Original Air Date 1/15/2022
Today we take a look at tradeoffs that are becoming ever more evident between the advancement of mass communication and social media technologies and the ways in which those advancements contribute to the degradation of social cohesion.
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Transcript
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SHOW NOTES
Ch. 1: Re-musing Ourselves - On the Media - Air Date 3-3-06
The late media critic Neil Postman argued in his seminal book "Amusing Ourselves to Death," that as TV prevailed over the printed word, it impaired our ability to make sense of a world of information. Jay Rosen writes the blog, PressThink.
Ch. 2: Neil Postman Technopoly - C-Span Book TV - Air Date 7-10-92
Neil Postman, author of Technopoly: The Surrender of Culture to Technology published by Alfred A. Knopf Publishers, spoke on the theme of his book which noted the dependence of Americans on technological advances for their own security.
Ch. 3: Prescient Predictions 1984; Brave New World; and Network Part 1 - Future Tense - Air Date 7-7-19
The dystopian best-seller 1984 was published exactly seventy years ago. Its influence has been profound. But does it really speak to today’s politico-cultural environment? Scott Stephens believes Aldous Huxley’s Brave New World is a closer match.
Ch. 4: The Trouble With Reality - On The Media - Air Date 5-17-17
This is a conversation between Brooke Gladstone, author of "The Trouble with Reality: A Rumination on Moral Panic in Our Time," and WNYC morning show host Brian Lehrer.
Ch. 5: Prescient Predictions 1984; Brave New World; and Network Part 2 - Future Tense - Air Date 7-7-19
Ch. 6: Neil Postman on Cyberspace - The MacNeil/Lehrer NewsHour - Air Date 7-25-95
Charlene Hunter-Gault interviews media theorist and cultural critic Neil Postman on PBS' The MacNeil/Lehrer NewsHour in 1995. Postman discusses new media and the "Faustian bargain" of technological change in the context of the "Information Superhighway."
Ch. 7: Alexa, What's Amazon Doing Inside My Home? - Land of the Giants - Air Date 7-30-19
What’s the downside to letting Alexa run your entire home? And why is Amazon making a microwave oven powered by Alexa?
FINAL COMMENTS
Ch. 8: Final comments on Faustian Bargains
MUSIC (Blue Dot Sessions)
Produced by Jay! Tomlinson
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Bonus Sample #286 Looking to the Past to See Ourselves
#1603 Clarence Thomas and the Highest Court in the Land with the Lowest Standards of Ethics
#1535 We Don't Do Accountability (Trump and GOP Crimes That Go Unpunished) (Repost)
Bonus Sample #285 The Christians and the Pagans
#1602 What Happens in Israel and Gaza Doesn't Stay in Israel and Gaza
#1601 Christian Nationalism is not Christianity, it is Fascism
Bonus Sample #284 First they came for the Italian babies
#1532 Accelerationism is the Brick on the Gas Pedal of the Runaway Car of Society (Repost)
#1533 How Theocracies Begin and End (Rise of the Far-Right + Demanding Women's Rights in Iran) (Repost)
#1600 Housing Cannot be a Fundamental Human Right and a Commodity at the Same Time
#1599 Taming the Beast: AI Regulation Before Human Relegation
Bonus Sample #283 Meaningless rituals are useful but self-driving cars are more questionable
#1598 Kiss of Death: Henry Kissinger's Bloody Legacy of Indifference
Bonus Samples #281 and 282 No one likes how this is going | Not Worth It
#1597 The rise of fascism around the world driven by economic insecurity
#1596 Building a positive future by first envisioning it and then designing it
#1519 International Fascist Movement on the Move (Throwback)
#1595 Pushing for Medicare For All in the Laboratories of Democracy
#1594 Testing New Climate Solutions: Geothermal and Geo-Engineering
#1518 Ronald Reagan, It Turns Out, Was Bad (Repost)
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