Howard Rheingold: "People Got to Be Free”
This Week's Guest: Howard Rheingold
Photo Credit: Chris Michel
ABOUT THIS EPISODE
“Where minds meet technology” is the overarching theme of this fascinating dive with modern-day prophet Howard Rheingold. Along with others like Doug Engelbart, Stewart Brand, and Alan Kay, he has been predicting how technology and humanity intersect since the 60s. Howard coined the term “virtual community” and served as Editor for the Whole Earth Catalog, which he calls, “a touchstone of the belief that we could improve things,” in addition to writing several books, teaching, speaking, and generally thinking in ways others don’t.
We explore two mind-boggling offshoots of this theme: 1) how do psychedelics play into the history of the conception of the internet, digital media, and virtual reality and 2) how are humans responding, as a society, to the technological advances we now enjoy?’
If you’re not sure what the Whole Earth catalog is, or who Engelbart was, or why you should care about how a network connecting all humans was conceived, just know that the late 60s was a time when everything was in upheaval, but just enough people responded with optimism, mind-blowing ideas, and, with help from a little well-placed LSD, the seeds of what would grow into our current technological reality.
And when Howard answers a question, get ready to jump into historically-rich rabbit holes and emerge with a list of books to buy and mid-century thinkers to read about.
Show Notes
BOOKS AND LINKS MENTIONED IN THIS EPISODE
Howard in 1965 at Reed College
Michael Pollan’s book: How to Change Your Mind: What the New Science of Psychedelics Teaches Us About Consciousness, Dying, Addiction, Depression, and Transcendence
Higher Creativity: Liberating the Unconscious for Breakthrough Insights by Howard Rheingold and Willis Harman
The WELL
Alan Kay’s article in Scientific American “Microelectronics in the Personal Computer"
Future Shock by Alvin Toffler
Self Reliance by Ralph Waldo Emerson
Whole Earth Catalog (on Amazon and Wikipedia) and the Millennium Whole Earth Catalog
Shoshana Zuboff and The Age of Surveillance Capitalism
Our Minds Have Been Hijacked by Our Phones. Tristan Harris Wants to Rescue Them from Wired.com
From Counterculture to Cyberculture by Fred Turner
The Secret of Our Success: How Culture Is Driving Human Evolution, Domesticating Our Species, and Making Us Smarter by Joseph Henrich
What the Dormouse Said: How the Sixties Counterculture Shaped the Personal Computer Industry by John Markoff
Doug Engelbart’s “Mother of All Demos” video— the world debut of personal and interactive computing in 1968!
William Calvin on the evolution of the brain
More About Our Guest
Independent Instigator & Observer
Howard Rheingold is a writer, speaker, and teacher, known for his specialties on the cultural, social and political implications of modern communication media such as the Internet, mobile telephony and virtual communities (a term he is credited with inventing).
Howard’s earliest books were Tools for Thought: The History and Future of Mind-Amplifiers (1984), Virtual Reality (1991), and The Virtual Community (1993).
In 1994, Howard was one of the principal architects and the first Executive Editor of HotWired.
Howard’s 2002 book, Smart Mobs, was acclaimed as a prescient forecast of the always-on era.
Howard was a winner in MacArthur Foundation’s Digital Media and Learning competition and used the award to work with a developer to create a free and open source social media classroom.
Howard’s blogs on learning and teaching 21st c. literacies for SFGate, as well as interviews and talks on the subject.
Howard’s latest book, Net Smart: How to Thrive Online, published in 2012
Online courses at Rheingold U and
