Technology As Symptom and Dream

Rating:
Summary: A daring re-visioning of technology....
Review: ...in its numinous potential, both dark and bright. Dr. Romanyshyn invites the reader to see the sense in the symptom of what we do with our linear-perspectival progress through time...and what it does to us. Highly recommended. -- Craig Chalquist, M.S., designer of the Thine Own Self self-exploration site.

Rating:
Summary: A daring re-visioning of technology....
Review: ...in its numinous potential, both dark and bright. Dr. Romanyshyn invites the reader to see the sense in the symptom of what we do with our linear-perspectival progress through time...and what it does to us. Highly recommended. -- Craig Chalquist, M.S., designer of the Thine Own Self self-exploration site.

Rating:
Summary: Romanyshyn Calls us to Re-member Many Things...
Review: In Technology as Symptom and Dream, Romanyshyn discovers that with the 'invention' of linear perspective vision came many changes in who we imagine ourselves to be. The mathematization of the world provided a new kind of freedom for (literally) seeing the world differently. The subject of the artist in paintings and the artist became broken up, or fragmented, through the process of using a veil based on a geometric understanding of space. Within that space one can see how the 'depth' of things changed, from a depth of levels to a depth of linear measurement. It is this frame that makes possible the anatomical view of the body, and it is the anatomical view that gives rise to the corpse, or what Romanyshyn calls the 'anatomical body' of science. We thus have a psychological and cultural division between the body as corpse and what Romanyshyn calls the 'pantomimic' body, or what phenomenology distinguishes as the 'lived body' of experience. Throughout the last 500 years we have seen these two possibilities manifest themselves in our culture. Romanyshyn has shown us that when our culture place too much of an emphasis on just one aspect of the body, certain aspects of the other (the pantomimic) show through in a not so glorious fashion. So we can understand Romanyshyn's discussion of the shadow side of the anatomical body (the witch, the madman, the monster, the anorexic) as a way of telling us what's wrong and as a remembrance for how to make things right. The pantomimic body, as a shadow of the anatomical body, reminds us that there are different ways of seeing the world, and that certain ways we think are the best (e.g. our technological worldview) come to us with a very expensive price tag.

Rating:
Summary: Romanyshyn Calls us to Re-member Many Things...
Review: In Technology as Symptom and Dream, Romanyshyn discovers that with the 'invention' of linear perspective vision came many changes in who we imagine ourselves to be. The mathematization of the world provided a new kind of freedom for (literally) seeing the world differently. The subject of the artist in paintings and the artist became broken up, or fragmented, through the process of using a veil based on a geometric understanding of space. Within that space one can see how the 'depth' of things changed, from a depth of levels to a depth of linear measurement. It is this frame that makes possible the anatomical view of the body, and it is the anatomical view that gives rise to the corpse, or what Romanyshyn calls the 'anatomical body' of science. We thus have a psychological and cultural division between the body as corpse and what Romanyshyn calls the 'pantomimic' body, or what phenomenology distinguishes as the 'lived body' of experience. Throughout the last 500 years we have seen these two possibilities manifest themselves in our culture. Romanyshyn has shown us that when our culture place too much of an emphasis on just one aspect of the body, certain aspects of the other (the pantomimic) show through in a not so glorious fashion. So we can understand Romanyshyn's discussion of the shadow side of the anatomical body (the witch, the madman, the monster, the anorexic) as a way of telling us what's wrong and as a remembrance for how to make things right. The pantomimic body, as a shadow of the anatomical body, reminds us that there are different ways of seeing the world, and that certain ways we think are the best (e.g. our technological worldview) come to us with a very expensive price tag.

Rating:
Summary: Brilliant!
Review: One of the most interesting and original books I have read in years. Romanyshyn writes clearly and convincingly.