CS213 Lecture Notes - Lecture 4: Marshall Mcluhan, Zipcar, Living Wage
Document Summary
Argues automobiles have changes us in three ways: enlargement of the body, deepening of the concept of anonymous privacy. The enlargement of the body: the automobile is a vehicle for satisfying demands, and is as such a tool like a hammer. But whereas hammers extend only our hands and arms, automobiles extend our legs, hands, fingers, arms, eyes, ears, and so on: the personal automobile, especially one with clutch and gearshift, serves to enlarge the body beyond the skin. In addition to thinking about technology as prosthesis, browning asks us to think about the enjoyment of the functioning. The suddenly- happening: a third transitional comment, the human self, enlarged by the automobile, becomes a fact of mobile privacy. It may be the case that we are wrong about both these aspects, but we function, as automobile humans as if they are real: the anonymity of the automobile its faceless commonness.
