How Are These Machines Changing Our Lives?

(This is part three in a five-part series called Interconnected, detailing how technology is changing humanity.)

Do you know how much sleep you got last night? How much of it was REM sleep? What was your heart rate? Should you be worried if it was high? Just how fit are you, exactly?

Many of us know more about ourselves—from exercise habits, to vital signs, to where we go and how fast we get there—than any humans in history. What are we doing with that knowledge? It can empower us to change our habits, or it can help us give into our more anxious impulses. What happens when we fully quantify ourselves?

GUEST: Natasha Schull, cultural anthropologist and associate professor in the Department of Media, Culture, and Communication at New York University. Her second book, Keeping Track, explores the relationship between an individual self and her personal data by exploring the advance of digital data-gathering techniques, like wearables.

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