There's no reason not to send this to the whole list, as I know there are others besides myself on this list interested in the ideas of McLuhan. Here is a posting by Dr. Paul Levinson from the Media Ecology list of last September that addresses your question..........Alex alex.kuskis@utoronto.ca Message text written by INTERNET:mediaecology@ube.ubalt.edu
I am aware that the idea of technologies as extensions of man can be traced back further than McLuhan but am nevertheless interested in this particular connection if there is any.
Thanks, Rune< Thinkers who explicitly discussed technologies as extensions, prior to McLuhan, include Samuel Butler, 1865; Emerson, 1870; Ernst Kapp, 1877; Henri Bergson, 1911; Hendrik Van Loon, 1928; Stuart Chase, 1929; Freud, 1930 -- see my Mind at Large, 1988, p. 149, for details. The whole book is a treatise on technology as an extension of the intellect (with some special attention to computers). In my 1977-79 Media Ecology classes at NYU, I and just about everyone else was talking about computers as extensions of the mind (see my PhD diss, Human Replay, 1979, for more). Engelbart was not specifically discussed. His importance indeed resides in his explication -- and implementation -- of what John Searles later called the "weak" AI model (AI as amplification of mind rather than autonomous replacement). Paul www.sff.net/people/paullevinson ----- Original Message ----- From: "Wendy Robinson" <wgrobin@uc.edu> To: <Air-l@aoir.org> Sent: Saturday, May 31, 2003 9:11 PM Subject: [Air-l] Seen Any Good McLuhan Cites Lately?
I'm trying to track down references (particularly fresh ones) to McLuhan's idea that media act as sensory extensions, as referenced in the subtitle to _Understanding Media_. At this time, I'm not especially interested in the global village or in his idea that the medium is the message or in the other stuff easier to find on McLuhan.
If you have suggestions and could please send them to me off-list, I would greatly appreciate it. If the AoIR list is interested in the cumulative results, I will be glad to share the list that results at a later time.
Thanks, Wendy Robinson wgrobin@uc.edu Asst Prof, Comm Dept Univ of Cincinnati