discourse brunch | jasmi.news 🌻 from counterculture to cyberculture (ft. fred turner)
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Jul 23, 2025 Fred Turner, a Stanford Professor and historian of Silicon Valley culture, dives into the fascinating history of the intersection between technology and counterculture. He discusses the evolution of cyberculture, touching on how the ideals of 1960s hippies transformed into today's digital utopianism. Topics include the corporatization of everyday life, the dynamics of dating apps, and the cultural origins of Burning Man. Turner also critiques the shift in Silicon Valley from libertarianism to corporate control, advocating for the importance of humanities in navigating our tech-driven society.
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Two 60s Countercultures
- The 1960s counterculture split into the new left focused on political activism and new communalists focused on technology and escaping politics.
- New communalists saw technology as a means for individual growth and community building, contrasting with the political activism of the new left.
Whole Earth Catalog as Proto-Internet
- The Whole Earth Catalog manifested a vision of the world as accessible information curated for personal growth.
- It was a precursor to the internet, revealing social networks and providing tools for self-improvement.
Disembodiment Limits Empathy
- Immersive, screen-based media foster disembodiment for privileged groups, distancing them from realities like war.
- This disembodiment causes tech communities to experience warfare abstractly, lacking empathy for bodily harm.
