. A humanistic approach involves an empirical, or a ‘phenomenal’, study of the client. As a part of this approach, he developed what is called the ‘phenomenal field’. The phenomenal field is a concept that explains a reality that completely surrounds the individual, but is yet independent of the individual. To explain the phenomenal field, he theorized nineteen propositions. 21
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1. All individuals (organisms) exist in a continually changing world of experience (phenomenal field) of which they are the center. 2. The organism reacts to the field as it is experienced and perceived. This perceptual field is “reality” for the individual. 3. The organism reacts as an organized whole to this phenomenal field. 4. A portion of the total perceptual field gradually becomes differentiated as the self.
Carl Rogers’ Nineteen Propositions Casemore, Roger. “An Overview of the Person-Centered Approach to Counselling and to Life.” In Person-centered Counselling in a Nushell, 20-1. 2nd ed. London: SAGE, 2011.
5. As a result of interaction with the environment, and particularly as a result of evaluational interaction with others, the structure of the self is formed - an organized, fluid but consistent conceptual pattern of perceptions of characteristics and relationships of the “I” or the “me”, together with values attached to these concepts. 6. The organism has one basic tendency and striving - to actualize, maintain and enhance the experiencing organism. 7. The best vantage point for understanding behaviour is from the internal frame of reference of the individual.
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8. Behaviour is basically the goaldirected attempt of the organism to satisfy its needs as experienced, in the field as perceived. 9. Emotion accompanies, and in general facilitates, such goal directed behaviour, the kind of emotion being related to the perceived significance of the behaviour for the maintenance and enhancement of the organism. 10. The values attached to experiences, and the values that are a part of the self-structure, in some instances, are values experienced directly by the organism, and in some instances are values introjected or taken over from others,
Opportunities for Growth
but perceived in distorted fashion, as if they had been experienced directly. 11. As experiences occur in the life of the individual, they are either, a) symbolized, perceived and organized into some relation to the self, b) ignored because there is no perceived relationship to the self structure, c) denied symbolization or given distorted symbolization because the experience is inconsistent with the structure of the self. 12. Most of the ways of behaving that are adopted by the organism are those that are consistent with the concept of self. 13. In some instances, behaviour may be brought about by organic experiences and needs, which have not been symbolized. Such behaviour may be inconsistent with the structure of the self but in such instances the behaviour is not “owned� by the individual. 14. Psychological adjustment exists when the concept of the self is such that all the sensory and visceral experiences of the organism are, or may be, assimilated on a symbolic level into a consistent relationship with the concept of self. 15. Psychological maladjustment exists when the organism denies awareness of significant sensory and visceral experiences, which
consequently are not symbolized and organized into the gestalt of the self-structure. When this situation exists, there is a basic or potential psychological tension. 16. Any experience which is inconsistent with the organization of the structure of the self may be perceived as a threat, and the more of these perceptions there are, the more rigidly the self structure is organized to maintain itself. 17. Under certain conditions, involving primarily complete absence of threat to the self structure, experiences which are inconsistent with it may be perceived and examined, and the structure of self revised to assimilate and include such experiences.
Interpretation of an individual in his/her phenomenal field
18. When the individual perÂceives and accepts into one consistent and integrated system all his sensory and visceral experiences, then he is necessarily more understanding of others and is more accepting of others as separate individuals. 19. As the individual perceives and accepts into his self structure more of his organic experiences, he finds that he is replacing his present value system - based extensively on introjections which have been distortedly symbolized - with a continuing organismic valuing process. 23
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Aspects of the phenomenal field are externalities. We internalize these externalities, consciously or not, and what results is our self-concept. A more conscious process of internalization could provide more awareness into how we are influenced by what surrounds us. It could help us develop metacognitive skills to help us understand why we believe the things we do, and why we want the things we want.
Self and Self As explored in the previous chapter, the “self versus self ” relationship is deceptive. The misalignment between the remembering self and the experiencing self is the difference between who we are and who we think we are. In contrast, a “self and self ” relationship is congruent. It involves honestly viewing one’s self and exploring who s/he is. This relationship involves genuine introspection to gain a sincere acceptance of one’s self. Along with the phenomenal field, Carl Rogers also formulated this idea of a ‘fully-functioning person’. A fully functioning person is characterized by openness to experience, existential lifestyle, realistic, creative, constructive in actions, and living life richly.
This means experiencing all the emotional spectrums of life (joy and pain, love and heartbreak, fear and courage). Ultimately, the fully functioning person is someone who is pursuing selfactualization – to become the person that one truly is. There are multiple interpretations of self-actualization, but Rogers used it to describe a self whose self-concept was an evolving gestalt, instead of one that was life-long. Such flexibility allows one to be honesty with and accept one’s self. 10 The clearest way to demonstrate a harmonious relationship within the self is consonance between the remembering and experiencing self. Interpreting life as a series of moments, many of these moments are forgotten simply because there are just too many moments. The remembering self takes lead in describing our identity because it is comprised of moments that are most impressionable to us. Kahneman, explains the remembering self as a storyteller and the story it tells is determined by “changes, significant moments and endings.”11
10 Ibid. 11 Kahneman, Daniel. TED2010,.
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For a congruent relationship between the remembering and experiencing self, we have to interpret our life as more than just passing moments. We have to consider them as “finite resource that we’re spending while we’re on this earth.”12 This acceptance of one’s self would lead to comfort with one’s identity. Our current society’s lack of this comfort is clearly indicated by our anxiety of being alone. However, many of us do not realize that being alone is not directly translated to loneliness. Loneliness comes from being isolated by others, which results in you being by yourself. Essentially, loneliness comes from our insecurities. We translate our aloneness as desertion by others, and being indicative of our worth. Solitude, on the other hand, is achieved by the desire to be alone. It comes from the confidence that comes with self-actualization, and comfort in being alone.
17 Ibid. 18 Larson, R.W. “Solitude: An Exploration of the Benefits of Being Alone.” Journal for the Theory of Social Behaviour 33 (2003): 21-44.
Opportunities for Growth
“This process of the good life is not, I am convinced, a life for the fainthearted. It involves the stretching and growing of becoming more and more of one’s potentialities. It involves the courage to be. It means launching oneself fully into the stream of life.” - Carl Rogers (1961)
“He said he’d been listening to a symphony, and it was absolutely glorious music and at the very end of the recording, there was a dreadful screeching sound. And then he added, really quite emotionally, it ruined the whole experience. But it hadn’t. What it had ruined were the memories of the experience. He had had the experience. He had had 20 minutes of glorious music. They counted for nothing because he was left with a memory; the memory was ruined, and the memory was all that he had gotten to keep.” - Daniel Kahneman, TED2010
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Growth Through Technology
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Growth Through Technology
As seen with the research presented in previous chapters, topics of
personal growth, wellbeing and happiness have been of interest to many. The following are a collection of projects that approach the “self and self ” relationship through technology. Projects such as these are part of an influx of projects, commercial and otherwise, which attempt to provide wellbeing through technology. They are suggestive of the potential we see in technology to help us grow as individuals. Some projects focus more on introspection, while others focus on retrospection. Introspection is the act of observing one’s self, while retrospection is the act of observing one’s past.
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Re: Introspection through a moderator These two artificial intelligence projects explore the possibilities of artificial intelligence providing individuals consolation. These projects post technology as a moderator that guides the user through introspection.
ELIZA: Rogerian Psychotherapist (1964-1966) ELIZA is one of the first natural language processors, developed in the 1960s by Joseph Weizenbaum of MIT’s Computer Science Department. It mimics a Rogerian psychotherapist by taking a passive role in a conversation with a ‘patient’, letting the patient engage in self-dialogue. It uses a simple function, reflecting much of what is said by the patient back to the patient, inquiring “why?” and “Can you elaborate on that?”13
Cleverbot (1997 – present) Cleverbot is a web application developed by Rollo Carpenter, a British AI scientist. It is a newer version of ELIZA, as it is AI that is designed to converse with users, and is open for conversation about any subject. Unlike ELIZA, Cleverbot constantly learns from its conversations, and has been developing its complexity since its infancy. 13 Güzeldere, Güven, and Stefano Franchi. “Dialogues with Colorful Personalities of Early Ai.” The Stanford Electronic Humanities Review 4, no. 2 (1995). Accessed March 7, 2015. http://web.stanford.edu/group/SHR/4-2/ text/dialogues.html.
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Image 7 (top): ELIZA; Image 8 (bottom): Cleverbot
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Re: Introspection through solitude As noted in the previous chapter, solitude is choosing to be alone, rather than being alone against choice. It often provides individuals a chance to be alone, and to be without others.
The Future of Writing (Royal College of Art x Microsoft): Thoughts You May Have by Koby Barhad (2011) Thoughts You May Have is a design project commissioned by Microsoft, to explore the future of writing within a world where everything will be recorded. It is a simple and poetic interaction piece, it lets the user type in their thoughts, and see what they type one word at a time. It belongs to an online space where users interact with the algorithms of their own thoughts.
Journey (2012) Journey is an indie video game that surrounds the story of a cloaked character travelling through a desert, for the most part in solitude. Gamers can exchange with other players (1 or 2 players at a time) that are spotted in the landscape, but no dialogue can be exchanged. Only musical chimes and gentle movements allow communication on between players.
Image 11: Still from Journey
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Images 9 (top) and 10 (bottom right): Images from Thoughts You May Have
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Re: Retrospection through replay A ‘replay’ usually refers to the playback of media content, to help our capabilities of human memory keep up with the speed of real-life events. A common use of the replay in society is in sports. A player of a sports game will score in a live-broadcasted event, and the event will show a playback of the goal for everyone to witness again. Replays are used to highlight important things for us, slow down life, and enable us to process and analyze pieces of it.
Black Mirror S01E03: “The Entire History of You” (2011) Approaching a future where everything will be on record, this BBC speculative fiction series explores the possibility of replaying every moment of your life through a recording device in your eyes. This episode shows the consequences of extreme retrospection enabled by the precise remembering capabilities of technology.
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Images 12 (top) and 13 (bottom): Stills from Black Mirror
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Re: Retrospection through crowdsourcing The Internet has allowed many new models of consumption to appear, namely crowdsourcing. Crowdsourcing is the collecting of resources from a large group of people. Typically, the contribution from one person is small, but in accumulation from all participants, the resources have potential to be of high quality and quantity. Some examples of the kinds of resources include monetary support, information, volunteerism, and media content.
Panoply (2014 - present) Panoply is a consumer application created by Robert Morris, a PhD researcher at MIT’s Media Lab, is a social-network devised to help users cope with depression. The application crowdsources group support, allowing users to share an issue they are dealing with and have fellow users to provide perspectives on the issue.14 It provides retrospection through another emphatic user’s eyes. 14 Vanhemert, Kyle. “A Social Network Designed to Combat Depression.” Wired.com. April 1, 2015. Accessed April 3, 2015.
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Growth Through Technology
Images 14 (top) and 15 (bottom): From Wired article
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The Null: Concept
The Internet of Things: the empowered future
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The Internet of Things: the empowered future
I
n Limbo, is a transmedia documentary that “questions what becomes of our individual and collective memory in the digital era.”15 It foresees a world where the digital data generated by connected devices for data reservoirs, such as Google, will create digital ‘clones’ of our selves. The digital clone is one of the many outcomes of the Internet of Things: a culmination of Big Data, connectivity, automation, and services.
Images 16: Still from In Limbo
Technology has been one of the main drivers of societal change throughout history. For decades the technology that has been creating change has been the Internet. As a new way to communicate, it has fundamentally changed the way we communicate with each other; as a new way to learn, it has changed the way we view knowledge. As a result, the Internet has greatly impacted the way we view others, our surroundings, and ourselves. Today, the emergent technology spawning change is the Internet of Things (IoT), how will IoT impact personal growth? In brief, IoT is the animation of all things inanimate through technology. It requires a network of embedded physical objects (with controllers, sensors, and actuators) connected to the Internet. With 50 billion devices connected devices by the year 2020, IoT promises to make our lives easier by transforming the objects that surround us into services (‘Smart’ buildings, ‘intelligent’ machines, etc)16. Some claim it is technology that could change every aspect of the economy, politics, the environment, and society.17 All the change IoT may bring possess many possibilities and implications. “The Roadmap for the Emerging 15 Viviani, Antoine. “About.” IN LIMBO. 2015. Accessed March 21, 2015. 16 “The Internet of Things.” Cisco Visualization. Accessed October 11, 2014. 17 Fell, Carré & Strauss. Roadmap for The Emerging “Internet of Things”. Carré & Strauss Online, http://carre-strauss.com/documents/IoT_Roadmap.pdf. Pg 6. (Accessed September, 2014)
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The Null: Concept
Internet of Things” report outlines associated future governance issues, such as “These include power over network standards, power over products and their distribution, power over network traffic, as well as power over services and their distribution. Rights, such as property and privacy, are going to need to be safeguarded. Security is going to have to be guaranteed, as is competition in the marketplace.”18 The future of IoT may even require redefining our definition of rights, property and privacy, as the Internet brings forth a new dimension to our living. Bruce Sterling, author, journalist, critic and a contributing editor of Wired magazine, criticizes IoT in an essay called “The Epic Struggle of the Internet of Things”. Although the focus of the essay concerns being cautious of IoT’s marketed motives, it also brings sound criticism to the current “folk” ideas about IoT. He refers to a common IoT scenario, in which a vacuum user realizes the vacuum’s potential to become part of the Internet of Things, and provide a ‘smart’ service to the user.19 Sterling sarcastically notes through the user’s revelation that not all things should become ‘things’, just because they can. As with any new technology, it is imperative we refrain from rudimentary applications and technical complications and to abstain from using this emerging technology as a marketing tool. In imagining the urbanized future, personalized growth, and a more ambitious application for the Internet of Things, what is envisioned is a more empowered population. A digital clone provides us a record of who we are, the least as a imprint of our actions. This data could empower us with possibly the most objective interpretation of our lives, lacking subjective biases, and empirically determined memory. Of course, as the phrase goes, nothing is created in a vacuum; nothing in life 18 Ibid. 19 Sterling, Bruce. The Epic Struggle of the Internet of Things. Strelka Press, 2014.
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is truly objective. But, assuming a complete and fully enabled, fully established IoT-world, the Internet of Things may just be able to represent the most objective view of the self. IoT as an objective observational tool could let us interpret the moments in our lives, our experiences as sources of data. In the past, emotionlessness of technology was often critiqued as being incompatible to human. Projects regarding technology often mean to humanize technology to create an approachable product. However, this cold objective quality to technology provides an opportunity for us to glimpse at reality without any sort of curation.
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The Null: Concept
The Null
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The Null
The Null is a private journaling platform, existing within an anti-social non-network. It explores technology’s potential in helping individuals contrast their remembering self against their experiencing self. In the Information Age, every moment of our lives will be sources of new data. The Null recreates these moments to provide personal growth through self-reflection.
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The Null: Concept
The Null The Null is a private journaling platform that exists within an anti-social non-network. This invite-only space, powered by the Internet of Things (IoT), is space for individuals to develop an understanding of self, and enable a personalization of growth.
1) The digital clone__ Enabled by the Internet of Things, each potential user possesses a digital ‘clone’, which encompasses their essence through all the data that has been shared and produced by them.
START
The Internet of Things (IoT) is the network of physical objects or “things” embedded with electronics, software, sensors and connectivity to enable it to achieve greater value and service.
This could create self-determined businesses.
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Application__ This concept could benefit many businesses, by acquiring talented, realized, and self-aware individuals.
Enabled for personalization by data, individual grows as they want.
Every time a user fulfills a criterion, they are given a notification digitally. Once they have fulfilled this first set of criteria, they are given an invitation to the platform.
The Null surveys the actions of users through these digital entities, to determine their readiness to access the platform.
The Null: Access Entry Point I hereby authorize use of my digital clone to gain a holistic understanding of myself.
2) Set of criteria__ The system determines for each user an individualized set of criteria, which they must fulfill to access The Null.
Enter
A privacy dialogue confirms their consent in using their data to access The Null.
Session 1: 7 DAY ACCESS 3) Private Journaling__ Users have 7 days to access the platform, where they can access their experiencing self.
(RE)EXPERIENCE
REMEMBER
Possible through the Internet of Things, the system responds to what the user has written on the left side of the screen, as the experiencing self.
Internet Agreement__ Privacy and security are yet a big hurdle to an invasive data application such as this. It needs supportive frameworks, such as an ‘Internet Agreement’, which would enable users total control of their ‘digital clones’.
Session 2: 7 DAY ACCESS *03/12/2015
(RE)EXPERIENCE
REMEMBER
03/12/2015
*03/13/2015
03/13/2015
*03/17/2015
03/17/2015
*03/18/2015
03/18/2015
*03/19/2015
03/19/2015
4) Personalized Growth__ As user adapts an explorative attitude towards life, they gain a better understanding of themselves, and is able to personalize growth.
On the right, they record their day as their remembering self, writing events that may have happened that day.
(x time later) After fulfilling another set of criteria, user gains access to The Null for a second session.
From the second session onwards, the user acquires access to their past session(s).
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The Null: Concept
Concept Details Remembering and Experiencing Self – the private journal: The private journal is the user’s access to his/her brutal truth. It is an opportunity for users to question their selves to understand their selves more complexly. It first aims to challenge the user, for them to seize the opportunity to formulate their own opinions, likes and dislikes, develop their values. Next it aims for users to realize their identities are fluid – meaning they will be influenced by many things, but they have the choice to let it influence them. As Carl Rogers said, in regards to his person-centered learning practice, “The circumstances of our lives may actually matter less to our happiness than the sense of control we feel over our lives.”20 20 Sutherland, Rory. “Perspective is Everything.” Speech, TED2012, , May 1, 2012. The Null’s first conceptualization as an electronic book (above).
(RE)EXPERIENCE
REMEMBER Final conceptualization as an online platform (left).
I was 8 minutes 36 seconds late to work today. I burned 136 extra calories rushing to work. I didn’t stop to chat to Caroll because I was late. I had 4 m eetings and ate lunch at my desk. I conversed with 3 friends today and talked to the janitor... 44
I was late to work today. Day was long and tiring. But dinner at home was pleasant.
The Null
Individualized Criteria: Even though the Remembering and Experiencing Self is what the users are aiming to access when they enter The Null, the individualized criteria provide bigger value for the following reasons. First, the criteria would likely promote potential users or returning users to actively challenge themselves with new aspects of life. As the criteria are a sort of test to see the readiness of a user, it is integral that the criteria maintain undisclosed to them. Also,
to prevent potential users from exchanging ‘fulfilled’ criteria with one another, the criteria are individually assigned to each user, according to their state of readiness. Once users become aware unknown set of criteria allow access an exclusive platform, there would be incentive for users to lead explorative lives. The following tables chart some possibilities for the individualized criteria. This sample is an amalgamation of thoughts from psychologists, the Six Dimensions of Wellness model, and my own insight.
Awareness to Action: Criteria Sampling Chooses discussion over brash agument
Social Wellbeing Intellectual Wellbeing
Found reading often
Occupational Wellbeing
Actively considerate of career choices
Pursues certain academic topic out of interest
Emotional Wellbeing PhysicalWellbeing Spiritual Wellbeing
Contributes time to the welfare of community
Able to determine where his/her abilities apply best Takes responsibility of his/her actions
Determines a physical aspect s/he wants to improve Chooses to have a moment of quiet Lower levels of difficulty
Takes actions to control one’s mood Repetitively avoids alcohol and drugs
Displays openmindedness to those different from him/her Higher levels of difficulty
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The Null: Concept
Second, it assures the platform will not cause trauma to the user. The act of peeling away ‘layers’ of an identity that’s have been constructed by society, layers that have brought so many people a sense of comfort, is very likely a painful experience. As described in the preface to this book, negative emotions create a compelling experience. Fokkinga and Desmet’s roller coaster is the most amusing amusement ride, because the contrast between emotions makes it a thrilling experience. Of amusement rides, there are ones that provide a less stimulating experience, such as the merry-go-around. A merry-go-around is a product of traditional design sense, in that it provides pleasure to the user: comfortable and adequately amusing. Considering how some people may not be ready for a roller coaster, and may prefer the safe merry-go-around, The Null’s criteria determines whether the individual is ready to access an honest perception of his/her self. hrough incorporating exclusivity and limitation to access, The Null
1st Session
2nd Session
3rd Session
4th Session
5th Session 3
6th Session 3
Rollercoaster
Higher levels of difficulty
T
3
3
3
3
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The number of squares under each session are proportional to the number of criteria the user needs to fulfill, to reach the session. For example, assuming the user needs to fulfill 3 criteria to gain access to The Null, by the 6th session, the user would have fulfilled 18 criteria. The level of difficulty in fulfilling a criteria increases with each successive session.
Merry-go-around
Lower levels of difficulty
3
The Null
Third, these sets of individualized criteria provide a valuable collection of data:
One is a list of individuals who meet the individualized criteria, and have entered The Null (users on their first session, second, third session, etc.) Another collection of data is the ‘shape’ to their identities, identifying their qualities, as well as other shapes they would fit well with.
Thus, a question forms: Where do we apply this priceless data?
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The Null: Concept
Conclusion creates a space where self-reflection is a desired activity. It is a private journal platform that is made accessible to the individual when the individual is ready for self-reflection. This project relies on the act of introspection to provide an individual an understanding of their constantly evolving self. It trusts that with this understanding, individuals will appreciate their being, make conscious changes, and create their futures. It trusts that this autonomy will result in creating content individuals. The Null aims to empower individuals to personalize their growth, because it is unlikely that the whole of society will change in one fell swoop to embrace every single individual. Through providing access to their own identities, individuals gain knowledge to create incremental changes. Urbanization involves being constantly surrounded by others online and offline, it will be important to carefully consider the individuals who will make up these societies. The main issue lies within a communal failure, as a society and as individuals, to personalize personal growth. To personalize anything, we have to understand our selves. The current practice of understanding our selves lack ‘stickiness’, meaning there is no persistence of interest. Many of us are told to achieve happiness in life, as if it is a simple check box for us to complete. We are faced by all the challenges this check box presents throughout life, and the idea of personal growth is instantly made insipid. My project hopes to showcase how personal growth could be made enticing through negative emotions, such as shedding the layers of comfort societal constructs provide for us, to consume vulnerability and exploration instead.
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The Null: Concept
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Rifkin, Jeremy. The Third Industrial Revolution: How Lateral Power Is Transforming Energy, the Economy, and the World. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2011. Sterling, Bruce. The Epic Struggle of the Internet of Things. Strelka Press, 2014. Sutherland, Rory. “Perspective is Everything.” Speech, TED2012, , May 1, 2012. “The Internet of Things.” Cisco Visualization. Accessed October 11, 2014. Viviani, Antoine. “About.” IN LIMBO. 2015. Accessed March 21, 2015. “World’s Population Increasingly Urban with More than Half Living in Urban Areas.” UN News Center. July 10, 2014. Accessed February 7, 2015. “World Population Projected to Reach 9.6 Billion by 2050.” UN News Center. June 13, 2013. Accessed April 7, 2015
com/documents/IoT_Roadmap.pdf. Pg 6. (accessed September, 2014)http://carre-strauss.com/documents/ IoT_Roadmap.pdf Fokkinga, S. F., & Desmet, P. M. A. “Ten ways to design for disgust, sadness, and other enjoyments: A design approach to enrich product experiences with negative emotions.” International Journal of Design 7, no. 1: 19-36. Güzeldere, Güven, and Stefano Franchi. “Dialogues with Colorful Personalities of Early Ai.” The Stanford Electronic Humanities Review 4, no. 2 (1995). Accessed March 7, 2015. http://web.stanford.edu/group/ SHR/4-2/text/dialogues.html. Jung, C. G. The Undiscovered Self. Boston, Massachusetts: Little, Brown, 1958. 59. Kahneman, Daniel. “Daniel Kahneman: The riddle of experience vs. memory.” Speech, TED2010, Long Beach, February 10, 2010. Kahneman, Daniel, and Jason Riis. “Living and Thinking about 50
Image Source List The following resources were used in this document for educational purposes. Images without a resource stated in this document are my own creation. 1. http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/ thumb/1/1e/Gradient-optical-illusion.svg/2000px-Gradientoptical-illusion.svg.png 2. Re-visualized from: http://www.nationalwellness. org/?page=Six_Dimensions 3. Stills from They Live, re-visualized from:http://www.highdefdiscnews.com/screenshots/they_live_23.png and 4. http://www.spoutnik.info/uploads/1387560876_tumblr_ mg1kr4dt7W1r3lllro1_1280.png 5. Stills from Memento, re-visualized from: https://picinmotion. files.wordpress.com/2012/07/memento-22.jpg and 6. http://24.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_m0u3yvMNl-
W1qf0x5ko1_500.jpg 7. http://www.scaruffi.com/mind/ai/eliza.jpg 8. http://static1.lxdcdn.net/images/d39edc3fcc518f644a56cab836086b7e.jpeg 9. and 10. http://research.microsoft.com/pubs/156620/ Future%20of%20Writing%20-%20RCA.pdf 11. http://thatgamecompany.com/wp-content/themes/thatgamecompany/_include/img/journey/journey-game-screenshot-7.jpg 12. http://9e3k.com/wp/wp-content/uploads/2011/12/blackmirror-Liam-Redo.jpg 13. https://lacarademilos.files.wordpress.com/2012/03/667619. jpg 14. http://cdni.wired.co.uk/1240x826/o_r/panoply-2.jpg 15. http://www.crowdsourcing.org/images/resized// article_47795_615x0_proportion.png?1428021015 16. https://s3.amazonaws.com/vice_asset_uploader files/1423845548RayKurtweil.png Graphic 1 created from: “A common estimate is that each of these moments of psychological present may last up to 3 seconds, suggesting that people experience some 20 000 moments in a waking day, and upwards of 500 million moments in a 70-year life.� Thinking, Fast and Slow p. 285.
Acknowledgements Love, support, advice, proof-reads, all-nighters, coffees, single malts, beers, critiques, rants, video appearances, giant favours and resource suggestions brought to you by: Alexander Manu
Tom Debecki
Harry Mahler
Cassie Lee, maja, and faja
Seden Lai
David Schnitman
Tarun Rihal
Peter Ha
Charlotte Rauchberger
Adrian Linde
Koby Barhad
Christina Paik
Fellow Shapeshifters (industrial design thesis graduates).
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