{"resolved":true,"match_type":"uuid","source_type":"original_book","book_id":"8a3d8546-8fbb-485e-b423-37bc08c3284a","title":"Media and New Capitalism in the Digital Age The Spirit of Networks","author":null,"edition":null,"publisher":null,"year":null,"isbn":"9781349379743","requested_by":"printed_page","book":{"source_type":"original_book","book_id":"8a3d8546-8fbb-485e-b423-37bc08c3284a","id":"8a3d8546-8fbb-485e-b423-37bc08c3284a","uuid":"8a3d8546-8fbb-485e-b423-37bc08c3284a","title":"Media and New Capitalism in the Digital Age The Spirit of Networks","normalized_title":"mediaandnewcapitalisminthedigitalagethespiritofnetworks","author":null,"edition":null,"publisher":null,"year":null,"isbn":"9781349379743","isbns":["9781349379743","9780230106062"],"parsed":true,"ai_readable":true,"document_type":"book","page_count":258,"navigation_url":"https://workshop.closeclaw.top/ai/book/8a3d8546-8fbb-485e-b423-37bc08c3284a","title_url":"https://workshop.closeclaw.top/ai/title/Media%20and%20New%20Capitalism%20in%20the%20Digital%20Age%20The%20Spirit%20of%20Networks","fixed_page_url_template":"https://workshop.closeclaw.top/ai/book/8a3d8546-8fbb-485e-b423-37bc08c3284a/page/{printed_page}","path_api_url_template":"https://workshop.closeclaw.top/api/ai/book/8a3d8546-8fbb-485e-b423-37bc08c3284a/page/{printed_page}","read_url":"https://workshop.closeclaw.top/api/ai/read/8a3d8546-8fbb-485e-b423-37bc08c3284a","page_url":"https://workshop.closeclaw.top/api/ai/books/8a3d8546-8fbb-485e-b423-37bc08c3284a/page","search_url":"https://workshop.closeclaw.top/api/ai/books/8a3d8546-8fbb-485e-b423-37bc08c3284a/search"},"page":{"printed_page":160,"pdf_page":162,"physical_index":162,"physical_index_base":0,"printed_page_status":"recognized","page_sha256":"0dc649301efd33a6d0ded557ba43bd318b7e0663facf383a4ec28a51150db422"},"chapter":"Media and New Capitalism in the Digital Age","content":"This new method is compared with the old, analogue lie detector—the polygraph. The latter measured surface, bodily phenomena such as heart rate and rising blood pressure. These measures change with increased levels of stress and, in turn, indicate whether the person is lying. The polygraph assumed a link between stress and lying. The problem with this assumption, the author says, is that “Sociopaths who don’t feel guilt and people who learn to inhibit their reactions to stress can slip through a polygrapher’s net.” The new lie detection technology, the fMRI, “should be tougher to outwit because it detects something much harder to suppress: neurological evidence of the decision to lie” (Silberman 2006).\n\nThe new technology goes to the “source code” of lying, bypassing the conscious human and undermining his agency. The story is accompanied by brain images produced by the fMRI, which supposedly distinguish a truth teller from a liar (Silberman 2006). The article interprets them thus: “When someone is telling the truth, the areas of the brain shown here in green become active. If he is lying, the parts of the brain shown in red display even more activity” (Silberman 2006). By human-machine commensurability and by establishing a direct link between the human brain and a computer, we can eliminate the soft, superficial, weak human epiphenomena and go directly to the hard, essential elements of humanness. Humans might sell a lie as truth to another person; brains, however, cannot pull the same trick on computers. The partnership of brain and fMRI gets rid of another human agent, the polygraph reader. In the new method, reading is done by the computer in order “to eliminate one major source of polygraph error—the subjectivity of the human examiner” (Silberman 2006). This method effectively establishes computer-to-brain communication, eliminating the subjectivity and agency of humans.\n\nSince the essence of humans lies in their brains (i.e., in them being ultimately informational and computational devices), and since, as such, they can be incorporated into computers, information technology is understood in the digital discourse to partake in the construction of human selves. This point can again be exemplified with the story of the aforementioned Matt Nagle. As a cyborg, an entity conflating a human with information technology, Nagle, the article insists, is more than simply “part biological, and part silicon, platinum, and titanium” (Martin 2005). Just as information technology is incorporated within him, part of him is externalized to a computer.\n\nThe identity of the cyborg is presented in the digital discourse as a matter of construction not unlike any other identity; it is not a natural and direct derivative of the hybridization with technology, just as sexual or gender identities are not direct and unproblematic derivatives of one’s genitalia. To become a cyborg, Nagle had to learn how to use his new computer “organs” and to adopt new ways of thinking, or a new mindset, inextricably intertwined with information technology. Hence, after having the operation that meshed together flesh and metal in his body, he went through a series of “encounters” with the computer. At first, the researcher “asked Nagle to think left, right, then relax” (Martin 2005). The monitors reveled that the computer clearly picked up the neural activity. That was Nagle learning to use BrainGate.\n\n160\n\nMedia and New Capitalism in the Digital Age","previous_page":159,"next_page":161}