The 10 Commandments: Where the Medium Was the Message

In: Bible and Theology

Commitment:
  • Words: 331
  • Sentences: 23
  • Grade level: 8.7-12.2
  • Read time: ~1.7 min @ 200WPM

1 Sep 2010

In my seminary Hebrew courses, we had to read the laws of several ancient near eastern societies and compare them to the 10 commandments of the Bible. Interestingly, most of them contain laws about not killing, stealing, or taking another man’s wife.

However, the the 10 commandments do have 2 commands which are unique among all other ethical systems. The first is the rejection of the pantheon of Canaanite, Egyptian, and Sumerian gods in religions and the demand for exclusive monotheistic devotion to Yahweh which we find in the first commandment:

1. You shall have no other gods before me. (Exodus 20:3)

The second commandment is also profoundly different than anything found in ancient documents when it forbids the creation of any graven images.

You shall not make for yourself a carved image … You shall not bow down to them or serve them… (Exodus 20:4-5)

Technology scholar Niel Postman (who was himself of Jewish origin) wrote,

“It is a strange injunction to include as part of any ethical system [instructions on how they were to symbolize, or not symbolize, their experience] unless its author assumed a connection between forms of human communication and the quality of a culture.” (Amusing Ourselves to Death, p. 9. Emphasis in the original.)

The Israelites might have argued that the technological means they used to approach God didn’t matter as long as they were devoted to him and him alone. But God begged to differ, because he knew that the instruments we use for worship always reinforce certain beliefs.

In the case of Israel, if they had used images to represent Yahweh then it might have appeared that he was like every other God. Instead, by forbidding images of himself, God was reinforcing his identity as wholly other. He is not an idol among idols or an image among images – He is the one, true God.

This means that the second commandment is a technological reinforcement of the first. The medium – or lack thereof in this case – was the message.

Location, location, location

In: Our Technological World

Commitment:
  • Words: 548
  • Sentences: 23
  • Grade level: 11.1-14.6
  • Read time: ~2.7 min @ 200WPM

26 Aug 2010

A friend recently asked if I’d seen any churches using location and check-in tools like Foursquare, Gowalla, and Facebook with their ministries. The Google Trend image above shows they are quickly gaining popularly, but personally, I haven’t come across many ministry oriented uses for them.

So far, check in technology seems to be focused on only two things (1) creating a games like collecting badges and points to keep users coming back, (2) creating business opportunities to buy and sell good. Neither of these are really related to the core mission of the church, so right now their use is limited to a few basic functions

  1. Coupons – Foursquare makes it pretty easy for companies or churches to claim their business location and then add specials for people who check in there. My own church offers a 10% discount for the mayor of its coffee shop (which all good mega churches have), and I’ve seen several other places that do the same. Personally, I don’t like the idea of only giving things to mayors since it just seems too competitive. But a coupon for every 5-10 checkins is a fun idea that frees you from carrying around a punch card.
  2. Checkin watcher – There are also API options for displaying checkins to your location on your website. A church, for example, could use http://turnsocial.com/ to display who recently checked into a location. Of course, there are all kinds of privacy problems to address in doing this, but I could see it being fun for certain events.

Beyond those basic ideas, what I would love to see in the future is the ability to add a layer of “meaning” to check-ins. Rather than just saying “I went to this location,” I want to be able to tag check-ins similar to how #hashtags are used on twitter. Here are some examples: Read the rest of this entry »

ECHO Conference and MediaElement.js

In: Code Commentary

Commitment:
  • Words: 125
  • Sentences: 7
  • Grade level: 10.3-13.9
  • Read time: ~0.6 min @ 200WPM

29 Jul 2010

My good friend Nathan Smith and I are giving a little presentation Friday at ECHO Conference. We’re not presenting on media ecology or anything theological, just good old straight forward web development. Nathan and I actually met over email when he was the web developer at Asbury Seminary and I was working at Dallas Theological Seminary.

Conference slides

MediaElement.js

I’m also releasing the first draft of a little code library that helps developers implement HTML5 <video>. You can click the image below to check it out.

mediaelement.js

The point of this exercise is that for all the tradeoffs and downsides to technology, we are still called to be makers and creators, and I always want to be a part of that.

Around the Web

In: Quotes

Commitment:
  • Words: 389
  • Sentences: 15
  • Grade level: 12.8-16.2
  • Read time: ~1.9 min @ 200WPM

17 Jul 2010

Here’s a few goodies from this week

  • Only Disconnect – Author Gary Shteyngart writes eloquently about his technological transformation, “With each post, each tap of the screen, each drag and click, I am becoming a different person — solitary where I was once gregarious; a content provider where I at least once imagined myself an artist; nervous and constantly updated where I once knew the world through sleepy, half-shut eyes; detail-oriented and productive where I once saw life float by like a gorgeously made documentary film. And, increasingly, irrevocably, I am a stranger to books, to the long-form text, to the pleasures of leaving myself and inhabiting the free-floating consciousness of another.”
  • Grades don’t drop for college Facebook fiends – Another study wondering whether Facebook usage affects students’ performance in college. My guess would be that in the early days of Facebook, it did make a difference, but over time as students are introduce to social media at a younger age, they use it more natively and it therefore has less off an effect on them – just as it has been with all prior new media.
  • Amazon’s Former Chief Scientist on Influence, Twitter’s Fake Audience, and iPad Sex Appeal – “Why do people tweet? What is the driver of them spending time doing this? I think it’s because they think they have people giving them attention, and they do everything to play with that attention. The reason Twitter works so well is that they don’t have a feedback-loop, where people can realize just how little attention they’re getting. I’m not saying the system was set up that way deliberately, but it’s a very well setup system. People can fool themselves into believing that others are listening, which is not easy in real life. When you’re talking to other people on the street and nobody is listening, after a while you sort of have to stop talking. Not so on Twitter.”
  • Apple’s new ads highlight FaceTime’s emotional connection – I really like the four new Apple iPhone 4 FaceTime commercials. And I find them to be a perfect example of how effective marketing doesn’t advertise “features,” but attempts to create an emotional connection to the experience of using the device. After watching the commercials, it almost feels like it would be better to experience those events over FaceTime than in person.

Technicism and the World Cup

In: Our Technological World

Commitment:
  • Words: 545
  • Sentences: 26
  • Grade level: 10.4-13.7
  • Read time: ~2.7 min @ 200WPM

7 Jul 2010

I confess that now that the US is out of the World Cup, I have not been paying much attention to the matches, but I have still been hearing an interesting argument come up from time to time.

Some have been complaining that the new ball is causing problems and that a newer, better ball needs to be developed. Others have been frustrated by some key missed calls by the referees and say that what we really need is new laser-sighted goal-line technology. There are dozens of news stories about FIFA considering “in-game technology” to deal with various problems that fans have noticed.

What is Technicism?

What is interesting about all of this is that it appears to follow the pattern of something Stephen V. Monsma calls “technicism” which is the unending pursuit of more and more complex technologies designed to make human life better, But when those devices cause problems, the solution is always additional technologies that solve the problems caused by the previous technology, and then even more technology to deal with the problems of that technology, and so on. Read the rest of this entry »

Around the Web

In: Quotes

Commitment:
  • Words: 223
  • Sentences: 11
  • Grade level: 9.7-13.3
  • Read time: ~1.1 min @ 200WPM

3 Jul 2010

In multitasking, more than two tasks do not compute – A report from Science on what happens in the human brain when we attempt to multitask. It turns out that the brain is not too bad at doing two tasks, but when we attempt to add a third, things don’t work out so well.

Kindle and iPad Books Take Longer to Read than Print – A study by Jakob Nielsen found that readers tended to read more slowly on iPads (6.2%) and Kindles (10.7%) than printed books. This seems about right to me since it will probably take some time for long-time readers to transition to a new medium.

iPhone 4 Creator talks about Materials – Jonathan Ive, Apple’s Senior Vice President of Design, talks about how important it is to touch and work with materials rather than just model them in computers. The is the chief difference between the formal senses of the terms technology (practical) and science (theoretical).

iPhone 4 and the Art of Self Photography – Interesting post from TUAW on the shift from photography being about capturing the world to capturing the self. The iPhone 4 makes this explicit with it’s front facing camera.

How the Web is Affecting Social Relationships – According to this study, most people self-report that in 2020 they see the Internet having a positive impact on their family and relationships.

About this blog

John DyerI'm John Dyer a web developer working on sites like Best Commentaries, Bible Web App, Dallas Seminary. I'm also a seminary graduate and teacher at Irving Bible Church.

This blog is about the the role of technology in the redemptive movement from the Garden to the City. I believe technology is an amazing testament to the creativity embedded in the imago dei, but instead of assuming technology is always a neutral tool, I believe it - like culture in general - profoundly influences us.

Upcoming Posts

  • What Are They Advertising?
  • Jesus, James, and McLuhan On the Heart, the Tongue, and the Internet
  • A Definition of Technology
  • The Cornwall Alliance: Technological Theory at Work
  • Reading and Publishing and Publishing and Reading
  • Learning from Buber: I-Thou and I-It
  • Prepackaged Communion and Albert Borgmann’s Device Paradigm
  • Technology is Kinda Like Money
  • Approaching Technology like We Approach Money
  • John Dyer: Paul, Yes, in a later post we'll talk about the debates in the early church about the meaning of im [...]
  • John Dyer: Lee, for sure! Moving from Oral to writing communicates a sense of authority and permanence. [...]
  • John Dyer: I can't remember about that one. If you find something and can draw some meaning from it, I'd love t [...]
  • John Dyer: God also spends much of the Pentateuch giving blueprints for various elements of worship. The point, [...]
  • Lee: Interesting points. Also, I would mention that delivering the 10 commandments on carved stone wa [...]

Asides

Our brains are designed to more easily be stimulated than satisfied
Fascinating look at the science of the brain’s response to seeking and rewards: http://www.slate.com/id/2224932/ (1)

Roman Catholic Church Expresses Concern Regarding Social Technologies
The head of the British Roman Catholic church says,

“I think there’s a worry that an excessive use, or an almost exclusive use of text and emails means that as a society we’re losing some of the ability to build interpersonal communication that’s necessary for living together and building a community.”
(0)

Internet Fatigue
CNN has a report on the phenomenon of internet fatigue. I wish they would have spent more time on giving suggestions for how to understand why this happens and how to avoid it. (0)

Articles and Tools on Texting
The NYTimes has a new article on the effects of texting on youth which include anxiety, sleep deprivation, and hand injuries. Interestingly, as Andy Crouch points out, the article also mentions that teens send many texts to their parents, meaning that teens are now connected to their parents more often during the day – a time when teenagers of the past were developing independence. LG has also created a new site to help parents decode text messages. (0)

Course Syllabus: Writing for Nonreaders in the Postprint Era
A humorous, but enlightening syllabus for a class on writing in the “postprint” era. Writing for nonreaders in the postprint era: “Students will examine why former generations carried around heavy clumps of bound paper and why they chose to read instead of watching TV or playing Guitar Hero.” (0)

Language Shapes Our Worldview
A psychology professor at Stanford University found that in languages with gender, the gender assigned to an objects tends to shape the way a speaker views that’s object. For example, in Spanish, “bridge” is masculine so Spanish speakers describe bridges as “strong” and “dangerous,” while German speakers for whom bridge is feminine tend to describe bridges as “fragile” and “beautiful.” Perhaps our own understanding of words like redemption, wrath, and adoption are also shaped by unseen factors. (0)

Survey Says Facebook Users Get Lower Grades
A study from educational researches at the Ohio State University found that students who regularly used facebook only study 1-5 hours per week and had GPAs in the 3.0-3.5 range, while non-facebook users study around 11-15 hours per week with GPAs in the 3.5-4.0 range. I wonder how church education compares? (0)

Risk-Reducing Technologies Increase Risk-Taking
The Pope and a Harvard scientist make an interesting argument that AIDS is increasing in Africa precisely because of condom distribution. More... (0)