The Cycle of Cognition

A Proposed Analysis Framework

for Immaterialisation

David Leevers, VERS Associates, London

www.vers.co.uk/dleevers

Immaterialisation:The ASSIST Mission

Dematerialisation of production achieves fractional improvements and does little to address the gulf between developed and developing world.

Immaterialisation of consumption achieves order of magnitude improvements leading to a world that is:

…Fair and Fulfilling, Prosperous and Sustainable

Immaterialisation works because it addresses BASIC human needs and aspirations, independent of culture, belief systems and Western status symbols

IST Infrastructure:From Information to Network

The “Immature IST” of the last 50 years has offered an “Information Society” - One-way two-stage information store and forward - Hierarchical architecture, e.g. the database

- Owned by information specialists- Intellectually satisfying to the disembodied mind

Future “Mature IST” can offer a “Network Society” - Two-way simultaneous interaction, - Peer to peer architecture, e.g. Napster

- Owned by all- Emotionally satisfying to the embodied mind

A day in the Life of an Information Society Worker

Radio Alarm - wake-up the bodyNews Television - breakfast, waking up the mindMobile – travelling to work

Web and E-mail - Information gathering tasksWord processor, CAD etc. - Information presentation tasksTelephone - negotiation tasks

Drama television – relaxing the social brainComputer games – engaging the social brain

They cannot provide comprehensive support because none of these services have a complete picture of the individual and their physical and social context

A sequence of self-contained IST services that support fragments of the persistent individual self.

A Day in the Life of a Network Society Worker

A persistent integrated IST infrastructure that support ever-changing groups of people in private and community activities.

There is continuous two way multimedia interaction with the network, primarily via

- wearable affective computers- ubiquitous computers in the surroundings- head mounted screens, fixed screens- Intellirooms/facilitation rooms

The Paradigm Shift:

from Dematerialisation to Immaterialisation

from an ever-changing sequence of IST services that support the persistence of the individual self

Many services – One person

to persistent IST infrastructure that supports ever-changing sequence of social groups

One infrastructure – Many people

The Story so far:Increasing Inequality of the

Information Society

NB. Curves are similar for Europe

…and the Pursuit of Happiness

Once income rises above about $10,000 per person happiness does not increase with increasing income

Possible reasons:

1. The aspirations of parents become the expectations of their children.

2. Luxury is perceived relatively, not absolutely. Thus “progress” requires an ever increasing gulf between rich and poor.

3. This increasing inequity creates stress and divides communities, lowers social sanctions against crime and increases fear (Wilkinson)

4. Increasing GDP creates expectations of freedom from social obligations (the hedonic 1960’s!), leading to increased family fragmentation, increasing happiness in adults but undermines the sense of identity and contentment in their children.

Towards the Network Society

CommunitySocial Actualisation

IndividualSelf Actualisation

Closed societies Open societies

Traditional Society

Industrial Society

Information Society

Network Society

3rd World Trajectory

1st World Trajectory

Towards the Network Society The 4 Quadrants

Traditional Society

GDP focus, access to information, efficient manufacturing,

self actualisation, entrepreneur

Industrial Society Information Society

Network Society

Self-contained communities,weak sense of the self

Industrial communities,

mass consumption

Social focus, social actualisation,

Down-shifting in the West

“Alternative IST” in the East

Towards the Network Society Integrating Horizontal and Vertical

Network Society, Sustainable

Immaterialisation of satisfiers allows matrix of communities:• Distributed Specialist groups• Local Family groups

Traditional and Industrial Society Information Society

From Self-contained Services to Integrated Infrastructure

The network becomes a second persistent environment; as robust, predictable, trusted, useful and fulfilling as the real world!

Long distance digital environment complements the local physical environment.

“Computer Mediated Community”

complements the traditional neighbourhood

“Spatially Mediated Community”

The Social Consequences of Improving Communications

The paradigmatic extreme Traditional Society is a tribe or village of 150 people – the number of people that can be trusted at one time. Everyone shares the same social trust group. Everyone else is an outsider, the enemy, the alien.

In the paradigmatic extreme Network Society each individual has a unique 150 member trust group.If such a society could exist no-one in a 6 billion planet is more distant than a friend of a friend of a friend of a friend. The mesh of relationships is so intertwined that traditional war becomes impossible.

(There has been no war between two countries which both have more than 5 telephones per 100 people)

Communication Modes

Theatre

Table

Gossip The Introduction/Reception2 People

RoomFor

Rapport and Trust

The Communications ContinuumThe Cycle of Collaboration

The other half of the Cycle of Cognition, the Cycle of Information, is not discussed here

Person to Person Communication Modes

Mode Function Typical Size

Landscape - for gathering facts - 150 people

Room - for building trust/rapport - 2 people

Table - for cooperative work - 4 people

Theatre - for transmitting social -25 people and factual information

From Dunbar “Grooming Gossip and Language”

Communication Channels & Impedance Matching - for Humans!

The “Network Society” Opportunity

The specifically symbolic & human aspects of our sensory and motor interfaces have only been evolving for about 200,000 years. They are far from perfect.

1, From speech to hearing, confined to short range

2, From positioning and gesture to vision, too public

3, Physical contact and mutual presence in space, confined to even shorter range

(However our cognitive needs are locked to existing group sizes!)

Improving the Impedance MatchReplacing verbal storytelling with

1, writing at the creative moment2, Reading at the receptive moment

Replacing conversation with text chat1, can look back over the past conversation2, can pause to think carefully

Replacing the finger with the mouse1, Does not hide the screen2, Does not tire the arm

The sensory and motor interfaces with the human mind are very flexible. Given a two-way channel a form of communication emerges spontaneously

1. Mobile SMS dialogue, single letter codes2. “Victorian Internet”, Morse code3. Nicaraguan sign language, spatial grammar

Improving the Communication Channel

1, The telephone increases the distance and narrows the spread of the speech to hearing channel

2, The camera increases the distance and narrows the range of the gesture to vision channel

But future Mature IST will be needed to support 3, Physical contact and mutual presence in space,

i.e. Immaterialisation of consumer needs requires enhanced awareness of the affect of remote bodies.

Enhancing Local Reality

The Shared Immersive Virtual Environment may be a dead end because it cannot be integrated into the local environment.

Enhanced Reality, enhancing the current environment with concise, relevant, impedance matched remote, virtual and historical fragments may be far more effective

New types of social transformers/gearboxes will be needed

Not Voice but text and diagrams of all kinds, e-mail, shared whiteboards

Not Video Window but cartoon representation of behaviour, mood, and affect

(VisiNET project developing sign language avatars)

1, Better than Face to Face?

The Mature IST infrastructure will be able convey more about another person than meeting them face to face:

•Home page, cross references, police checks, •Affect and mood indicators,

more reliable than video windows

Remote multimedia dialogue shows each person at their best, in their own local context

Faster trust building (Room metaphor) less wasted time

2, Better Than Being There?

1. Already Formula 1 crowd only smell the race, They watch it on portable television.

2. One person can be telepresent in several places at the same time.

3. No travelling time.

But, how can Immaterialisation provide something better than the social aspects of the best travel experiences?

The Transport ProblemThe more satisfying the car, the more the kilometres

UK

How can virtual travel as satisfying as driving an IST-enhanced vehicle!

Appendix