Re: [xmca] adult affordances

[Martin Packer <packer@duq.edu>]

Hi Larry,

But the former seems to me more an example of technology becoming transparent. The cell phones are not transparent - they are obtruding, like the little bottle labelled 'drink me' in Alice in Wonderland, which Alice against all her better judgment couldn't resist sampling. 

Martin
 
On Mar 14, 2012, at 9:09 PM, Larry Purss wrote:

> Martin
> 
> Reading your post, I was thinking about Harre's explaining  Wittgenstein's
> notion of rule following and language games.
> Harre gives the example, When I say *6 times 6* persons participating in
> our *way of life* will respond [immediately? automatically? intentionally?
> with self-control?]  with the answer *36*
> If cell phones as a form of technology are now part of a *way of life* for
> many students [part of our grammar] who is in control?
> 
> Larry
> On Wed, Mar 14, 2012 at 6:31 PM, Martin Packer <packer@duq.edu> wrote:
> 
>> An odd conjunction of issues of content and management  in my
>> undergraduate developmental psychology course has me puzzled, and so I'm
>> appealing for xmca help!  A few weeks ago I was expounding on the notion
>> that the toddler lives in a world not of permanent objects but of
>> affordances - irresistible offers to action, made by the things and people
>> and places that surround him or her. Gibson, filtered through Vygotsky.
>> 
>> At the same time, I was waging an unceasing war against the use of cell
>> phones in the classroom. (Today I actually got to the point of confiscating
>> them when I saw them, and telling the students they could buy them back
>> from me later in the city center. With humor, I hope!)
>> 
>> Finally, it struck me. These young adults, too, are victims of
>> irresistible offers to action, made by their little iPhones or Nokias or
>> whatever.
>> 
>> So what is it about a cell phone that completely overwhelms any and every
>> facet of self control? Why is it that I can forbid cell use at the start of
>> each class, yet in seconds they start to appear? What is it that transforms
>> a young adult into no more than a toddler?
>> 
>> Martin
>> 
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