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The Addictive Nature of Cognitive Prostheses
5 The Addictive Nature of Cognitive Prostheses
Information technology is “sold” by its promoters as a way of making life simpler, accelerating our means of communication and increasing our productivity. Miniaturization of digital technologies and the professional and recreational extension that they present make it difficult to dislodge telephones from our pockets and handbags. Cognitive prostheses are introduced in the social environment with neither a real crash barrier nor a wide-reaching evaluation in advance. Political players appear to have endorsed the social representation proposed by marketing, which shows that we are free to choose whether to use the tools on offer or not and that these are means of emancipation and access to culture. Monopolization of attention by interactive personal digital devices, however, raises numerous questions with regard to our contemporary social practices, if we consider simply the total time spent in a sitting position during the day with our eyes glued to various devices. Habituation and the irrepressible need to consult digital media are the vectors of a type of power that digital industrialists and media have over users. The fascination created by cognitive prostheses is a form of Internet addiction. Internet addiction describes addictively resorting to digital tools. Not all users are systematically “addicted” to their digital gadgets; nevertheless, making these tools available to the wider public is not to be taken lightly. The need to use a wearable digital prosthesis can cause compulsive behavior, or anxieties, where disconnection is a form of withdrawal, comparable, to a certain extent, to how a drug addict feels.
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It is useful to think about the notions of dependency, addiction, excessive use, suffering and risk of submission to a form of technoscientific “psycho power” that certain users can feel, those who are psychologically the least “prepared” to resist the sirens of digital consumption.
5.1. Cognitive prostheses and Internet addiction The wearable electronic device is, literally, an orthosis or a true prosthesis of the body. It inundates us with pleasant stimulation. It is sometimes difficult for certain people to live without the scintillating presence of the smartphone. When this breaks down, it is equivalent to going through toothache, an ailment that must be relieved as quickly as possible. The removable character of our cognitive prostheses ends up facilitating above all changes in models as fashions change and as industrially orchestrated obsolescence progresses, more than it gives us the opportunity to remove ourselves from the clutches of a portable digital system. It can be said that claiming that objects of this kind have a prosthetic dimension can indeed be called into question. The theory of “embedded cognition” designates, as we have already said, the situation of interdependence between the cognitive activity of an individual and the tools that they resort to, without, however, crossing over the border between intracranial cognitive activity and non-localized activity in the brain, which some do consider to be a cognitive activity [WHE 13, CLA 98]. We will use this definition to think about cognitive prostheses during this study. 5.1.1. “Excessive dependency
use”,
“disconnect
anxiety”
and
feeling
of
With the notion of “dependency” on a removable digital prosthesis, we designate a process of habituation not to a chemical substance, but to behavioral patterns that imperatively require time to be spent with a technological tool of a cognitive nature. Internet addiction is extremely polymorphic, and its repercussions are totally variable. “Disconnect anxiety” is a worrying situation that reveals the existence of a type of Internet addiction. Compulsive consultation of the Web is another type of this situation. These behaviors all bear witness to the fact that the phenomenon of
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dependence on information technology is not at all limited to dependence connections on established digital tools1. However, we seem to be observing more frequently various behaviors exhibiting cognitive dependency, probably induced by the all too frequent use of cognitive prostheses. A teaching assistant, working in a public high school in Morbihan, in western France, told me two stories about the status of the mobile phone for certain high school pupils and their families. In high schools, internal regulations prohibit the use of smartphones during classes and detentions. However, these regulations are not readily adhered to. A colleague, the supervisor, confiscated the smartphone of a pupil who was using it during detention. After working hours, the supervisor went home, having forgotten the smartphone in his bag. Very soon, the supervisor received numerous messages from the management of the establishment and from his colleagues. He realized that he had forgotten to give the phone back to the pupil at the end of the detention time and that he must urgently return to the high school to give the device back to the pupil. It seemed out of the question to give the device back the next morning. On his arrival back at the high school, he found himself confronted by the parents and the management team. Everyone seemed to be in a high state of panic. The parents threatened to press charges for “phone theft”. Although it was obvious to everyone that the supervisor did not intend to steal an object that he had openly confiscated, the parents absolutely wanted to put pressure on the educational teams. The parents argued that their son’s telephone was essential to their family life to “be able to monitor the welfare of their child at all times”. In numerous classrooms, pupils communicate frequently by SMS throughout the lessons. Widespread use of phones in class at school is so common that most teachers “have abdicated” (the term used by the special needs assistant who was interviewed) from their mission to prevent pupils using their smartphones in class. The rule states that mobile phones must be switched off and placed inside the pupil’s bag, but it is not followed. Furthermore, most owners of this type of device consult them during lessons. Professors could be tempted to resort to mobile phone jammers, but these objects are legally reserved for prisons and concert halls. Facebook on smartphones today appears to constitute the greater part of Web use by high school pupils (according to the special needs assistant that I interviewed). Visits to Facebook are obligatory throughout the day to establish a “clique” feeling. This is also a means of reciprocally controlling individuals who create this feeling of a 1 Operation of an implanted pacemaker is very often vital to life and, however, as we have seen, the dependence connection that unites the patient and the device does not appear to truly generate anxiety (except in the case of prophylactic reasons for carrying a defibrillator that we have previously mentioned).
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clique. If Facebook one day falls by the wayside, it is highly probable that the social function that it currently allows will continue with an application run by a competitor. The observed high school pupils seem to be dependent on their smartphone, because, since 2012, it has become an essential tool for socialization. Many individuals therefore find it difficult to be without their mobile phones today: “Without my mobile phone I am lost”. Very often, we need access to the Web to consult certain pieces of data: “you will find the information on the Internet”. In comparison with the situation that prevailed at the end of the 20th Century, we no longer memorize telephone numbers of our close friends and family: “I don’t remember your number by heart”. These mnestic delegations bear witness to the feeling of missing something that immediately results from a situation in which the tool is absent or not working. This confirms the idea that the tool is considered to be a prosthesis by an increasing proportion of users. All of us depend on our phones to make calls because our body is incapable of doing this itself, without a technological device. However, telephone boxes fulfill this function without being prostheses. Mobile phones and smartphones are more than phones; they are felt in many cases to be a part, certainly immobile, but all the same a part of the human body. Removable digital prostheses, with the functions they perform and the data they contain, are depositories of part of our personalities. An attachment of this kind gives rise to an association with a “horcrux” figure imagined by J.K. Rowling2 as a central narrative theme of the famous Harry Potter saga. The loss of his computer, for Andy Clark, as he describes it in Natural-Born Cyborgs [CLA 03, p. 4], is experienced as a near-amputation. However, dependency between the user and this type of tool is not necessarily synonymous with addiction or excessive use. Resorting to one prosthesis in particular can arise from a considered need and therefore not compulsive. It is logical to equip ourselves with a phone in many situations in our daily and 2 “Horcruxes” are, in the imaginary world described in Harry Potter, objects in which the “soul” of Voldemort, the adversary of the hero, is deposited. These objects are extremely important for Voldemort, because they are both his strength and weakness. The evil wizard has placed pieces of his soul in these removable objects, which makes him immortal. At the same time, destruction of these objects constitutes a means of destroying it. The attachment between Voldemort and these objects is therefore more than an obsession; these mobile parts are literally parts of the body of his personality. In any case, he considers them as such (see [ROW 14, chapter 23]).
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professional lives, because it is a technological object that is essential for making calls. Yet, a phone call is a frequent social interaction in our societies, very often necessary in professional and personal situations. Addiction to digital tools represents a more intense stage of Internet addiction. The notion of compulsive use then comes into play. The users are being excessive, they know it and suffer from it, but they cannot restrict their use to certain digital prostheses. Certain individuals, who have no electronic impact, can no longer be without their “digital toys”, such as phones, computers and game consoles, depending on the scenario. Although they do not consider themselves explicitly to be cyborgs, it is obvious that they can no longer really detach themselves from tools that are, all the same, physically “removable”. The social impact caused by dissemination of removable prosthetic digital objects is an eminently political question. However, it is essential to note that thinking about the well-founded nature of this availability has been completely hidden for the last decade. When a user gives themself over to the digital game, they can “surf the Web” and play a game such as an MMORPG for hours, feeling “addicted” to Facebook. Time seems to run away with them. The multimedia stimulations procured by all these devices hypnotize us, sometimes stupefying us, encouraging us to go to bed late. Online cognitive prostheses impose their ringtones, alerts, flow and electronic temporality on us. The phone rings, receives messages, emails come in and adverts go past. Circadian rhythms are forgotten. The user can find themselves “fixated” on the Web. However, the aspect that escapes them the most is perhaps the fact that the intense frequency of digital tools is more or less subtly in the process of modifying their cognition, imagination and therefore socialization methods: “What if I do all my reading on the web not so much because the way I read has changed, i.e. I’m just seeking convenience, but because the way I THINK has changed?”3 “Internet addiction” is excessive use of digital devices. This is represented in a compulsive, impulsive behavior that is almost visible to close friends and family, which causes suffering for the person who suffers from it.
3 Words of Scott Karp, cited by Nicholas Carr [CAR 08].
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“Addiction [is] dependence on a thing or an occupation. In ancient Roman Law, a debtor unable to pay his debts could find himself “auctioned off” to his creditor, to whom he became a slave. By analogy, today we talk about addiction when we want to characterize dependence of a person or his great weakness for a substance (drug or alcohol, for example) or for an activity, such as gambling, work or… the use of the Internet network (Kandell et al., The APA Monitor, June 1996). Amongst other addictions, we see bulimia, compulsive buying and certain dangerous behaviors (risk-taking). Addiction gives pleasure and calms an internal unease, but it often has unhappy consequences” [SIL 06]. Addiction is closely linked to the fear of missing something. A device has the function of responding immediately to a demand or a need, just as a psychotropic responds very quickly to oneʼs mood. With addiction, it is a case of not being able to differentiate between satisfaction and need. Activity becomes difficult to control, and impulsive. With regard to the uses of numerical prostheses, the aspect that can be qualified as “impulsive” is the impossibility, for certain people, to stop consulting them, and to systematically seek to communicate through them. Consulting the tool becomes in some way “automatic”, a new reflex. The user takes on the form of an organic “automaton”, hypnotized by their logico-mathematical automatons. This is linked in particular to “the fear of missing out”. Dependence on the network or on digital gadgets is not monolithic, but, on the contrary, is very polymorphic. Certain individuals are “dependent” on social networks, others on online games (MMORPG), others on online gambling and still others on pornography, on downloading programs and data, and on news. Thierry Crouzet [CRO 12, p. 254], who has written a book about withdrawal from excessive use of the Web, distinguishes different profiles of network users: – users (using online shopping, legal or illegal downloads, using administration or financial sites, looking at the news); – explorers (finding information in the databases); – communicators (using social networks, blogs, messaging services). He seems to have omitted one category that must not be ignored:
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– gamers (although Internet-addicted gamers do not necessarily play online games, a considerable number of hardcore gamers stop at offline games). “Internet addiction”, “net addiction”, was officially used for the first time by the psychologist Kimberley Young during the American Psychological Association conference in Toronto in 1996. The question of determining whether electronic equipment can give rise to a form of drug addiction without chemical substances remains a subject of strong debate. Currently, there is a controversy about the term “addiction” applied to something other than a chemical substance. In the strict sense of the term, addiction is not supposed to be applicable to adolescence. In the eyes of those who criticize an extension of the definition of addiction to adolescence, this period of life is a phase of frequent excesses, because the individual is in the process of finding themselves. The question of not qualifying adolescent practices such as “addiction” and “dependence” would be a kind of “good intention”, aiming to protect adolescents from abusive use of medicines that would benefit the industrial sector. These fears are found if we refer to the work of Édouard Zarifian [ZAR 96]. It must be recognized that certain practices among the very young are, however, far too intense, too impulsive and are accompanied by suffering and social exclusion. Certain young individuals, who are intensively faced with digital tools early on, sometimes appear to be qualified as “Internet addicted” despite not yet being 10 years old or even less. In this case, the terms “excessive use” and “excessive practice” [LAL 09] can be used to describe this “dependence, addiction without substances” [VAL 02] and this irrepressible need to be connected, to use a tablet, to play a game, to be connected to social networks, to consult pornographic sites and so on. Psychologists such as Serge Tisseron and Vanessa Lalo rebuff the idea of dependence on digital tools, preferring instead the expression “excessive use”. Nor is excessive use yet entirely clarified by the scientific world. When can we qualify an “excessive” use? There is no consensus on this subject. From one discipline to another, from one scientist to another, the cursor of the definition of “excess” varies considerably.
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The criteria selected is often suffering. If the individual suffers from their use, this is because it is excessive [ROS 09]. Addiction has two definitions in the dictionary4: it can be a case of an “addictive behavior” or of a “drug addiction”. We can be “addicted” to a chemical substance in the same way as a behavior (watching the television is a very widespread addictive behavior). In medicine, dependency is related to behavioral problems related to the consumption of a chemical substance; however, gambling has been accepted as an activity that can cause dependency. Seeking immediate gratification is the conscious or unconscious corollary of these practices. As was pointed out to me by the psychologist Elizabeth Rossé, who works at the Marmottan Hospital, an establishment at the cutting edge of drug addiction and dependency treatments, “addiction occurs with meetings between a person, a situation and a product”. In her view, this product can be chemical just as easily as digital. The deciding factor is the fact that the individual feels they are missing out; in other words, they feel a social or psychological unease which they will be compensating for by using a ritual practice that can only be stopped with increasing difficulty as this ritual becomes more impulsive. A veteran gamer, a hardcore gamer, a social networks “addict”, an online pornography “addict”, a dating website “addict” and a television “addict” are all going to feel a very significant psychological loss if we deprive them suddenly of their compulsive ritual. Internet addiction is perhaps an abusive term, because dependency is not the same when comparing someone “addicted” to Facebook with an alcoholic. Addiction to alcohol is being addicted to the consumption of a substance, whereas dependency on the use of social networks is a compulsive behavior not involving ingestion of any substance at all. The feeling of missing out felt by an Internet addict “in withdrawal” is of a different nature to the physiological withdrawal felt by a drug addict who depends on certain chemical products (alcohol, heroin, amphetamines, cocaine, tranquilizers, tobacco, etc.). Whether we characterize Internet addiction as dependence without substances or as an excessive use is an important terminological subject. However, it must be recognized that individuals who are dissocialized and who become incapable of reining in their impulsive digital consumption can rightfully be described as people who are going through a “problem with misuse of digital tools”.
4 Petit Larousse illustrated, 2013, “addiction” entry.
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An aspect that is in all likelihood a deciding factor in the severity of pathology is the age at which addictive behavior starts. The earlier it starts, the more difficult it will be to overcome. By analogy, it seems that consumption of caffeinated soda and high sugar content at an early age will cause a form of dependence. According to a study carried out in December 2010, published in The Journal of Pediatrics [WAR 11], the daily dose of caffeine that should not be exceeded for a child aged 5–7 is a 33 cl can of caffeinated soda5, beyond which attention difficulties (irritation, lack of attention, anxiety) are temporarily triggered. It is in the first years of life that behavioral routines that structure our personalities are set up. It is no accident that, throughout the last century, advertising for tobacco products largely targeted an adolescent public and sought to present industrial cigarettes as everyday consumption products. Indeed, for many parents, giving Coca-Cola to a baby would appear as shocking as making a child smoke. On the contrary, several times I observed that certain parents propose the use of tablets to very young children or even to babies. It is clear that the potential danger of cognitive prostheses is not at all obvious for many parents. Although the nutritional question is relatively well understood by parents, the question of the use of digital tools has not yet been sufficiently formulated into a problem and standardized social habits do not yet exist on this subject. Resorting to endoprostheses and prosthetic limbs goes hand in hand with legal and social regulation carried out by the medical body and transmitted to patients. The activities of industrialists and, in particular, the pharmaceutical advertising sector are strictly regulated in France. Regulation considerations do not yet accompany the use of cognitive prostheses. Indeed, pervasive information technology has appeared very recently, and we are facing the first generation of these digital natives who have used digital tools even before “the age of reason”. Although no substances are involved, it is significant that certain games are already very addictive for adults, adolescents and pre-adolescents. Because of this fact, parents can be tempted to place this type of “toy” in the hands of even younger children, such as those between 2 and 3 years of age, who are right in the middle of their sensory-motor development.
5 The only useful drink for a child of age below 4 years is water, spiced up from time to time by fruit juices with added sugar.
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In a popular magazine like ELLE6, the cognitive powers of attraction of the iPad are recognized for the following virtues: “In the car, I begin by neutralizing the attention of our son, aged 11, by selecting the app Angry Birds7 on his iPad […], there is nothing like it to make a young person blind, mute and above all deaf”. This empirical statement by this columnist about an 11-year-old child also seems to apply to a much younger child. Precocious familiarization with unsuitable tools at their age appears, in our eyes, to a certain extent, to be comparable to the consumption of caffeinated drinks or psychoactive substances. The intoxication that results from the use of digital tools at an early age is more cognitive than physiological. Addiction cannot be summed up by an encounter with a tool. In fact, addictive behavior, as we have seen with the Japanese otakus, seemingly supposes all the same a particular family and psychological breeding ground. At the beginning of 2017, many articles8 have relayed the words of Dr Anne-Lise Ducanda, doctor at the Essonne PMI (Protection maternelle et infantile – Infant school and Preschool). This doctor posted a word of warning on a video9 on YouTube based on her daily experience with children “intoxicated” by screens. She says: “In 2003, 35 children in difficulty were indicated to me by schools amongst 1000 preschool pupils in first and second year classes at the Essonne. Over a year and a half, 210 in great difficulty have already been pointed out to me”. “Every week, I am contacted about new cases. Through seeing these cases, I have ended up making the connection with their consumption of screens. And I am not talking about children who watch television 6 A.G.A, “We tested the mommy porn”, ELLE, no. 3464, p. 132, 18 May 2012. Article evoking the growing popularity, at the time, of the pro-sadomasochistic novel Fifty Shades of Grey by the novelist E.L. James among mothers and the use of digital tools as an effective means of “neutralizing” children’s attention. 7 Angry Birds (Rovio, 2009) is the most widespread of all video games, which today has been downloaded more than a billion times. The objective of this game of skill is to destroy fortifications with missiles. 8 For example: http://www.lemonde.fr/sciences/article/2017/06/26/exposition-aux-ecransmon-fils-n-est-plus-le-meme-petit-garcon_5151418_1650684.html. Also refer to a methodological critique about the possibly over-extended aspect of Dr Ducanda’s alert: https://sabineduflofr.wordpress.com/2017/03/09/ecrans-et-autisme-des-chercheurs-reagissent/. 9 Available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9-eIdSE57Jw.
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for one hour a day! Most of those who are referred to me spend at least six hours a day in front of their screens. The problems are more serious than 15 years ago and disappear in most cases when parents manage to ‘disconnect’ their children”. 5.1.2. Cybersex and the origin of Internet addiction In 1996, very young users of digital tools were very rare (below age 2). The question of addiction was posed at the time for adolescent and adult Internet users who started to use the Web in a compulsive manner to consult pornographic or sexually suggestive content to set up contacts related to sexual activity. Dr Kimberly Young10 is a pioneering psychologist on the question of dependence on cybersex. She is the one who popularized the term “net addiction”. The following is her questionnaire at the time: “Are you addicted to cybersex? 1) Do you routinely spend time sexting and instant messaging with the sole purpose of finding cybersex? 2) Do you feel preoccupied with using the online world for sex? 3) Do you frequently use anonymous communication to engage in sexual fantasies? 4) Do you anticipate your next online session with the expectation that you will find sexual arousal or gratification? 5) Do you move from cybersex to phone sex or even real-life meetings? 6) Do you hide your online interactions from your significant other? 7) Do you feel guilt or shame from your online use? 8) Did you accidentally become aroused by cybersex only to now find that you actively seek it out when you log online? 9) Do you masturbate when having cybersex or looking at online pornography? 10) Do you feel less interest with your real-life sexual partner only to prefer cybersex as a primary form of sexual gratification?”11
10 Dr Kimberly Young’s website is http://www.netaddiction.com/. 11 Questionnaire from the website: http://netaddiction.com/cybersex-self-test, consulted on 21 May 2018.
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The content of this questionnaire reveals the questions that are being posed about behaviors in which digital devices become cognitive prostheses of a sexual vocation. The interesting thing to note is that compulsive behavior and the use of digital tools appeared at the time when desktop computers and the Web were becoming more widespread in households and were no longer reserved for a few select pioneers, as had previously been the case. To a certain extent, through this phenomenon, we are witnessing a certain “externalization” of human sexual activity or, at least, broadcasting of sexual imagination and fantasies by means of digital tools. In large French towns, it is significant to note that places like X-rated cinemas are becoming few and far between in favor of sexual content found on the Internet. The sexuality broadcast by information technology and cybersex demonstrates once again to what point Metal affects the sphere of intimacy and sexuality [JAC 07]. In itself, cybersex already existed with the Minitel and its pink messaging services. Non-“cyber-related” pornographic content already existed in the form of magazines and video cassettes. The Internet network has participated in making pornography accessible, just one or two mouse clicks away. This deeply affects popular imagination and the traditional media. Initially, cybersex between partners on the Internet was established as part of laboratory testing or artistic performances. However, pornography has quickly been installed on web servers to the point of constituting a significant part of all the available data. Sexuality is one of the most common intimate activities. With the advent of information technology available to the wider public, we are seeing an enormous broadcast of eroticism by means of electronic devices. Pornography has gradually lost its scandalous nature to become an everyday consumer good. It is of interest to note that cybersex appeared in an era when AIDS was creating a feeling of fear of contamination from sexual relations. The libertarian era of “free love” came to an end for medical reasons (the spread of the HIV virus) rather than moral or religious ones. Pornographic films were a very important launch product (along with football and cinema) for the Canal Plus Group when it was starting out. Visual erotic stimulation moved away from peep shows to reach into family homes. The erotic message services “messageries roses” or “Minitel rose” (pink Minitel) in French were proposed by different private companies on the Minitel network from 1980 to 2012, which itself was provided in all French territories by PTT (French administration providing postal services and telecommunications at the time). These pink message
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services were another facet of cybersex that allowed conservations of a sexual nature to be held with other “minitel-ers”. It is worthwhile to point out that one of the most influential French Internet access providers, the Iliad group (Free SAS, ALICE ADSL, Free Mobile and One Tel are owned by this company), structured itself around a pink Minitel service company called Fermic Multimedia. The digital market for sex has been one of the driving forces for the spread of digital technologies. A form of network cybersex that is still experimental today consists of the remote control of artificial sex organs. Prostheses of this type are known as “teledildonics”12. Intimacy with robots would not be surprising in a world, like ours, populated by machines, numerous automatic distributors and online shopping platforms. Dynamic interactions without a person-to-person aspect are already banal. We have previously seen that robot lovers represent a technico-erotic fantasy that has accompanied the imaginary world of robotics right from its origins. It is likely that this type of robot will appear in the future. From now on, certain otakus possess a Real Doll13 and perhaps consider their inflatable doll as a spouse, a sexual partner, even though it is only a model of a woman, albeit very realistic, but completely inert and immobile. The difficulty of connecting with others can be the driving force behind a desire to replace their presence with dolls or automatons14. A very marginal fringe of the population can get to the point of seeking to remain in denial by considering a digital object to be a human being, like a companion in itself. Metal is then taken to be Flesh. In my view, this confusion, which can appear to be pathetic and is certain to remain very rare, raises the question of social relations broadcast by information technology. In the past, in France, this type of generalized broadcasting of social relations and, especially, amorous relations, seemed incongruous and not very probable, and, above all, it evoked the marginal disciples of the pink Minitel. Yet, today, social networks on Web 2.0, Facebook and emails very strongly impregnate social behaviors, at a very large scale. The Internet is no longer futuristic in the slightest, it is the present, entirely ordinary. 12 Male and female artificial genitals controlled remotely over the Internet. 13 Available at: https://www.realdoll.com/. 14 In the film Blade Runner, the character of J.F. Sebastian is a misanthropic man, due to his Methuselah Syndrome, who lives in an immense abode inhabited by machines in order to compensate for his solitude.
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The idea of living with a robot as an all-encompassing partner is becoming decreasingly unfathomable. It is already the case for otakus “in love with” their Real Dolls. These life-sized dolls cost approximately 6,000 dollars. Their buyers choose all the anatomical features of the face and body. Robotization of these objects is a later stage that seeks to crystallize the imaginary figures Olympia, Hadaly, Maria and Pris that were conjured up by E.T.A Hoffmann, Villiers de L’Isle-Adam, Fritz Lang and Philip K. Dick. If android robots of this kind are made, then remote control of certain models will probably become possible over the Internet, intensifying the confusion between what is inert and what is alive15. Robot sexuality is sometimes presented as a means of fighting against slavery, prostitution, sexually transmitted diseases, adultery [YEO 12] and so on. Robots that are so perfect that they are attractive do not yet exist. Authors like David Levy [LEV 09] believe that in a few decades’ time, we will treat humans and robots in a similar way [VEN 10]. Professor Ishiguro’s gynoids are among the most complex androids currently in existence. Just like other biomimetic androids, they are not commercialized for the moment. Robotic sexuality is, however, a relevant prospective theme to consider. The widespread use of pseudo-human digital devices can truly bring about a change of social status of the automaton and associated social representations, and thus lead to astounding ontological confusion from the viewpoint of current usual social norms. A change of this type can in fact appear to be hypothetical. By analogy, who could have imagined in 1978 that a large proportion of children in the West below age 10 would have almost unhindered access in 2018 to infinite quantities of pornographic content via a very cheap portable system connecting to ARPANET? However, removable digital prostheses are still currently the main vectors of information exchanges of an erotic nature. Most cybersex takes place today in front of a keyboard and a screen and sometimes with a webcam and a microphone. Also, in this field, the monopolistic concentration of Lords of the Cloud had led to the fact
15 Nor is the consequence of the fetish attraction to dolls that they become imitations of real women, but, on the contrary, they become a model of physical appearance for certain humans. Female characters like Lara Croft have been created as fantasies for men. Now, certain women seek to resemble them, by wearing a disguise (cosplay is an example of this) or undergoing an operation. The figure of Barbie is also a model of imitation. However, neither Lara Croft nor Barbie is of a truly human form, since their proportions are not realistic. Virtual creatures have so much effect on representations that they tend to impose aesthetic rules that are impossible to reach.
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that most companies operating in the X-rated field are directed by one and the same holding company: MindGeek, parent company of Pornhub and YouPorn [BER 16]. Internet addiction is not limited to an addiction only to cybersex. Nevertheless, the question of Internet addiction to sexualized digital content is also an archetypical example used in order to think about the question of excessive use of cognitive prostheses. Sexuality effectively allows us to obtain gratification, pleasure. The combination of sexual activity with automatization can lead to a form of dependency or impulsive use. This automatization can involve other sources of gratification. For Elizabeth Rossé, it is, however, neither web access nor the availability of a digital tool that triggers the initial compulsive behavior of consulting data of a sexual nature [ROS 09]. According to this psychologist, this access only serves to reinforce preexisting behavior. Patients who consult data of a sexual nature in a compulsive manner all confirm that their habit has been reinforced due to the ease of access to materials that were once less accessible, in particular, due to their cost (cassette tapes, DVDs, magazines). The current abundance of this type of content, directly accessible through terminals connected to the Web, raises different sociological questions. There is nothing objectionable about Internet sexuality, a priori, if the material produced conforms to the laws of the country in which it is consulted. Internet sexuality is not systematically synonymous with Internet addiction. Certain individuals and couples use the Internet network as a vector of their sexuality. Compulsive behavior is above all the expression of an immediate search for gratification. Digital devices like electronic automatons are completely appropriate for this type of gratification. We give it an order, and it does what we have asked; we change game, image, web page and video, and it does what we ask. It allows avatars to be directed for hours in virtual worlds. Over and above the content, digital tools and, in particular, their latest user-friendly interfaces that need no technical training become, in themselves, addictive for certain individuals. Web consultation can be a factor of cognitive saturation and cause progressive modification of the structure of thought (increased vigilance and immediate mental excitation accompanied by a reduction in deep attention and the capacity to carry out thinking in the long term). Use of digital devices that is too frequent causes habituation to “software” thinking, which constitutes a reductionist thinking framework, because it is necessarily pre-formatted.
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Internet addiction appears when it is impossible to carry out a particular action without resorting to Metal. Internet addiction is then functional. This is not a sign of behavioral problems. We are dependent on the electricity network to turn on a lightbulb, without, however, being “addicted” to electricity. Internet addiction becomes truly problematic when it corresponds to irrepressible behaviors. Internet addiction can be seen as impulsive and therefore “unhealthy”. 5.1.3. The figure of the otaku: suffering as a criterion defining addiction Automatization of any behavior means that the individual finds it difficult to control themselves. This loss of self-control translates an immaturity or a regression of autonomy. Generally, impulsive behaviors express suffering and at the same time add suffering by giving way to a feeling of alienation. The figure of an otaku clearly illustrates this suffering that is associated with a compulsive obsessional behavior. An otaku, in Japanese, is a person who establishes an imaginary “kingdom” for themselves by appropriating, personalizing and collecting objects (digital or not). Yû Kawamorita, a Japanese otaku aged 37 when this statement was made, is a garagekit doll collector (dolls for people to build themselves, which represent pretty young girls), who states: “It is true that collectors, all those who, like myself, live by proxy, must have a complex of some kind. When there is a hole in our hearts, the collection doubtlessly compensates for this loss. Those who are lucky enough to live worry-free lives do not turn out like me” [BAR 99]. An otaku’s way of life is mainly legitimized by the existence of a hobby, which is the basis of boundless pride for them. Internet addiction is analogous to the act of impulse buying or to all the activities that people cannot restrain themselves from doing. Addiction manifests itself in a succession of actions associated with suffering. Otakus, just like compulsive buyers or Internet addicts, focus on an exclusive and impulsive repetitive activity, probably to try to compensate for an emotional loss or a feeling of anxiety. Internet addiction is not necessarily immediately accompanied by suffering. An unease related to a state of withdrawal can be felt when a digital prosthesis is lost or disconnected.
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Authors such as Bernard Stiegler, Nicholas Carr and Michel Desmurget further specify the warnings given by Günther Anders in The Obsolescence of Man. Audiovisual tools modify the individual, as well as society, by exposing them to mockery and phantoms, as much by creating pseudo-intimate situations with “friends” (in the sense given by Facebook to this word) and “people”16, as by conferring the illusion of acting on the world by publishing short texts on websites like blogs or Twitter, but, above all, by accompanying daily cognition to the point of considerably influencing it [AND 02, pp. 138–139]. Nicholas Carr [CAR 08] begins his famous article that appeared in The Atlantic with the following statement: “Over the past few years I’ve had an uncomfortable impression that someone, or something, has been tinkering with my brain, remapping the neural circuitry, reprogramming the memory. My mind isn’t going – as far as I can tell – but it’s changing. I’m not thinking the way I used to think. I can feel it most strongly when I’m reading. Immersing myself in a book or a lengthy article used to be easy. My mind would get caught up in the narrative or the turns of the argument, and I’d spend hours strolling through long stretches of prose. That’s rarely the case anymore. Now my concentration often starts to drift after two or three pages. I get fidgety, lose the thread, begin looking for something else to do. I feel as if I’m always dragging my wayward brain back to the text. The deep reading that used to come naturally has become a struggle”. The same author concludes the article by mentioning 2001: A Space Odyssey by Stanley Kubrick (1968 film): “I’m haunted by that scene in 2001: A Space Odyssey. What makes it so poignant, and so weird, is the computer’s emotional response to the disassembly of its mind: its despair as one circuit after another goes dark, its childlike pleading with the astronaut, ‘I can feel it, I can feel it. I’m afraid,’ and its final reversion to what can only be called a state of innocence. The outpouring of feelings by HAL [artificial intelligence] contrasts with the emotionlessness that characterizes the human figures in the film, who go about their business with an almost robotic efficiency. Their thoughts and actions feel scripted, as if they’re following the steps of an algorithm. In the world of 2001, 16 Certain people sometimes do not know the name and personality of the neighbors living on the same floor but see a presenter as a member of their family. It is possible to have hundreds of “virtual” friends while feeling desperately alone on a daily basis.
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people have become so machinelike that the most human character turns out to be a machine. That’s the essence of Kubrick’s dark prophecy: as we come to rely on computers to mediate our understanding of the world, it is our own intelligence that flattens into artificial intelligence”. There are different aspects to the suffering that describes Internet addiction. First, this suffering can result from a feeling of guilt, a feeling of exclusion or deprivation. Second, this suffering can occur in instances of digital “withdrawal”, when Metal is taken away from the body or when digital programs no longer function following an equipment malfunction, an energy supply fault, a disconnection of Internet access or a software bug. The third form of suffering is much subtler. It results from the progressive alteration of cognitive mechanisms and methods of playing out social relations caused by connecting the mind too constantly to programs that function in an essentially “deterministic” manner. Suffering will arise from an interactional dissatisfaction caused by the cognitive prosthesis enthusiast’s chronic inadaptation to usual social “games” (interpersonal face-to-face without digital broadcasting). The last type of suffering that must be taken into account is the suffering felt by close friends and family. Sometimes, drug addicts or Internet addicts are so “anesthetized” by their “soma” that they feel no suffering [HUX 07]. However, if this addicted person finds a family or remains at their parents’ house or with their siblings, then those close to them can feel suffering due to compulsive behavior. The criteria of suffering characterizing a situation of addiction to digital tools can be seen in the surroundings of the Internet addict. 5.2. Cognitive prostheses and electromagnetic radiation Connection to the “wireless” network of mobile phones and contemporary telematics means that vast areas of the planet are covered with invisible networks that wrap us in artificial electromagnetic invisible fields. Microwave radio frequencies of approximately 2 GHz are not entirely without consequence for the health of a biological organism. The water making up the main part of a living thing can be heated by this high-level radiation. This principle is applied to the operation of a microwave oven. A telephone relay mast permanently emits an electric field between 41 and 61 V/m (volts per meter). According to the
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WHO, 50 V/m is the maximum exposition tolerated by a human being17. Behavioral problems in animals clearly intervene at 350 V/m. The French green MEP Michèle Rivasi proposed a reduction of maximum values from 50 to 0.6 V/m18. Another factor that must be taken into account is the duration of exposure to radiation19. This type of questioning leads to the problem of radioactive radiation. Microwaves and radioactive radiation are both directly imperceptible to our senses. Illness or malfunction reveals an exposition that is too intense. In order to assess this issue, the advice given by the INPES (French National Institute for Health Prevention and Education) with regard to electromagnetic radiation emitted by our digital equipment is summarized as follows20: – Mobile phone: - mobile phones must not be used before the age of 12; - hands-free kits must be used systematically as much as possible; - mobile phones must not be used in areas of bad network coverage (lift, basement). In this scenario, phones emit a maximum level of waves, sometimes multiplying their emission power by 1,000;
17 Studies on the subject of electromagnetic waves are mainly about the thermal effects on humans of microwaves and our communication networks. AFSSET (French Agency for Health and Safety in the Environment and at Work), in 2009, recommended that an interest should be taken in the non-thermal effects to better emphasize the effect of mobile phone relays on the body. The CRIIREM (Centre for Research and Independent Information about Non-ionizing Electromagnetic Radiation) and certain researchers have called the innocuous nature of this type of wave into question or contested the maximum authorized values. 18 It would appear that switching on compact fluorescent lights generates a 24 V/m electric field, a value much higher than 0.6 V/m. Power-line communication technologies (PLC) on certain Internet boxes and future Linky electric counters require reinforced electric cables to avoid microwave emission from all domestic electric wires. Linky counters are a crystallization of the concept of smartgrids that consist of putting electricity networks in place that are capable of receiving and emitting electricity and whose parameters can be precisely controlled in real time via remote access. 19 Because of this lack of ability to perceive it, improper exposure can occur without our knowledge. Living a few meters from a device that emits 49 V/m is authorized, whereas it is, however, probably more dangerous than getting close for a few minutes to a relay mast emitting 60 V/m. 20 For more information on mobile phones, refer to http://lesondesmobiles.fr/. To read a brochure about radiation in a more overall sense, refer to http://www.radiofrequences.gouv.fr/IMG/pdf/ ORS_IDF_Radiofrequences_sante_et_societe_decembre_2009.pdf.
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- it is best not to call from a train moving at high speed, nor when in an elevator; - the phone should be moved away from the ear just after dialing and before the person we are calling picks up; - moderate use must be made of mobile phones insofar as the handset is often placed next to the cranium; - keep the phone away from electronic implants; - give preference to sending text messages. – Microwaves in the home: - place the Wi-Fi box several meters away from bedrooms; - do not rest computers on the knees. Current computers generate microwaves (their processor is cadenced at a frequency greater than a gigahertz and they are equipped with Bluetooth or Wi-Fi) that affect us when we are at a distance of less than 12.5 cm from the device. Although their name designates them as cognitive prostheses that we can rest on our knees (laptop), we are strongly advised not to do this, because the radiation is too close to the genital organs; - where possible, avoid using baby monitors; - the new 2008 standard for wireless landline telephones means that the base no longer emits radiation when the handset is placed in it. This DECT ECO standard should be given preference over the older DECT standard. INPES considers that to avoid lengthy exposure at school or work: – cable connections must be given preference; – place Wi-Fi sources as far away as possible (in false ceilings, for example) and only switch them on in response to actual requirements. It is a good idea to switch off21 the Internet box at home during sleeping hours. Operators have not put a switch on it to minimize manufacturing costs and especially to benefit from the fact that we thus create free Wi-Fi relays that we pay the electricity supply for. Even when domestic Wi-Fi is disconnected, the box can continue to generate an access to the operator’s network for itinerant users.
21 Switching off the box does not damage it and saves electricity. It is possible, thanks to this, to plug it into an on/off switch power strip, although this is strongly discouraged by the operator who wishes, in fact, to see it function permanently.
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However, even if radio frequencies potentially pose a form of danger or if children’s access to unsuitable multimedia content (sexuality22, violence, shocking images) is a source of concern, it appears that one of the main worries posed by intensive use of removable digital prostheses with a cognitive vocation is the dependence that they can bring about in certain individuals. When Marshall McLuhan tells us: “medium is message”, we need to take him seriously! The means of access to culture and information shapes our relation to the world. For example, we do not consume online press and the printed press in the same way. It is not relevant to consider whether one type of access would be better or worse than another. Instead, it is a case of thinking about these differences in order to make optimal choices. Once again, I repeat the fact that due to the inherent immaturity of childhood, excessive availability of digital prostheses will probably cultivate cognitive “orthopedia”. This risks preventing individuals from being able to make their own choice later on in their development between reasonable and liberating use rather than a use that is more or less compulsive, and therefore, to a certain extent, alienating.
22 Providing very young children with open access to the Web exposes individuals below 10 years of age more frequently to pornographic or violent content.
Information technology is “sold” by its promoters as a way of making life simpler, accelerating our means of communication and increasing our productivity. Miniaturization of digital technologies and the professional and recreational extension that they present make it difficult to dislodge telephones from our pockets and handbags. Cognitive prostheses are introduced in the social environment with neither a real crash barrier nor a wide-reaching evaluation in advance. Political players appear to have endorsed the social representation proposed by marketing, which shows that we are free to choose whether to use the tools on offer or not and that these are means of emancipation and access to culture. Monopolization of attention by interactive personal digital devices, however, raises numerous questions with regard to our contemporary social practices, if we consider simply the total time spent in a sitting position during the day with our eyes glued to various devices. Habituation and the irrepressible need to consult digital media are the vectors of a type of power that digital industrialists and media have over users. The fascination created by cognitive prostheses is a form of Internet addiction. Internet addiction describes addictively resorting to digital tools. Not all users are systematically “addicted” to their digital gadgets; nevertheless, making these tools available to the wider public is not to be taken lightly. The need to use a wearable digital prosthesis can cause compulsive behavior, or anxieties, where disconnection is a form of withdrawal, comparable, to a certain extent, to how a drug addict feels.
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It is useful to think about the notions of dependency, addiction, excessive use, suffering and risk of submission to a form of technoscientific “psycho power” that certain users can feel, those who are psychologically the least “prepared” to resist the sirens of digital consumption.
5.1. Cognitive prostheses and Internet addiction The wearable electronic device is, literally, an orthosis or a true prosthesis of the body. It inundates us with pleasant stimulation. It is sometimes difficult for certain people to live without the scintillating presence of the smartphone. When this breaks down, it is equivalent to going through toothache, an ailment that must be relieved as quickly as possible. The removable character of our cognitive prostheses ends up facilitating above all changes in models as fashions change and as industrially orchestrated obsolescence progresses, more than it gives us the opportunity to remove ourselves from the clutches of a portable digital system. It can be said that claiming that objects of this kind have a prosthetic dimension can indeed be called into question. The theory of “embedded cognition” designates, as we have already said, the situation of interdependence between the cognitive activity of an individual and the tools that they resort to, without, however, crossing over the border between intracranial cognitive activity and non-localized activity in the brain, which some do consider to be a cognitive activity [WHE 13, CLA 98]. We will use this definition to think about cognitive prostheses during this study. 5.1.1. “Excessive dependency
use”,
“disconnect
anxiety”
and
feeling
of
With the notion of “dependency” on a removable digital prosthesis, we designate a process of habituation not to a chemical substance, but to behavioral patterns that imperatively require time to be spent with a technological tool of a cognitive nature. Internet addiction is extremely polymorphic, and its repercussions are totally variable. “Disconnect anxiety” is a worrying situation that reveals the existence of a type of Internet addiction. Compulsive consultation of the Web is another type of this situation. These behaviors all bear witness to the fact that the phenomenon of
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dependence on information technology is not at all limited to dependence connections on established digital tools1. However, we seem to be observing more frequently various behaviors exhibiting cognitive dependency, probably induced by the all too frequent use of cognitive prostheses. A teaching assistant, working in a public high school in Morbihan, in western France, told me two stories about the status of the mobile phone for certain high school pupils and their families. In high schools, internal regulations prohibit the use of smartphones during classes and detentions. However, these regulations are not readily adhered to. A colleague, the supervisor, confiscated the smartphone of a pupil who was using it during detention. After working hours, the supervisor went home, having forgotten the smartphone in his bag. Very soon, the supervisor received numerous messages from the management of the establishment and from his colleagues. He realized that he had forgotten to give the phone back to the pupil at the end of the detention time and that he must urgently return to the high school to give the device back to the pupil. It seemed out of the question to give the device back the next morning. On his arrival back at the high school, he found himself confronted by the parents and the management team. Everyone seemed to be in a high state of panic. The parents threatened to press charges for “phone theft”. Although it was obvious to everyone that the supervisor did not intend to steal an object that he had openly confiscated, the parents absolutely wanted to put pressure on the educational teams. The parents argued that their son’s telephone was essential to their family life to “be able to monitor the welfare of their child at all times”. In numerous classrooms, pupils communicate frequently by SMS throughout the lessons. Widespread use of phones in class at school is so common that most teachers “have abdicated” (the term used by the special needs assistant who was interviewed) from their mission to prevent pupils using their smartphones in class. The rule states that mobile phones must be switched off and placed inside the pupil’s bag, but it is not followed. Furthermore, most owners of this type of device consult them during lessons. Professors could be tempted to resort to mobile phone jammers, but these objects are legally reserved for prisons and concert halls. Facebook on smartphones today appears to constitute the greater part of Web use by high school pupils (according to the special needs assistant that I interviewed). Visits to Facebook are obligatory throughout the day to establish a “clique” feeling. This is also a means of reciprocally controlling individuals who create this feeling of a 1 Operation of an implanted pacemaker is very often vital to life and, however, as we have seen, the dependence connection that unites the patient and the device does not appear to truly generate anxiety (except in the case of prophylactic reasons for carrying a defibrillator that we have previously mentioned).
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clique. If Facebook one day falls by the wayside, it is highly probable that the social function that it currently allows will continue with an application run by a competitor. The observed high school pupils seem to be dependent on their smartphone, because, since 2012, it has become an essential tool for socialization. Many individuals therefore find it difficult to be without their mobile phones today: “Without my mobile phone I am lost”. Very often, we need access to the Web to consult certain pieces of data: “you will find the information on the Internet”. In comparison with the situation that prevailed at the end of the 20th Century, we no longer memorize telephone numbers of our close friends and family: “I don’t remember your number by heart”. These mnestic delegations bear witness to the feeling of missing something that immediately results from a situation in which the tool is absent or not working. This confirms the idea that the tool is considered to be a prosthesis by an increasing proportion of users. All of us depend on our phones to make calls because our body is incapable of doing this itself, without a technological device. However, telephone boxes fulfill this function without being prostheses. Mobile phones and smartphones are more than phones; they are felt in many cases to be a part, certainly immobile, but all the same a part of the human body. Removable digital prostheses, with the functions they perform and the data they contain, are depositories of part of our personalities. An attachment of this kind gives rise to an association with a “horcrux” figure imagined by J.K. Rowling2 as a central narrative theme of the famous Harry Potter saga. The loss of his computer, for Andy Clark, as he describes it in Natural-Born Cyborgs [CLA 03, p. 4], is experienced as a near-amputation. However, dependency between the user and this type of tool is not necessarily synonymous with addiction or excessive use. Resorting to one prosthesis in particular can arise from a considered need and therefore not compulsive. It is logical to equip ourselves with a phone in many situations in our daily and 2 “Horcruxes” are, in the imaginary world described in Harry Potter, objects in which the “soul” of Voldemort, the adversary of the hero, is deposited. These objects are extremely important for Voldemort, because they are both his strength and weakness. The evil wizard has placed pieces of his soul in these removable objects, which makes him immortal. At the same time, destruction of these objects constitutes a means of destroying it. The attachment between Voldemort and these objects is therefore more than an obsession; these mobile parts are literally parts of the body of his personality. In any case, he considers them as such (see [ROW 14, chapter 23]).
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professional lives, because it is a technological object that is essential for making calls. Yet, a phone call is a frequent social interaction in our societies, very often necessary in professional and personal situations. Addiction to digital tools represents a more intense stage of Internet addiction. The notion of compulsive use then comes into play. The users are being excessive, they know it and suffer from it, but they cannot restrict their use to certain digital prostheses. Certain individuals, who have no electronic impact, can no longer be without their “digital toys”, such as phones, computers and game consoles, depending on the scenario. Although they do not consider themselves explicitly to be cyborgs, it is obvious that they can no longer really detach themselves from tools that are, all the same, physically “removable”. The social impact caused by dissemination of removable prosthetic digital objects is an eminently political question. However, it is essential to note that thinking about the well-founded nature of this availability has been completely hidden for the last decade. When a user gives themself over to the digital game, they can “surf the Web” and play a game such as an MMORPG for hours, feeling “addicted” to Facebook. Time seems to run away with them. The multimedia stimulations procured by all these devices hypnotize us, sometimes stupefying us, encouraging us to go to bed late. Online cognitive prostheses impose their ringtones, alerts, flow and electronic temporality on us. The phone rings, receives messages, emails come in and adverts go past. Circadian rhythms are forgotten. The user can find themselves “fixated” on the Web. However, the aspect that escapes them the most is perhaps the fact that the intense frequency of digital tools is more or less subtly in the process of modifying their cognition, imagination and therefore socialization methods: “What if I do all my reading on the web not so much because the way I read has changed, i.e. I’m just seeking convenience, but because the way I THINK has changed?”3 “Internet addiction” is excessive use of digital devices. This is represented in a compulsive, impulsive behavior that is almost visible to close friends and family, which causes suffering for the person who suffers from it.
3 Words of Scott Karp, cited by Nicholas Carr [CAR 08].
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“Addiction [is] dependence on a thing or an occupation. In ancient Roman Law, a debtor unable to pay his debts could find himself “auctioned off” to his creditor, to whom he became a slave. By analogy, today we talk about addiction when we want to characterize dependence of a person or his great weakness for a substance (drug or alcohol, for example) or for an activity, such as gambling, work or… the use of the Internet network (Kandell et al., The APA Monitor, June 1996). Amongst other addictions, we see bulimia, compulsive buying and certain dangerous behaviors (risk-taking). Addiction gives pleasure and calms an internal unease, but it often has unhappy consequences” [SIL 06]. Addiction is closely linked to the fear of missing something. A device has the function of responding immediately to a demand or a need, just as a psychotropic responds very quickly to oneʼs mood. With addiction, it is a case of not being able to differentiate between satisfaction and need. Activity becomes difficult to control, and impulsive. With regard to the uses of numerical prostheses, the aspect that can be qualified as “impulsive” is the impossibility, for certain people, to stop consulting them, and to systematically seek to communicate through them. Consulting the tool becomes in some way “automatic”, a new reflex. The user takes on the form of an organic “automaton”, hypnotized by their logico-mathematical automatons. This is linked in particular to “the fear of missing out”. Dependence on the network or on digital gadgets is not monolithic, but, on the contrary, is very polymorphic. Certain individuals are “dependent” on social networks, others on online games (MMORPG), others on online gambling and still others on pornography, on downloading programs and data, and on news. Thierry Crouzet [CRO 12, p. 254], who has written a book about withdrawal from excessive use of the Web, distinguishes different profiles of network users: – users (using online shopping, legal or illegal downloads, using administration or financial sites, looking at the news); – explorers (finding information in the databases); – communicators (using social networks, blogs, messaging services). He seems to have omitted one category that must not be ignored:
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– gamers (although Internet-addicted gamers do not necessarily play online games, a considerable number of hardcore gamers stop at offline games). “Internet addiction”, “net addiction”, was officially used for the first time by the psychologist Kimberley Young during the American Psychological Association conference in Toronto in 1996. The question of determining whether electronic equipment can give rise to a form of drug addiction without chemical substances remains a subject of strong debate. Currently, there is a controversy about the term “addiction” applied to something other than a chemical substance. In the strict sense of the term, addiction is not supposed to be applicable to adolescence. In the eyes of those who criticize an extension of the definition of addiction to adolescence, this period of life is a phase of frequent excesses, because the individual is in the process of finding themselves. The question of not qualifying adolescent practices such as “addiction” and “dependence” would be a kind of “good intention”, aiming to protect adolescents from abusive use of medicines that would benefit the industrial sector. These fears are found if we refer to the work of Édouard Zarifian [ZAR 96]. It must be recognized that certain practices among the very young are, however, far too intense, too impulsive and are accompanied by suffering and social exclusion. Certain young individuals, who are intensively faced with digital tools early on, sometimes appear to be qualified as “Internet addicted” despite not yet being 10 years old or even less. In this case, the terms “excessive use” and “excessive practice” [LAL 09] can be used to describe this “dependence, addiction without substances” [VAL 02] and this irrepressible need to be connected, to use a tablet, to play a game, to be connected to social networks, to consult pornographic sites and so on. Psychologists such as Serge Tisseron and Vanessa Lalo rebuff the idea of dependence on digital tools, preferring instead the expression “excessive use”. Nor is excessive use yet entirely clarified by the scientific world. When can we qualify an “excessive” use? There is no consensus on this subject. From one discipline to another, from one scientist to another, the cursor of the definition of “excess” varies considerably.
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The criteria selected is often suffering. If the individual suffers from their use, this is because it is excessive [ROS 09]. Addiction has two definitions in the dictionary4: it can be a case of an “addictive behavior” or of a “drug addiction”. We can be “addicted” to a chemical substance in the same way as a behavior (watching the television is a very widespread addictive behavior). In medicine, dependency is related to behavioral problems related to the consumption of a chemical substance; however, gambling has been accepted as an activity that can cause dependency. Seeking immediate gratification is the conscious or unconscious corollary of these practices. As was pointed out to me by the psychologist Elizabeth Rossé, who works at the Marmottan Hospital, an establishment at the cutting edge of drug addiction and dependency treatments, “addiction occurs with meetings between a person, a situation and a product”. In her view, this product can be chemical just as easily as digital. The deciding factor is the fact that the individual feels they are missing out; in other words, they feel a social or psychological unease which they will be compensating for by using a ritual practice that can only be stopped with increasing difficulty as this ritual becomes more impulsive. A veteran gamer, a hardcore gamer, a social networks “addict”, an online pornography “addict”, a dating website “addict” and a television “addict” are all going to feel a very significant psychological loss if we deprive them suddenly of their compulsive ritual. Internet addiction is perhaps an abusive term, because dependency is not the same when comparing someone “addicted” to Facebook with an alcoholic. Addiction to alcohol is being addicted to the consumption of a substance, whereas dependency on the use of social networks is a compulsive behavior not involving ingestion of any substance at all. The feeling of missing out felt by an Internet addict “in withdrawal” is of a different nature to the physiological withdrawal felt by a drug addict who depends on certain chemical products (alcohol, heroin, amphetamines, cocaine, tranquilizers, tobacco, etc.). Whether we characterize Internet addiction as dependence without substances or as an excessive use is an important terminological subject. However, it must be recognized that individuals who are dissocialized and who become incapable of reining in their impulsive digital consumption can rightfully be described as people who are going through a “problem with misuse of digital tools”.
4 Petit Larousse illustrated, 2013, “addiction” entry.
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An aspect that is in all likelihood a deciding factor in the severity of pathology is the age at which addictive behavior starts. The earlier it starts, the more difficult it will be to overcome. By analogy, it seems that consumption of caffeinated soda and high sugar content at an early age will cause a form of dependence. According to a study carried out in December 2010, published in The Journal of Pediatrics [WAR 11], the daily dose of caffeine that should not be exceeded for a child aged 5–7 is a 33 cl can of caffeinated soda5, beyond which attention difficulties (irritation, lack of attention, anxiety) are temporarily triggered. It is in the first years of life that behavioral routines that structure our personalities are set up. It is no accident that, throughout the last century, advertising for tobacco products largely targeted an adolescent public and sought to present industrial cigarettes as everyday consumption products. Indeed, for many parents, giving Coca-Cola to a baby would appear as shocking as making a child smoke. On the contrary, several times I observed that certain parents propose the use of tablets to very young children or even to babies. It is clear that the potential danger of cognitive prostheses is not at all obvious for many parents. Although the nutritional question is relatively well understood by parents, the question of the use of digital tools has not yet been sufficiently formulated into a problem and standardized social habits do not yet exist on this subject. Resorting to endoprostheses and prosthetic limbs goes hand in hand with legal and social regulation carried out by the medical body and transmitted to patients. The activities of industrialists and, in particular, the pharmaceutical advertising sector are strictly regulated in France. Regulation considerations do not yet accompany the use of cognitive prostheses. Indeed, pervasive information technology has appeared very recently, and we are facing the first generation of these digital natives who have used digital tools even before “the age of reason”. Although no substances are involved, it is significant that certain games are already very addictive for adults, adolescents and pre-adolescents. Because of this fact, parents can be tempted to place this type of “toy” in the hands of even younger children, such as those between 2 and 3 years of age, who are right in the middle of their sensory-motor development.
5 The only useful drink for a child of age below 4 years is water, spiced up from time to time by fruit juices with added sugar.
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In a popular magazine like ELLE6, the cognitive powers of attraction of the iPad are recognized for the following virtues: “In the car, I begin by neutralizing the attention of our son, aged 11, by selecting the app Angry Birds7 on his iPad […], there is nothing like it to make a young person blind, mute and above all deaf”. This empirical statement by this columnist about an 11-year-old child also seems to apply to a much younger child. Precocious familiarization with unsuitable tools at their age appears, in our eyes, to a certain extent, to be comparable to the consumption of caffeinated drinks or psychoactive substances. The intoxication that results from the use of digital tools at an early age is more cognitive than physiological. Addiction cannot be summed up by an encounter with a tool. In fact, addictive behavior, as we have seen with the Japanese otakus, seemingly supposes all the same a particular family and psychological breeding ground. At the beginning of 2017, many articles8 have relayed the words of Dr Anne-Lise Ducanda, doctor at the Essonne PMI (Protection maternelle et infantile – Infant school and Preschool). This doctor posted a word of warning on a video9 on YouTube based on her daily experience with children “intoxicated” by screens. She says: “In 2003, 35 children in difficulty were indicated to me by schools amongst 1000 preschool pupils in first and second year classes at the Essonne. Over a year and a half, 210 in great difficulty have already been pointed out to me”. “Every week, I am contacted about new cases. Through seeing these cases, I have ended up making the connection with their consumption of screens. And I am not talking about children who watch television 6 A.G.A, “We tested the mommy porn”, ELLE, no. 3464, p. 132, 18 May 2012. Article evoking the growing popularity, at the time, of the pro-sadomasochistic novel Fifty Shades of Grey by the novelist E.L. James among mothers and the use of digital tools as an effective means of “neutralizing” children’s attention. 7 Angry Birds (Rovio, 2009) is the most widespread of all video games, which today has been downloaded more than a billion times. The objective of this game of skill is to destroy fortifications with missiles. 8 For example: http://www.lemonde.fr/sciences/article/2017/06/26/exposition-aux-ecransmon-fils-n-est-plus-le-meme-petit-garcon_5151418_1650684.html. Also refer to a methodological critique about the possibly over-extended aspect of Dr Ducanda’s alert: https://sabineduflofr.wordpress.com/2017/03/09/ecrans-et-autisme-des-chercheurs-reagissent/. 9 Available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9-eIdSE57Jw.
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for one hour a day! Most of those who are referred to me spend at least six hours a day in front of their screens. The problems are more serious than 15 years ago and disappear in most cases when parents manage to ‘disconnect’ their children”. 5.1.2. Cybersex and the origin of Internet addiction In 1996, very young users of digital tools were very rare (below age 2). The question of addiction was posed at the time for adolescent and adult Internet users who started to use the Web in a compulsive manner to consult pornographic or sexually suggestive content to set up contacts related to sexual activity. Dr Kimberly Young10 is a pioneering psychologist on the question of dependence on cybersex. She is the one who popularized the term “net addiction”. The following is her questionnaire at the time: “Are you addicted to cybersex? 1) Do you routinely spend time sexting and instant messaging with the sole purpose of finding cybersex? 2) Do you feel preoccupied with using the online world for sex? 3) Do you frequently use anonymous communication to engage in sexual fantasies? 4) Do you anticipate your next online session with the expectation that you will find sexual arousal or gratification? 5) Do you move from cybersex to phone sex or even real-life meetings? 6) Do you hide your online interactions from your significant other? 7) Do you feel guilt or shame from your online use? 8) Did you accidentally become aroused by cybersex only to now find that you actively seek it out when you log online? 9) Do you masturbate when having cybersex or looking at online pornography? 10) Do you feel less interest with your real-life sexual partner only to prefer cybersex as a primary form of sexual gratification?”11
10 Dr Kimberly Young’s website is http://www.netaddiction.com/. 11 Questionnaire from the website: http://netaddiction.com/cybersex-self-test, consulted on 21 May 2018.
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The content of this questionnaire reveals the questions that are being posed about behaviors in which digital devices become cognitive prostheses of a sexual vocation. The interesting thing to note is that compulsive behavior and the use of digital tools appeared at the time when desktop computers and the Web were becoming more widespread in households and were no longer reserved for a few select pioneers, as had previously been the case. To a certain extent, through this phenomenon, we are witnessing a certain “externalization” of human sexual activity or, at least, broadcasting of sexual imagination and fantasies by means of digital tools. In large French towns, it is significant to note that places like X-rated cinemas are becoming few and far between in favor of sexual content found on the Internet. The sexuality broadcast by information technology and cybersex demonstrates once again to what point Metal affects the sphere of intimacy and sexuality [JAC 07]. In itself, cybersex already existed with the Minitel and its pink messaging services. Non-“cyber-related” pornographic content already existed in the form of magazines and video cassettes. The Internet network has participated in making pornography accessible, just one or two mouse clicks away. This deeply affects popular imagination and the traditional media. Initially, cybersex between partners on the Internet was established as part of laboratory testing or artistic performances. However, pornography has quickly been installed on web servers to the point of constituting a significant part of all the available data. Sexuality is one of the most common intimate activities. With the advent of information technology available to the wider public, we are seeing an enormous broadcast of eroticism by means of electronic devices. Pornography has gradually lost its scandalous nature to become an everyday consumer good. It is of interest to note that cybersex appeared in an era when AIDS was creating a feeling of fear of contamination from sexual relations. The libertarian era of “free love” came to an end for medical reasons (the spread of the HIV virus) rather than moral or religious ones. Pornographic films were a very important launch product (along with football and cinema) for the Canal Plus Group when it was starting out. Visual erotic stimulation moved away from peep shows to reach into family homes. The erotic message services “messageries roses” or “Minitel rose” (pink Minitel) in French were proposed by different private companies on the Minitel network from 1980 to 2012, which itself was provided in all French territories by PTT (French administration providing postal services and telecommunications at the time). These pink message
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services were another facet of cybersex that allowed conservations of a sexual nature to be held with other “minitel-ers”. It is worthwhile to point out that one of the most influential French Internet access providers, the Iliad group (Free SAS, ALICE ADSL, Free Mobile and One Tel are owned by this company), structured itself around a pink Minitel service company called Fermic Multimedia. The digital market for sex has been one of the driving forces for the spread of digital technologies. A form of network cybersex that is still experimental today consists of the remote control of artificial sex organs. Prostheses of this type are known as “teledildonics”12. Intimacy with robots would not be surprising in a world, like ours, populated by machines, numerous automatic distributors and online shopping platforms. Dynamic interactions without a person-to-person aspect are already banal. We have previously seen that robot lovers represent a technico-erotic fantasy that has accompanied the imaginary world of robotics right from its origins. It is likely that this type of robot will appear in the future. From now on, certain otakus possess a Real Doll13 and perhaps consider their inflatable doll as a spouse, a sexual partner, even though it is only a model of a woman, albeit very realistic, but completely inert and immobile. The difficulty of connecting with others can be the driving force behind a desire to replace their presence with dolls or automatons14. A very marginal fringe of the population can get to the point of seeking to remain in denial by considering a digital object to be a human being, like a companion in itself. Metal is then taken to be Flesh. In my view, this confusion, which can appear to be pathetic and is certain to remain very rare, raises the question of social relations broadcast by information technology. In the past, in France, this type of generalized broadcasting of social relations and, especially, amorous relations, seemed incongruous and not very probable, and, above all, it evoked the marginal disciples of the pink Minitel. Yet, today, social networks on Web 2.0, Facebook and emails very strongly impregnate social behaviors, at a very large scale. The Internet is no longer futuristic in the slightest, it is the present, entirely ordinary. 12 Male and female artificial genitals controlled remotely over the Internet. 13 Available at: https://www.realdoll.com/. 14 In the film Blade Runner, the character of J.F. Sebastian is a misanthropic man, due to his Methuselah Syndrome, who lives in an immense abode inhabited by machines in order to compensate for his solitude.
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The idea of living with a robot as an all-encompassing partner is becoming decreasingly unfathomable. It is already the case for otakus “in love with” their Real Dolls. These life-sized dolls cost approximately 6,000 dollars. Their buyers choose all the anatomical features of the face and body. Robotization of these objects is a later stage that seeks to crystallize the imaginary figures Olympia, Hadaly, Maria and Pris that were conjured up by E.T.A Hoffmann, Villiers de L’Isle-Adam, Fritz Lang and Philip K. Dick. If android robots of this kind are made, then remote control of certain models will probably become possible over the Internet, intensifying the confusion between what is inert and what is alive15. Robot sexuality is sometimes presented as a means of fighting against slavery, prostitution, sexually transmitted diseases, adultery [YEO 12] and so on. Robots that are so perfect that they are attractive do not yet exist. Authors like David Levy [LEV 09] believe that in a few decades’ time, we will treat humans and robots in a similar way [VEN 10]. Professor Ishiguro’s gynoids are among the most complex androids currently in existence. Just like other biomimetic androids, they are not commercialized for the moment. Robotic sexuality is, however, a relevant prospective theme to consider. The widespread use of pseudo-human digital devices can truly bring about a change of social status of the automaton and associated social representations, and thus lead to astounding ontological confusion from the viewpoint of current usual social norms. A change of this type can in fact appear to be hypothetical. By analogy, who could have imagined in 1978 that a large proportion of children in the West below age 10 would have almost unhindered access in 2018 to infinite quantities of pornographic content via a very cheap portable system connecting to ARPANET? However, removable digital prostheses are still currently the main vectors of information exchanges of an erotic nature. Most cybersex takes place today in front of a keyboard and a screen and sometimes with a webcam and a microphone. Also, in this field, the monopolistic concentration of Lords of the Cloud had led to the fact
15 Nor is the consequence of the fetish attraction to dolls that they become imitations of real women, but, on the contrary, they become a model of physical appearance for certain humans. Female characters like Lara Croft have been created as fantasies for men. Now, certain women seek to resemble them, by wearing a disguise (cosplay is an example of this) or undergoing an operation. The figure of Barbie is also a model of imitation. However, neither Lara Croft nor Barbie is of a truly human form, since their proportions are not realistic. Virtual creatures have so much effect on representations that they tend to impose aesthetic rules that are impossible to reach.
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that most companies operating in the X-rated field are directed by one and the same holding company: MindGeek, parent company of Pornhub and YouPorn [BER 16]. Internet addiction is not limited to an addiction only to cybersex. Nevertheless, the question of Internet addiction to sexualized digital content is also an archetypical example used in order to think about the question of excessive use of cognitive prostheses. Sexuality effectively allows us to obtain gratification, pleasure. The combination of sexual activity with automatization can lead to a form of dependency or impulsive use. This automatization can involve other sources of gratification. For Elizabeth Rossé, it is, however, neither web access nor the availability of a digital tool that triggers the initial compulsive behavior of consulting data of a sexual nature [ROS 09]. According to this psychologist, this access only serves to reinforce preexisting behavior. Patients who consult data of a sexual nature in a compulsive manner all confirm that their habit has been reinforced due to the ease of access to materials that were once less accessible, in particular, due to their cost (cassette tapes, DVDs, magazines). The current abundance of this type of content, directly accessible through terminals connected to the Web, raises different sociological questions. There is nothing objectionable about Internet sexuality, a priori, if the material produced conforms to the laws of the country in which it is consulted. Internet sexuality is not systematically synonymous with Internet addiction. Certain individuals and couples use the Internet network as a vector of their sexuality. Compulsive behavior is above all the expression of an immediate search for gratification. Digital devices like electronic automatons are completely appropriate for this type of gratification. We give it an order, and it does what we have asked; we change game, image, web page and video, and it does what we ask. It allows avatars to be directed for hours in virtual worlds. Over and above the content, digital tools and, in particular, their latest user-friendly interfaces that need no technical training become, in themselves, addictive for certain individuals. Web consultation can be a factor of cognitive saturation and cause progressive modification of the structure of thought (increased vigilance and immediate mental excitation accompanied by a reduction in deep attention and the capacity to carry out thinking in the long term). Use of digital devices that is too frequent causes habituation to “software” thinking, which constitutes a reductionist thinking framework, because it is necessarily pre-formatted.
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Internet addiction appears when it is impossible to carry out a particular action without resorting to Metal. Internet addiction is then functional. This is not a sign of behavioral problems. We are dependent on the electricity network to turn on a lightbulb, without, however, being “addicted” to electricity. Internet addiction becomes truly problematic when it corresponds to irrepressible behaviors. Internet addiction can be seen as impulsive and therefore “unhealthy”. 5.1.3. The figure of the otaku: suffering as a criterion defining addiction Automatization of any behavior means that the individual finds it difficult to control themselves. This loss of self-control translates an immaturity or a regression of autonomy. Generally, impulsive behaviors express suffering and at the same time add suffering by giving way to a feeling of alienation. The figure of an otaku clearly illustrates this suffering that is associated with a compulsive obsessional behavior. An otaku, in Japanese, is a person who establishes an imaginary “kingdom” for themselves by appropriating, personalizing and collecting objects (digital or not). Yû Kawamorita, a Japanese otaku aged 37 when this statement was made, is a garagekit doll collector (dolls for people to build themselves, which represent pretty young girls), who states: “It is true that collectors, all those who, like myself, live by proxy, must have a complex of some kind. When there is a hole in our hearts, the collection doubtlessly compensates for this loss. Those who are lucky enough to live worry-free lives do not turn out like me” [BAR 99]. An otaku’s way of life is mainly legitimized by the existence of a hobby, which is the basis of boundless pride for them. Internet addiction is analogous to the act of impulse buying or to all the activities that people cannot restrain themselves from doing. Addiction manifests itself in a succession of actions associated with suffering. Otakus, just like compulsive buyers or Internet addicts, focus on an exclusive and impulsive repetitive activity, probably to try to compensate for an emotional loss or a feeling of anxiety. Internet addiction is not necessarily immediately accompanied by suffering. An unease related to a state of withdrawal can be felt when a digital prosthesis is lost or disconnected.
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Authors such as Bernard Stiegler, Nicholas Carr and Michel Desmurget further specify the warnings given by Günther Anders in The Obsolescence of Man. Audiovisual tools modify the individual, as well as society, by exposing them to mockery and phantoms, as much by creating pseudo-intimate situations with “friends” (in the sense given by Facebook to this word) and “people”16, as by conferring the illusion of acting on the world by publishing short texts on websites like blogs or Twitter, but, above all, by accompanying daily cognition to the point of considerably influencing it [AND 02, pp. 138–139]. Nicholas Carr [CAR 08] begins his famous article that appeared in The Atlantic with the following statement: “Over the past few years I’ve had an uncomfortable impression that someone, or something, has been tinkering with my brain, remapping the neural circuitry, reprogramming the memory. My mind isn’t going – as far as I can tell – but it’s changing. I’m not thinking the way I used to think. I can feel it most strongly when I’m reading. Immersing myself in a book or a lengthy article used to be easy. My mind would get caught up in the narrative or the turns of the argument, and I’d spend hours strolling through long stretches of prose. That’s rarely the case anymore. Now my concentration often starts to drift after two or three pages. I get fidgety, lose the thread, begin looking for something else to do. I feel as if I’m always dragging my wayward brain back to the text. The deep reading that used to come naturally has become a struggle”. The same author concludes the article by mentioning 2001: A Space Odyssey by Stanley Kubrick (1968 film): “I’m haunted by that scene in 2001: A Space Odyssey. What makes it so poignant, and so weird, is the computer’s emotional response to the disassembly of its mind: its despair as one circuit after another goes dark, its childlike pleading with the astronaut, ‘I can feel it, I can feel it. I’m afraid,’ and its final reversion to what can only be called a state of innocence. The outpouring of feelings by HAL [artificial intelligence] contrasts with the emotionlessness that characterizes the human figures in the film, who go about their business with an almost robotic efficiency. Their thoughts and actions feel scripted, as if they’re following the steps of an algorithm. In the world of 2001, 16 Certain people sometimes do not know the name and personality of the neighbors living on the same floor but see a presenter as a member of their family. It is possible to have hundreds of “virtual” friends while feeling desperately alone on a daily basis.
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people have become so machinelike that the most human character turns out to be a machine. That’s the essence of Kubrick’s dark prophecy: as we come to rely on computers to mediate our understanding of the world, it is our own intelligence that flattens into artificial intelligence”. There are different aspects to the suffering that describes Internet addiction. First, this suffering can result from a feeling of guilt, a feeling of exclusion or deprivation. Second, this suffering can occur in instances of digital “withdrawal”, when Metal is taken away from the body or when digital programs no longer function following an equipment malfunction, an energy supply fault, a disconnection of Internet access or a software bug. The third form of suffering is much subtler. It results from the progressive alteration of cognitive mechanisms and methods of playing out social relations caused by connecting the mind too constantly to programs that function in an essentially “deterministic” manner. Suffering will arise from an interactional dissatisfaction caused by the cognitive prosthesis enthusiast’s chronic inadaptation to usual social “games” (interpersonal face-to-face without digital broadcasting). The last type of suffering that must be taken into account is the suffering felt by close friends and family. Sometimes, drug addicts or Internet addicts are so “anesthetized” by their “soma” that they feel no suffering [HUX 07]. However, if this addicted person finds a family or remains at their parents’ house or with their siblings, then those close to them can feel suffering due to compulsive behavior. The criteria of suffering characterizing a situation of addiction to digital tools can be seen in the surroundings of the Internet addict. 5.2. Cognitive prostheses and electromagnetic radiation Connection to the “wireless” network of mobile phones and contemporary telematics means that vast areas of the planet are covered with invisible networks that wrap us in artificial electromagnetic invisible fields. Microwave radio frequencies of approximately 2 GHz are not entirely without consequence for the health of a biological organism. The water making up the main part of a living thing can be heated by this high-level radiation. This principle is applied to the operation of a microwave oven. A telephone relay mast permanently emits an electric field between 41 and 61 V/m (volts per meter). According to the
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WHO, 50 V/m is the maximum exposition tolerated by a human being17. Behavioral problems in animals clearly intervene at 350 V/m. The French green MEP Michèle Rivasi proposed a reduction of maximum values from 50 to 0.6 V/m18. Another factor that must be taken into account is the duration of exposure to radiation19. This type of questioning leads to the problem of radioactive radiation. Microwaves and radioactive radiation are both directly imperceptible to our senses. Illness or malfunction reveals an exposition that is too intense. In order to assess this issue, the advice given by the INPES (French National Institute for Health Prevention and Education) with regard to electromagnetic radiation emitted by our digital equipment is summarized as follows20: – Mobile phone: - mobile phones must not be used before the age of 12; - hands-free kits must be used systematically as much as possible; - mobile phones must not be used in areas of bad network coverage (lift, basement). In this scenario, phones emit a maximum level of waves, sometimes multiplying their emission power by 1,000;
17 Studies on the subject of electromagnetic waves are mainly about the thermal effects on humans of microwaves and our communication networks. AFSSET (French Agency for Health and Safety in the Environment and at Work), in 2009, recommended that an interest should be taken in the non-thermal effects to better emphasize the effect of mobile phone relays on the body. The CRIIREM (Centre for Research and Independent Information about Non-ionizing Electromagnetic Radiation) and certain researchers have called the innocuous nature of this type of wave into question or contested the maximum authorized values. 18 It would appear that switching on compact fluorescent lights generates a 24 V/m electric field, a value much higher than 0.6 V/m. Power-line communication technologies (PLC) on certain Internet boxes and future Linky electric counters require reinforced electric cables to avoid microwave emission from all domestic electric wires. Linky counters are a crystallization of the concept of smartgrids that consist of putting electricity networks in place that are capable of receiving and emitting electricity and whose parameters can be precisely controlled in real time via remote access. 19 Because of this lack of ability to perceive it, improper exposure can occur without our knowledge. Living a few meters from a device that emits 49 V/m is authorized, whereas it is, however, probably more dangerous than getting close for a few minutes to a relay mast emitting 60 V/m. 20 For more information on mobile phones, refer to http://lesondesmobiles.fr/. To read a brochure about radiation in a more overall sense, refer to http://www.radiofrequences.gouv.fr/IMG/pdf/ ORS_IDF_Radiofrequences_sante_et_societe_decembre_2009.pdf.
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- it is best not to call from a train moving at high speed, nor when in an elevator; - the phone should be moved away from the ear just after dialing and before the person we are calling picks up; - moderate use must be made of mobile phones insofar as the handset is often placed next to the cranium; - keep the phone away from electronic implants; - give preference to sending text messages. – Microwaves in the home: - place the Wi-Fi box several meters away from bedrooms; - do not rest computers on the knees. Current computers generate microwaves (their processor is cadenced at a frequency greater than a gigahertz and they are equipped with Bluetooth or Wi-Fi) that affect us when we are at a distance of less than 12.5 cm from the device. Although their name designates them as cognitive prostheses that we can rest on our knees (laptop), we are strongly advised not to do this, because the radiation is too close to the genital organs; - where possible, avoid using baby monitors; - the new 2008 standard for wireless landline telephones means that the base no longer emits radiation when the handset is placed in it. This DECT ECO standard should be given preference over the older DECT standard. INPES considers that to avoid lengthy exposure at school or work: – cable connections must be given preference; – place Wi-Fi sources as far away as possible (in false ceilings, for example) and only switch them on in response to actual requirements. It is a good idea to switch off21 the Internet box at home during sleeping hours. Operators have not put a switch on it to minimize manufacturing costs and especially to benefit from the fact that we thus create free Wi-Fi relays that we pay the electricity supply for. Even when domestic Wi-Fi is disconnected, the box can continue to generate an access to the operator’s network for itinerant users.
21 Switching off the box does not damage it and saves electricity. It is possible, thanks to this, to plug it into an on/off switch power strip, although this is strongly discouraged by the operator who wishes, in fact, to see it function permanently.
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However, even if radio frequencies potentially pose a form of danger or if children’s access to unsuitable multimedia content (sexuality22, violence, shocking images) is a source of concern, it appears that one of the main worries posed by intensive use of removable digital prostheses with a cognitive vocation is the dependence that they can bring about in certain individuals. When Marshall McLuhan tells us: “medium is message”, we need to take him seriously! The means of access to culture and information shapes our relation to the world. For example, we do not consume online press and the printed press in the same way. It is not relevant to consider whether one type of access would be better or worse than another. Instead, it is a case of thinking about these differences in order to make optimal choices. Once again, I repeat the fact that due to the inherent immaturity of childhood, excessive availability of digital prostheses will probably cultivate cognitive “orthopedia”. This risks preventing individuals from being able to make their own choice later on in their development between reasonable and liberating use rather than a use that is more or less compulsive, and therefore, to a certain extent, alienating.
22 Providing very young children with open access to the Web exposes individuals below 10 years of age more frequently to pornographic or violent content.