Humanizing and Dehumanizing

Two high tech developments symbolize the disquieting trends that Sherry Turkle identifies in Alone Together: Why We Expect More from Technology and Less from Each Other(xiv): “These days, parents wait in line to buy their childreninteractive Zhu Zhu robotic pet hamsters, advertised as ‘living to feel thelove.’ And one of the hottest online programs is Chatroulette, with 1.5 millionusers, which randomly connects you to other users all over the world. You seeeach other on live video. You can talk or write notes. People mostly hit ‘next’after about two seconds to bring another person up on their screens. It seemsright that Zhu Zhu pets and Chatroulette are the final ‘objects’ I report on inthis book: the Zhu Zhus are designed to be loved; in Chatroulette, people areobjectified and quickly discarded. I leave my story at a point of disturbing symmetry:we seem determined to give human qualities to objects and content totreat each other as things.”