Alone Together by Sherry Turkle
“Alone Together” by Sherry Turkle is the book that I have chosen to read for my project. Before even opening the novel, I was intrigued by Turkle’s creativity within her choice of words. At first, I was extremely confused by the title, which seems to be redundant considering the fact that it’s physically impossible to be ‘alone’ yet ‘together’ seeing as though being “together” infers that you are with another person/thing. I believe she did this on purpose in order to make us want to read more and find out how being “alone together” is possible; her intentions proved to be valid and I was immediately captivated at first sight.
Turkle raises many strong arguments within the first twenty pages of her book, introducing her numerous critical views towards technology. As we change technology, technology changes us, which according to Turkle is something that should be feared rather than praised. Turkle focuses on the various detrimental effects that the Internet and computer systems have had on us over the years and investigates how our future as human beings will be impacted.
By mentioning Zhu Zhu pets in her first chapter, Turkle makes us aware of the fact that real pets are starting to become replaced by artificial ones that are marketed as being “better than any real pet could be.” By having “sociable robots” (as Turkle refers to them as), our need for companionship is fulfilled, ultimately making human-human friendship unnecessary. This is also displayed through the action of texting, which has become the most popular mode of communication in our current day society. Our mobile devices have made it so that we can get in touch with other people without having to meet up with them face-to-face. I completely agree with Turkle when she says, “technology offers us substitutes for connecting with each other face-to-face“. We are offered robots and a whole world of machine-mediated relationships on networked devices. As we instant-message, e-mail text, and Twitter, technology redraws the boundaries between intimacy and solitude” (page 11).
In her second chapter entitled “alive enough”, Turkle focuses on what being ‘alive’ truly means. She questions whether or not the multiple different types of fake pets that kids have, such as Tamagotchis and Furbies, are essentially “alive” considering the emotional responses that they elicit. We as the readers are told of various cases in history of kids who have become emotionally attached to their online pets, treating them the same way that they would treat a real pet. Many of these children regard their online pets as ‘living creatures’ due to the involvement that they have in their lives.
Turtle says, “and children fervently believe that the child who loves his or her Furby best will be most loved in return.” Therefore, children not only love these pets as though they were ‘real’, but they also expect to receive an equal amount of love in return. It is certainly nice for kids to have such a loving friendship, but is it bad that they expect such things from a machine?
Turkle introduces many disturbing truths hidden behind technology, ultimately making me fear the future even more than I did previously. Although I personally agree with her arguments, many people would deem them as invalid including many of my friends. Such people are quick to shut down the idea that technology does more harm for our society than good, holding the point of view that these technological advancements have bettered our understanding of the world around us.
I have multiple questions that I hope Turkle will answer at some point in her piece:
- What exactly do you think the world will be like in 100 years?
- Do you believe that we should completely abolish social media entirely even though we have already become so dependent on it?
- If all forms of technology were taken away from everybody for an entire month, how do you think people would react?
- Do you believe that having access to technology makes us safer?
- Do the adverse effects of ‘fake pets’ on children’s mental health outweigh the beneficial effects? If so, should things such as Furbys and Tamagotchis be banned from society?
