The prediction, in brief:

In the world that we cyborgs inhabit … the electronic retinas of our video cameras produce shifts and fragments. Rooms and buildings now have new kinds of apertures; the scenes that we see through the glass are rescaled and distant, the place on the other side may change from moment to moment, and the action may be a replay … Once, places were bounded by walls and horizons. Days were defined by sunrises and sunsets. But we video cyborgs see things differently. The Net has become a worldwide, time-zone-spanning optic nerve with electronic eyeballs at its endpoints.

Predictor: Mitchell, William J.

Prediction, in context:

In his 1994 book “City of Bits,” MIT computer scientist William J. Mitchell writes:”In the historic haunts of unaugmented humankind, space and time were continuous; a window divided inside from outside, but the very same place was always there on the other side, and there was no time difference across the glass. In the world that we cyborgs inhabit, though, the electronic retinas of our video cameras produce shifts and fragments. Rooms and buildings now have new kinds of apertures; the scenes that we see through the glass are rescaled and distant, the place on the other side may change from moment to moment, and the action may be a replay … Once, places were bounded by walls and horizons. Days were defined by sunrises and sunsets. But we video cyborgs see things differently. The Net has become a worldwide, time-zone-spanning optic nerve with electronic eyeballs at its endpoints.”

Biography:

William J. Mitchell was a professor and dean of architecture at MIT and the author of the predictive book “City of Bits: Space, Place and the Infobahn” (1994). He also taught at Harvard, Yale, Carnegie-Mellon and Cambridge Universities. (Research Scientist/Illuminator.)

Date of prediction: January 1, 1994

Topic of prediction: Community/Culture

Subtopic: Human-Machine Interaction

Name of publication: City of Bits

Title, headline, chapter name: Chapter 3: Cyborg Citizens

Quote Type: Direct quote

Page number or URL of document at time of study:
http://mitpress2.mit.edu/e-books/City_of_Bits/index.html

This data was logged into the Elon/Pew Predictions Database by: Anderson, Janna Quitney