Kids with cell-phones

[PrinceMyshkin]

Kids with cell-phones
clapped to their ears,
speaking with who knows
whom or what.

The next innovation will be
devices that touch us
when we need
to be touched.

[firefangled]

Oh yeah! This struck a nerve with me, Prince. You are so correct in your perception of this phenomenon. Don't you wonder how, with so many devices now available for communicating, genuine personal connection seems to be diminishing?

My daughter sends me text messages for which I am poorly skilled to respond with the same vehicle. "Why don't you just call me," I say. "It's not the same," she says. I wonder, what does that mean, not the same, not the same as what. I've seen her sitting in the same room with another girl texting a "conversation."

[PrinceMyshkin]

Oh yeah! This struck a nerve with me, Prince. You are so correct in your perception of this phenomenon. Don't you wonder how, with so many devices now available for communicating, genuine personal connection seems to be diminishing?

My daughter sends me text messages for which I am poorly skilled to respond with the same vehicle. "Why don't you just call me," I say. "It's not the same," she says. I wonder, what does that mean, not the same, not the same as what. I've seen her sitting in the same room with another girl texting a "conversation."

Thanks. I gave about a nano-second of concern about coming across as an old fogey but waved that aside. The scene was in the underground parking area of a supermarket. The kid - somewhere between 8 & 11 - was talking on the phone while a woman I took to be his mother stood maybe three feet away.

Will your daughter and her generation lose some of their sensitivity to the many nuances that the human voice can convey?

[Bar22do]

The next innovation will be
devices that touch us
when we need
to be touched.

well, Prince, they do exist already, get updated!

As for text messages "mania", it is debatable, I should say, and agree to some extend with FF's daughter (one thing it has is that it certainly renews languages, if for the better or for the worse... time will say). However, as with all, measure is what makes a thing healthy or sick... but then, who is entitled to decide what is the right measure...

[qimissung]

The adults at my school seem as addicted as the kids. I like my phone to, and get somewhat annoyed when my students tease me when I text. It's not difficult. My son once cost me several hundred dollars with his texting. His "conversations" went something like this: "What r u doing?" "Nothing, just chillin." Gahhh!

And yet, he can write a fairly decent letter.

[Jerrybaldy]

Thought provoking as ever #1. I am something of a texter as I hate to talk on the telephone, for that god awful need to fill a silence. A text conversation gives time to consider a response and cuts all the superfluous crap. Having finally just got around to reading The Catcher in the Rye, I could say it can cut down on all the phoney (no pun intended) :) Of course its just as likely to create all the phoney. Depresses the hell out of you doesn't it :D
cheers
J.B

[Jack of Hearts]

You're pretty right Prince. There's something to be said for human touch, and we're losing something, and it sucks. And it's hurting us in ways that aren't immediately obvious.





J

[_Shannon_]

So pleased to wander back here and see something of yours here!

[Lumiere]

If I'm missing something (I might be), please explain it.

But how is writing comments on this site different, fundamentally, from texting? Instead of seeking virtual contact with strangers, should we seek more contact with the people in our physical spheres? Why? Why shouldn't we take meaningful contact wherever it can be found, in whatever medium? And by "meaningful", I don't mean "about poetry or literature".

I see the perceived danger is that people are texting INSTEAD of talking face-to-face or voice-to-voice. I guess this could be a problem, sure. But we're not losing our faces or our voices, and, unless hermits, we're not losing contact with other bodies. Humans continue to want and need this contact. I don't think it's easily unwired.

Plato thought we'd become dependent on writing things down, and the human memory would wreck, but things aren't necessarily lost.....

[PrinceMyshkin]

If I'm missing something (I might be), please explain it.

But how is writing comments on this site different, fundamentally, from texting? Instead of seeking virtual contact with strangers, should we seek more contact with the people in our physical spheres? Why? Why shouldn't we take meaningful contact wherever it can be found, in whatever medium? And by "meaningful", I don't mean "about poetry or literature".

I see the perceived danger is that people are texting INSTEAD of talking face-to-face or voice-to-voice. I guess this could be a problem, sure. But we're not losing our faces or our voices, and, unless hermits, we're not losing contact with other bodies. Humans continue to want and need this contact. I don't think it's easily unwired.

Plato thought we'd become dependent on writing things down, and the human memory would wreck, but things aren't necessarily lost.....

I thank you heartily for reminding me that I'm in danger of becoming the prototypical aging grump, who sees every social innovation as retrograde whereas in fact he himself is frightened of falling out of touch. I personally hunger for face-to-face contact and regard pretty much anything else as thin gruel.