The tendency to anthropomorphize certain objects, natural or cultural, more
than others is indeed interesting. Somewhere recently I read about the
tendency being related to the familiarity of the material object to the
subject. I tend to keep my 'hot file' of books at home, so I cannot
locate the reference immediately - perhaps it was Gentners mental models
book. It is plausible that as a subject develops a more comprehensive
understanding of the behavior of the 'thing' it develops a personality in
the mind of the subject - it has predictable traits.
As stone mason (drawing from my early experience) my father would talk to
his morter and to the stone wall he was building. I have taken up the
practice of talking to morter myself as there is a delicate balance in
making it 'just right' so it will stick to the stones, but be pliable to
work into the cracks (My house has a stone foundation, which is in
constant need of patching). But even without Freud I can admit that there
may be other reasons that I am talking to the work, beside my knowing the
stone work and predicting whether it will do what I want, encouraging it
where I am uncertain that it will behave as intended.
In a seemingly unpublished chapter, John Clement and I wrote about the
behavior of physics students (and a professor) who applied body movements
in problem solving behavior. This practice involved the tendency of the
person to 'become' the material object, or to envision physically
interacting with it, or to re-present its motion through gestures. One
could certainly bring the ideas of mutual constitution that Naoki and Mike
have expressed to bear.
Gotta go,
Bill Barowy, Associate Professor
Technology in Education
Lesley College, 29 Everett Street, Cambridge, MA 02138-2790
Phone: 617-349-8168 / Fax: 617-349-8169
_______________________
"One of life's quiet excitements is to stand somewhat apart from yourself
and watch yourself softly become the author of something beautiful."
[Norman Maclean in "A river runs through it."]