Is planet earth the end of the line, or is space itself the next stop?
Cyberspace. It's incredible, taking us to any part of the planet we want to visit. But as Paul Levinson shows in his brilliant new book, when it comes to transport, we're still stuck in the past, preferring to take our bodies with us. Whether it's trains, yachts, scooters or pogo-sticks, we're compelled to keep moving, our movements curtailed only by the earth itself. In our imaginations however, we soar way past the limits of current technology.
With a lucid but reflective style that takes in everything from robots and science fiction to religion and philosophy, Paul Levinson asks why there is a deep seated human desire to know what's 'out there'. Why, after getting a man on the moon, did the US space program develop so slowly? In a world where space is constantly repackaged, how do we know what real space is? Is our desire to get into space natural, or a religious craving, and is it a modern phenomenon, or did our ancestors also dream of escaping the clutches of Mother Earth?
Jam-packed with exciting, innovative, even revolutionary thinking about our future, Realspace is essential reading for everyone who has ever sat at their desk, gazed into the distance and imagined boarding a space shuttle...

REALSPACE: THE FATE OF PHYSICAL PRESENCE IN THE DIGITAL AGE, ON AND OFF THE PLANET

Levinson, Paul

Ashgate Publishing Limited

Taylor & Francis Ltd

Gower Publishing Ltd

United Kingdom and Ireland, United Kingdom

London, New York, United Kingdom, 2003

LONDON, Unknown, 2003

June 17, 2003

1, PT, 2003

obscured text on leaf 2

Указ.
Библиогр.: с. 153-0169

РГБ

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xv, 176 pages ; 18 cm
Includes bibliographical references (pages 153-169) and index
Preface: Four departures -- 1. Bicycling into outer space -- The limits of cyberspace -- The lure of outer space -- What went wrong in outer space? -- Space repackaged -- Robots and missed golden opportunities -- 2. Walking and talking: the reason they rhyme -- The biological antiquity of the coupling -- Human roads -- Railroads -- Out of the box -- Impulse power and partners -- Global villages -- The beginnings of space travel and cyberspace -- 3. Breaking out of windows and cyberspace -- The appeal of interaction -- The medium of media and the real world -- Two kinds of Java in the world -- Ecologies of transport and communications -- 4. The cellphone as antidote to the Internet -- Dissolving what glues us to the screen -- Talking again leads the way to walking, on this Earth -- 5. The only way forward from California is up: what's keeping us down? -- Realpolitik versus realspace -- The entropy of details and science fiction -- Philosophy versus science -- 6. Further from home, closer to truth -- Mirrors: pitfalls and opportunities -- Telescopes into microscopes -- Apartment, city, universe -- 7. Is democracy the best launchpad to space? -- War and peace, application and invention -- Microsoft space? -- Democracy's partners -- 8. Old-time religion as a new wing to space -- Conquistadors to the stars? -- Coinciding heavens -- How would religion make its contribution? -- Playful space -- 9. Would you want to live near a star named HD 209458? -- Old names for new worlds -- Spacefarming metaphors -- The comforts of home in space -- 10. Real robots don't cry -- Robotic merits -- Limitations of programming -- Knowledge in tiers and tears -- Robots with emotions? -- 11. Realspace in an age of terrorism -- Two-edged swords of communication -- Anthrax and e-mail -- Planes and rockets: reversal of symbols? -- Starport at the World Trade Center -- A few last words about images, reality, and opportunity

In an inquiry that ranges from robots to religion, Paul Levinson asks why there is a deep-seated human desire to know what's "out there". Full of examples, "Realspace" asks some searching questions about space and the way we think about it.

Realspace is about the need for full, face-to-face interaction with people and the world around us in the age of the Internet.

2023-06-28