The History of “Cyber Means Pilot”
One of the first orders of business I had after finishing my Master’s degree work was to start writing more. Producing academic articles and essays was an area of weakness. It was difficult to synthesize and analyze theories and apply those thoughts to what was happening in the world. I figured reformating my website to focus on this effort would help me become a better academic writer. The one problem was finding a hook that I could use as the foundation for a series of articles.
I had a university website when I was at Ohio University. The only purpose it served was to practice HTML and CSS coding. Computer Science was my major in college back in the long, long ago. Working on the space provided by the university to create my faculty homepage was good practice to use the faculty homepage to work on my coding skills. The final design wasn’t too bad. However, the information was stale as the pages were static.
I needed a blog with a definite purpose to truly motivate me to write on a regular basis.
I figured reformating my website to focus on this effort would help me find my voice. I was reading the Cyberculture Reader in the winter of 2004 and came across Timothy Leary’s chapter from the book entitled The Cyber-punk: The Individual as Reality Pilot. Specifically, it was a passage in this work that has stuck with me to this day:
“A cyber-person is one who pilots his/her own life. By definition, the cyber-person is fascinated by navigational information-especially maps, charts, labels, guides, manuals, which help pilot one through life. The cyber-person continually searches for theories, models, paradigms, metaphors, images, icons which help chart and define the realities which we inhabit.”
Leary, T. (1988). The Cyber-Punk: The Individual as Reality Pilot. Mississippi Review, 16(2/3), 264.
Leary focuses on the concept of an “Individual who Thinks for Him/Herself” throughout his article. He uses Prometheus, Quetzalcoatl, Charles Lindbergh, Anne Morrow Lindbergh, Stanley Kubrick, Mary Ferguson, Steve Jobs, Steve Wozniak, David Hockney, Andy Warhol, George Koopman, William Gibson, Bruce Sterling, John Shirley, Rudy Rucker, Mark Twain, Gertrude Stein, Roy Walford, Wilt Chamberlain, Mathias Rust, Stewart Brand, Bob Harris, and David Lightman as the “boot-up” examples of cyber-punks. All of these examples would fight what Leary would call the governors of the system.
“The words governor or steersman or G-man are used to describe those who manipulate words and communication devices to control, to bolster authority-feudal, management, government. And to discourage innovative thought and free exchange. We describe a person who relies on static, verbal abstractions, conformity to dogma, reliance on authority, as a vassal or G-Person or G-Man. From which we get G-think, G-text, G-babble, G-
Leary, T. (1988). The Cyber-Punk: The Individual as Reality Pilot. Mississippi Review, 16(2/3), 265.berish ,vassaline ,vassalize .”
I think the article inspired me first to examine the cyber-tech that influences the day-to-day actions within society. I also believe this article explains why the Actor-Network Theory is a theoretical model I tend to use on a regular basis for my research as it questions the interaction between cyber-tech and members within society. Cyber-tech was defined by Leary as:
“the tools, appliances, and methodologies of knowing and communicating. Linguistics. Philosophy. Semantics. Semiotics. Practical epistemologies. The ontologies of daily life. Words, icons, pencils, printing presses, screens, keyboards, computers, disks.”
Leary, T. (1988). The Cyber-Punk: The Individual as Reality Pilot. Mississippi Review, 16(2/3), 265.
Cyber-tech was the central theme of my writing after graduating with my Master’s degree. Most of this writing was for the “42 Chronicles,” which was a bi-monthly posting of the forum of one of my gaming groups. Most of these posts still contained some of the artifacts of my inability to write clearly. I’m sort of glad that this content has disappeared in the ether of the online void.
However, I still like the phrase as a representation of my online work as I feel that I’m working through one of the last concepts that Leary referred to in his article, which was the cyber-political.
“Cyber-politics introduces the Foucauldian notions of the use of language and linguistic-tech by the ruling classes in Feudal and Industrial societies to control children, the uneducated and powerless individuals.”
Leary, T. (1988). The Cyber-Punk: The Individual as Reality Pilot. Mississippi Review, 16(2/3), 265.
I believe understanding how technology influences society, how influential members of society use technology to control culture, and how understanding this influence and control can help explain modern-day issues and attempt to promote the social good and reduce potential societal harms.