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The Coming Integration of Humanity, Machines, and the Internet
Free Press
February 2010
On Sale: February 15, 2010
258 pages ISBN: 1439119147 EAN: 9781439119143 Hardcover
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Non-Fiction
What if digital communication felt as real as being touched? This question led Michael Chorost to explore profound new
ideas triggered by lab research around the world, and the
result is the book you now hold. Marvelous and momentous,
World Wide Mind takes mind-to-mind communication out
of the realm of science fiction and reveals how we are on
the verge of a radical new understanding of human interaction. Chorost himself has computers in his head that enable him
to hear: two cochlear implants. Drawing on that experience,
he proposes that our Paleolithic bodies and our Pentium
chips could be physically merged, and he explores the
technologies that could do it. He visits engineers building wearable computers that allow
people to be online every waking moment, and scientists
working on implanted chips that would let paralysis victims
communicate. Entirely new neural interfaces are being
developed that let computers read and alter neural activity
in unprecedented detail. But we all know how addictive the Internet is. Chorost
explains the addiction: he details the biochemistry of what
makes you hunger to touch your iPhone and check your email.
He proposes how we could design a mind-to-mind technology
that would let us reconnect with our bodies and enhance our
relationships. With such technologies, we could achieve a
collective consciousness - a World Wide Mind. And it would
be humankind's next evolutionary step. With daring and sensitivity, Chorost writes about how he
learned how to enhance his relationships by attending
workshops teaching the power of touch. He learned how to
bring technology and communication together to find true
love, and his story shows how we can master technology to
make ourselves more human rather than less. World Wide Mind offers a new understanding of how we communicate, what we
need to connect fully with one another, and how our
addiction to email and texting can be countered with
technologies that put us - literally - in each other's minds.
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