• About
  • Collage
  • Fauna
  • Flora
  • Landscapes
  • Looks
  • Radio
  • sketchy stuff

M.T. Karthik

~ midcareer archive, 1977 – 2017 plus 2022

M.T. Karthik

Tag Archives: fifty foot pine tree press

Pre-Internet Baccalaureate and Homo sapiens digitalis

13 Wednesday Jun 2012

Posted by mtk in essay, social media

≈ 1 Comment

Tags

baccalaureate, children, culture, digital, digitalis, ffptp, fifty foot pine tree press, generation, homo, idaltu, parents, pre-Internet, sapiens, society, species, tcp/ip, technology

Pre-Internet Baccalaureate

The Internet arrived just as I was finishing my undergraduate education at University and already my younger peers, in their 30’s now, were better prepared for the world we exist in today – the Digital Generation.

My generation, the Pre-Internet Baccalaureates, are one of the fastest shrinking groups of humanity: those who received a college degree or university education without the existence of the Internet.

Forever, Pre-Internet Baccalaureates will be the last of what came before, from the slower, quieter, less crowded world sans digital devices and the world wide web. (For the purposes of definition, I propose the Digital Generation begins in 1993, with the standardization of TCP/IP Protocols).

Most of us have, of course, absorbed the Internet and lots of peripheral tech into our education now and we stumble along using the tools given to us by Silicon Valley social engineers in amazing ways with handheld devices a hundred times a day.

Our children and the generations that follow have become guides to absorbing the transition to digital tech.

In 2005, a Japanese mother of two young adults that I interviewed in Narita airport, told me many Japanese actually refer to the children of the digital age as “a new species, Shin Jin-rui” – because of their facility with computers,

a NEW SPECIES.

That interview was one of a series called The First Contact Project.

With the expansion of the digital divide, I propose a Western equivalent of the Japanese phrase, using the Latin taxonomy:

Homo sapiens digitalis

Today, we consider human beings, Homo sapiens sapiens, to be the only living species of the genus Homo.

Wiki tells us that in 2003, scientists defined the 1997 findings of Tim White in Ethiopia of Homo sapiens idaltu as: an extinct subspecies of Homo sapiens that lived almost 160,000 years ago in Pleistocene Africa.

Homo sapiens idaltu was to describe the divide between us and this species that was so similar to us yet went extinct. Idaltu is from the African Saho-Afar language, a word meaning “elder or first born”

So if future generations look upon our disconnected, pre-internet society as backward, naturally, we need defining terminology to describe the divide. The term digitalis has numerous meanings that apply here – from fingers to digital technology – in defining the generations to come as advanced from us.

People using digital technology have fast become a part of almost every career, society, community, corporation and culture and if evolution holds, the inevitable death and transfiguration of homo sapiens sapiens and rise of homo sapiens digitalis, will be total.

Many homo sapiens sapiens will die-off, others will evolve into homo sapiens digitalis.

Anyone can study digital technology and move from sapiens to digitalis, but indeed, we have learned it is easiest if this education is begun at an earlier age … which brings us back to the lonely generation at the end of the previous era: Pre-Internet Baccalaureate.

Among the Pre-Internet Baccalaureate homo sapiens sapiens, we find unusual relationships designed from facility with digital tech during the era of its creation:

– Marriages in which one partner is tech-savvy and the other not so, preferring to yield the tech responsiblity to the other.

– Communal groups in which a single friend is highly skilled – the now famous early adopter – who teaches the others to engage in particular tech.

– Bellweather users who guide others around them – one elder in a retirement community for example who helps others by using the net – in communities where people are uncomfortable with new tech.

The argument that we are not a different species from our children lies squarely on the fact that, obviously, homo sapiens sapiens and digitalis can intermarry and breed, but note that while this is true, it is rare that offspring of such unions remain sapiens sapiens.

And thus is born Homo sapiens digitalis, the final species of the genus Homo.

Pincecrest Lake, 2010

20 Sunday Jun 2010

Posted by mtk in our son

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

2010, california, ffptp, fifty foot pine tree press, forest, Karthik, lake, m.t., milan, mtk, National, NORTHERN, ocean, omm, pinecrest, stainslaus

M.T. Karthik

This blog archives early work of M.T. Karthik, who took every photograph and shot all the video here unless otherwise credited.

Performances and installations are posted by date of execution.

Writing appears in whatever form it was originally or, as in the case of poems or journal entries, retyped faithfully from print.

all of it is © M.T. Karthik

a minute of rain

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QYLHNRS8ik4

Top Categories

2022 Asia baseball birds Coastal Cali collage elections essay fauna flora GBC Readers India installations journalism landscape Los Angeles music video North Oakland NYC performance photography poetry politics protest reviews S.F. short film social media thoughts travel

MTK on Twitter

My Tweets

other mtk projects

  • an SF Giants Fan
  • current Youtube
  • first Youtube site 2007
  • MTK on Vimeo
  • Rocky Pt Recharge Zone
  • SF Mayoral Campaign 2011
  • Yesterday's Hoops 2010

Archives

  • December 2022
  • November 2022
  • October 2022
  • September 2022
  • August 2022
  • July 2022
  • June 2022
  • May 2022
  • April 2022
  • March 2022
  • January 2022
  • December 2017
  • November 2017
  • October 2017
  • September 2017
  • August 2017
  • July 2017
  • June 2017
  • May 2017
  • April 2017
  • March 2017
  • February 2017
  • January 2017
  • December 2016
  • November 2016
  • October 2016
  • September 2016
  • August 2016
  • July 2016
  • June 2016
  • May 2016
  • April 2016
  • March 2016
  • February 2016
  • November 2015
  • September 2015
  • August 2015
  • July 2015
  • June 2015
  • October 2014
  • August 2014
  • July 2014
  • June 2014
  • May 2014
  • April 2014
  • November 2013
  • September 2013
  • June 2013
  • May 2013
  • April 2013
  • December 2012
  • November 2012
  • October 2012
  • September 2012
  • August 2012
  • July 2012
  • June 2012
  • May 2012
  • April 2012
  • March 2012
  • February 2012
  • January 2012
  • December 2011
  • November 2011
  • October 2011
  • September 2011
  • August 2011
  • July 2011
  • June 2011
  • May 2011
  • April 2011
  • March 2011
  • February 2011
  • January 2011
  • December 2010
  • November 2010
  • October 2010
  • August 2010
  • July 2010
  • June 2010
  • April 2010
  • October 2009
  • July 2009
  • June 2009
  • May 2009
  • April 2009
  • November 2008
  • October 2008
  • April 2008
  • January 2008
  • November 2007
  • October 2007
  • July 2007
  • May 2007
  • April 2007
  • March 2007
  • February 2007
  • January 2007
  • December 2006
  • November 2006
  • September 2006
  • February 2006
  • January 2006
  • December 2005
  • November 2005
  • October 2005
  • September 2005
  • August 2005
  • April 2005
  • February 2005
  • January 2005
  • December 2004
  • November 2004
  • August 2004
  • June 2004
  • April 2004
  • December 2003
  • October 2003
  • September 2003
  • March 2003
  • February 2003
  • December 2002
  • November 2002
  • October 2002
  • September 2002
  • May 2002
  • April 2002
  • September 2001
  • July 2001
  • June 2001
  • February 2001
  • November 2000
  • August 2000
  • June 2000
  • March 2000
  • December 1999
  • October 1999
  • July 1999
  • June 1999
  • April 1999
  • March 1999
  • October 1998
  • July 1998
  • June 1998
  • May 1998
  • April 1998
  • February 1998
  • January 1998
  • December 1997
  • November 1997
  • October 1997
  • September 1997
  • August 1997
  • June 1997
  • March 1997
  • January 1997
  • December 1996
  • November 1996
  • October 1996
  • September 1996
  • August 1996
  • July 1996
  • May 1996
  • April 1996
  • March 1996
  • February 1996
  • December 1995
  • November 1995
  • October 1995
  • September 1995
  • August 1995
  • June 1995
  • May 1995
  • February 1995
  • January 1995
  • October 1994
  • September 1994
  • August 1994
  • May 1994
  • August 1993
  • August 1992
  • April 1992
  • November 1991
  • February 1991
  • December 1988
  • October 1984
  • May 1982
  • July 1981
  • April 1977

Blog at WordPress.com.

  • Follow Following
    • M.T. Karthik
    • Join 52 other followers
    • Already have a WordPress.com account? Log in now.
    • M.T. Karthik
    • Customize
    • Follow Following
    • Sign up
    • Log in
    • Report this content
    • View site in Reader
    • Manage subscriptions
    • Collapse this bar
Privacy & Cookies: This site uses cookies. By continuing to use this website, you agree to their use.
To find out more, including how to control cookies, see here: Cookie Policy