Drawing, doodling, creating something with your mind and your hands without guidance, a blank sheet of paper. Drawing, back to basics, offers up the possibility of re-connecting with an inventiveness and creativity that is lost through immersion in the computer screen.
A computer culture encourages alienation whilst at the same time leads us to believe that we are more connected. The computer is attractive, it is compelling and often addictive, it gives us a false sense of control and connection leaving us alienated, unwell physically and largely disappointed.
It is the idea that through the computer we are really communicating with each other that leads to its disappointment. The connection and communication are 'false'. Working at a computer screen creates a different flow of chemicals in the body than would be experienced through more physical labours, all sorts of emotions being processed, going nowhere but through a keyboard. I read an article on the net recently about how trees actually communicate with each other. Through chemical releases they inform other about any danger to their well being. How do we emit chemicals in front of the screen, how do we process our anger, frustrations, fears, excitement within a limited range of movement in the chair, inside our head, inside our bodies? What happens to the chemicals from 'fight or flight' - where do they go, and how might these chemicals interact with the electronic fields emitted from the screen? What is the deadening of energy that occurs from spending too much time at the screen? Is it simply the poor ergonomics or is something 'other' occurring?
There is a difference in well being both physically and mentally between the process of drawing and making and working with the computer screen which seems on the whole to be a process of containment, but there are addictive qualities to using a computer that are possibly related to the idea that we are actually connecting to something - 'out there' at the expense of what goes on within.
"WE ARE NOT A MASS OF UNCRITICAL COMPUTER-CONTROLLED ZOMBIES YET, but the changes are becoming visible in Adult Society"
"WHY ARE WE IN SUCH A RUSH"
Baroness Greenfield in a The Times Saturday 21st October 2006 writes about her concerns that the onscreen computer culture could create a dumb generation. Greenfield has just established the All Party Group on Scientific Research in Leanring and Education informed by the Oxford Institute for the Future of the Mind looking at how much time children should spend in front of the computer screen or television. Her fears are that young human brains are so uniquely adaptable that they may easily get bent out of shape by our accelerated culture. She is concerned about the lack of blank space, the over stimulation culture and how this affects attention spans and our ability to reflect, to absorb information and use it to create abstract ideas independently.
future mind
Baroness Professor Susan Greenfield is a pioneering scientist, an entrepreneur, a communicator of science and policy adviser.
Susan has achieved a reputation as one of the most influential and inspirational women in the world. She has long been regarded as a world-leading expert on the human brain, widely known for her research into the areas of Parkinson’s and Alzheimer’s disease, and has received a life peerage and a CBE in the United Kingdom.
Susan is the first woman to lead the prestigious Royal Institution of Great Britain and holds the positions of Senior Research Fellow, Lincoln College, Oxford and Honorary Fellow at St Hilda's College, Oxford.
Baroness Greenfield is an outstanding communicator and a significant contributor to the public understanding of science – best selling author of ‘The Human Brain: A Guided Tour’, ‘Brain Story’ and ‘Tomorrow's People: How 21st Century Technology Is Changing the Way We Think and Feel’,
among others. Susan has presented numerous television and radio programs, including a major six part series on the brain and mind, 'Brain Story' broadcast on the BBC.
