the loneliness of technology?

Dick Staub and a panel of bloggers recently discussed the following fascinating question on their live radio show: Can The Inklings face-to-face pub experience be replaced with online interaction?

Various intriguing aspects related to this question arose. One that caught my attention was this: Does online interaction increase our (western, 1st world) isolation from community, from *real* others? Or does it decrease that aloneness?

Apparently there is an already large and growing body of research (for instance, check out this search on google scholar) on what is termed "computer mediated community" or CMC. Wikipedia has an interesting overview as well

"Michael Keren, who has written Blogosphere: The New Political Arena, suggests individuals who bare their souls in blogs are isolated and lonely, living in a virtual reality instead of forming real relationships or helping to change the world." (from this provocative article).

I remember Mother Teresa talking about how while the third world has a poverty of basic stuff like food/water, the 1st world has a poverty of community. In blogging about how to MTWABP, are we somehow exacerbating our separation from each other, and our separation from those in least developed countries (for whom internet access is fairly far down the list of "things we don't have which we'd like to get")?

victim vs. perpetrator

I went to The Kindling's Muse live radio program yesterday with my friends Chris and Laurel. They had a panel discussion of various stories pulled from yesterday's New York Times chosen by Dick Staub, the host. It was fun. I really like Dick's insights and commentary, and I also really like Bill Hogg's insightful comments (there's a little redundancy for you, to make up for the recent oxymoron). One question Dick asked, which I'd like to ask here, was

1. Is peace in the Middle East possible?

Bill Hogg pointed out the magnificent irony of George Bush's repeated use, in his recent Iraq Policy (non) Update Speech, of the phrase "peace in the Middle East". I responded to this question with a question of my own during the "questions from the audience" segment. I shall ask that here as well:

2. Can question "Is peace in the Middle East possible" be rephrased as:

3. "Is it possible for me, for us, to choose to be the victim rather than the perpetrator?"?

Question three, I guess, feeds into the whole area of nonviolence. Is it possible for us to respond to the perpetrator with love? Is it possible to overcome violence with more violence? For me the answer to question three is generally "no". I am too often the perpetrator. I can see that as I mature, this is less often true--more often than before I can answer "yes" to question three. However, I still far too often must answer "no". And if the answer to question two is "yes", then I guess from my perspective the answer to question one is (by implication) also more often than not "no".

What are your answers?

Everything you ever wanted to know about the devil...

But were afraid to ask. Megan and I went to Hale's Ale's Brewery the other night for The Kindlings Muse. The beer was really good, and the food was tasty and the radio show was brilliant. Dick Staub, Bill Hogg and Bryan Burton (and will you please notice, Gretta and Megsie, that I have deferred to your (very strange) method of having no comma after the last item before "and" in a list of items?) talked for a while about the devil--who/what is he (Bryan won't say "who"--he wants to withhold personhood, which Bill thinks is a bity silly), his history, the reality/nature of evil, what about demons, how do christians in the modern and postmodern eras see all these things, etc. etc. It was facinating, and they took live questions, and Megan and I *both* got our questions chosen *quite* early (2 of the first 4). Megan says this is because we are both brilliant. I know she's brilliant.

You can listen to segment one of the show here. And segments 2 and 3 are coming tomorrow and Friday (in which Megan and I feature! Yippee!)

They do a show every Monday, so if you're in Seattle ...