The document discusses directed research on how humans engage with and process the physical world versus virtual experiences. It covers topics like how the brain receives and processes sensory information, how we interact with the physical world through our senses and socially, our online experiences, the impacts of technology and modern society, why we take risks, and philosophical perspectives on defining the self. The document provides an extensive list of references and proposes a project to explore interventions for experiencing the physical world in a technology-dominated age through meditation, tactile experiences, social interaction, and sensory documentation and experimentation.

1. DIRECTED RESEARCH
Real and Spectacular
Modern Life and the Classic Universe
Michael Silber | Professor Tom Klinkowstein

2. Hypothesis
I hypothesize that the screen-world and technologically-
mediated experience will never supplant the classic universe.
Our five senses engage and ground us in the pleasures and
pain of the physical world, asserting our mortality and the
wonder of life. Technology cannot match the alluring tactility
and thrilling volatility of the classic universe, and therefore
cannot alone satisfy our human wants and urges. We break
boundaries in pursuit of our desires and we challenge
what exists for the possibility of what could be. Although
technology has become deeply integrated with our lives, it
can only simulate these risks and rewards. We will never
become machines, because our wants and urges–our desires
and pleasures–lead us to impulsive illogical action; the thrill
overcomes our rationality.

3. 1. Image Processing and Cognitive Activity
What is happening in the brain as we receive sensory
information? How is this information processed?
A. How the Brain Receives Imagery Through Vision
• Gregory, R., 1966, Eye and Brain, London: Weidenfeld and Nicolson.
• Spivey, M.J., Richardson, D.C., Tyler, M.J., and E.E. Young, 2000,
“Eye movements during comprehension of spoken scene descrip-
tions,” Proceedings of the 22nd Annual Conference of the Cognitive
Science
Society Meeting, 487–492.
• Milner, D. and Goodale, M.A. (1995). The Visual Brain in Action. New
York: Oxford University Press.
B. How the Brain Processes Information
i. Areas of the Brain and Their Cognitive Function
• Block, N. (1983). Mental pictures and cognitive science. Philosophical
Review, 92, 499–541.
• Hirschfeld, L.A., and S.A. Gelman, 1994, (eds.), Mapping the mind: Domain
specificity in cognition and culture, New York: Cambridge University Press.

4. ii. Neuroscience / Cognitive Psychology
• Anderson, J., 2010. Cognitive Psychology and its Implications , 7th
edn., New York: Worth.
• Clark, A., 2008. Supersizing the Mind: Embodiment, Action, and Cog-
nitive Extension, New York: Oxford University Press.
• Lakoff, G., and M. Johnson, 1980, Metaphors We Live By, Chicago:
University of Chicago Press.
• Garson, James, “Connectionism”, The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philoso-
phy (Winter 2010 Edition), Edward N. Zalta (ed.), URL = <http://plato.
stanford.edu/archives/win2010/entries/connectionism/>.
• Von Eckardt, B., 2005, “Connectionism and the Propositional Attitudes,”
in C. Erneling and D. Johnson (eds.), The Mind as a Scientific Object: Be-
tween Brain and Culture, New York: Oxford University Press
• Pascual-Leone, A., and R.H. Hamilton, 2001, “The metamodal organiza-
tion of the brain,” Progress in Brain Research, 134: 427–445.
• Thompson E., 2007, Mind and Life, Cambridge, MA: Harvard University
Press.
• Smith, L.B., and E. Thelen, 2003, “Development as dynamic system,”
Trends in Cognitive Science, 7 (8): 343–348.

5. 2. Physical World – The Classic Universe
How do we engage with the physical world and the
objects and people within it?
A. Conceptions of Time
B. Real Imagery
C. Social and Physical Engagement
• Rizzolatti, G., Fogassi, L., and V. Gallese, 2001, “Neurophysiological
mechanisms underlying the understanding and imitation of action,”
Nature Neuroscience Review, 2: 661–670.
• Rizzolatti, G. and Sinigaglia, C. (2008). Mirrors in the brain: how our
minds share actions, emotions. Oxford University Press.
• Tsakiris, M., Hesse, M.D., Boy, C., Haggard, P., and G.R. Fink, 2007,
“Neural signatures of body ownership: A sensory network for bodily
self-consciousness,” Cerebral Cortex, 17: 2235–2244.
• Waller, D., Lippa, Y., and A. Richardson, 2008, “Isolating observer-
based reference directions in human spatial memory: Head, body,
and the self-to-array axis,” Cognition, 106: 157–183.

6. D. Reception/Perception of Sensory Information
i. Sight
ii. Smell
iii. Touch,
iv. Hearing,
v. Taste
vi. Tactile experience.
• Pecher, D., and R.A. Zwaan, (eds.), 2005, Grounding cognition.
The role of perception and action in memory, language, and thinking,
Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

7. 3. Screen World / Observed Experience
What kind of experiences and relationships do we have
in our online and technology–mediated experience?
• Rizzolatti, G., Fogassi, L., and V. Gallese, 2001, “Neurophysiological
mechanisms underlying the understanding and imitation of action,”
Nature Neuroscience Review, 2: 661–670.
A. Conceptions of Time.
B. Screen Imagery
C. Exploration
- Information Retrieval and Data Consumption
D. Online Experience - Expansive not Immersive
E. Online Relationships and Socialization
• Virtual Friendship,” Ethics and Information technology, DOI: 10.1007/
s10676-012-9294-x

8. 4. How Technological Advancements and
Modern Society Impact our Processing
What is the impact of modern and future technology
on our relationships and our position in the world?
A. Social Changes
i. A Newly Connected World
a. Urban Development–Larger Groups Living Together
ii. Transportation Systems Allowing Global Travel
b. Impact of Fast Delivery Systems
c. Global Reach of Online Media
B. Artificial Intelligence
• Christian, Brian. 2011. The most human human: what talking with
computers teaches us about what it means to be alive. New York:
Doubleday.
• Gelernter, D., 2007, “Artificial Intelligence Is Lost in the Woods,” Tech-
nology Review, July/August, pp. 62–70. http://www.technologyreview.
com/article/408171/artificial-intelligence-is-lost-in-the-woods/

9. • Simon, H.A., 1995, “Machine as mind,” in Android epistemology,
K.M., Ford, C. Glymour, and P.J. Hayes (eds.), Cambridge, MA: MIT
Press, pp. 23–40.
• Simon, H.A. (1983). Search and reasoning in problem solving. Artifi-
cial Intelligence, 21, 7-29.
• Turing, A. M., 1948, “Machine Intelligence”, in B. Jack Copeland, The
Essential Turing: The ideas that gave birth to the computer age, Ox-
ford: Oxford University Press.
C. Augmented Reality Transhumanism/
Posthumanism and Genetic Modification
• Singularity Hub: http://singularityhub.com.
• Kurzweil, R., 2006. The Singularity is Near, New York: Penguin Press.
• Bedau, M. and E. Parke (eds.), 2009, The Ethics of Protocells: Moral and
Social Implications of Creating Life in the Laboratory, Cambridge: MIT Press.
D. Interaction Design Implications

10. 5. Human Folly–Risks, Thrills, & Misbehavior
Why do we take risks? And how does our irrational
behavior define our human experience?
A. Risks Philosophy/Psychology
• Prinz, J.J., 2004, Gut reactions: A perceptual theory of emotion, New
York: Oxford University Press.
• Schnall, S., Haidt, J., Clore, G.L., and A.H. Jordan, 2008a, “Disgust as
Embodied Moral Judgment,” Personality and Social Psychology Bulle-
tin, 34 (8): 1096–1109.
• Shrader-Frechette, K., 1991, Risk and Rationality. Philosophical Foun-
dations for Populist Reforms, Berkeley: University of California Press.
• Thomson, J.J., 1985, “Imposing Risks”, in To Breathe Freely, Mary
Gibson (ed.), Totowa, NJ: Rowman and Allanheld, 124–140.
B. Thrills/Misbehaviors
i. Adventure Sports: Sky-Diving, Base Jumping, Bungee
Jumping, Running with the Bulls, Smoking, Drugs and
Alcohol, Promiscuity, Overeating, Marriage..

11. 6. Philosophical Explorations
Phenomenology, Embodied Cognition, Bodily
Awareness, and Transcendentalism all seek to
understand and define our place in the world and
how we interact with it. How do we define the self?
And how do our perceptions of the world define us?
A. Phenomenology
• Bachelard, Gaston, and M. Jolas. 1994. The Poetics of Space. Bos-
ton: Beacon
• Heidegger, Martin. 1962. Being and time. New York: Harper.
• Hildebrand, Grant. 1999. Origins of architectural pleasure. Berkeley:
University of California Press.
• Merleau-Ponty, Maurice.1962. Phenomenology of Perception, Colin
Smith (trans.), New York: Humanities Press.
• Merleau-Ponty, Maurice.1964.The Primacy of Perception, J.M. Edie
(ed.), Evanston: Northwestern University Press.

12. B. Embodied Cognition
• Clark, A., 1997, Being There: Putting Mind, Body, and World Together
Again, Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.
• Lakoff, George, and Mark Johnson, 2003, Metaphors We Live By, 2nd
ed., Chicago and London: University of Chicago Press.
• Lakoff, G., 1987, Women, Fire, and Dangerous Things: What Catego-
ries Reveal About the Mind, Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
• Rupert, R., 2009b, Cognitive Systems and the Extended Mind, Oxford
University Press.
• Shapiro, L., 2011, Embodied Cognition. New York: Routledge.
• Varela, F., Thompson, E. and E. Rosch, 1991, The Embodied Mind:
Cognitive Science and Human Experience, Cambridge, MA: MIT
Press.
• Wilson, R.A., 2010, “Extended Vision,” in Perception, Action and Con-
sciousness, N. Gangopadhyay, M. Madary, and F. Spicer (eds.), New
York: Oxford University Press.

13. C. Bodily Awareness
• de Vignemont, Frédérique, “Bodily Awareness”, The Stanford Encyclo-
pedia of Philosophy (Fall 2011 Edition), Edward N. Zalta (ed.), URL =
<http://plato.stanford.edu/archives/fall2011/entries/bodily-awareness/>.
• Berlucchi, G. and Aglioti, S. (1997). The body in the brain: neural bases
of corporeal awareness. Trends in neuroscience, 20 (12), 560–564.
• Bermudez, J.L. (1998). The paradox of self-consciousness. Cam-
bridge: MIT Press.
• Bermudez, J.L. (2005). The phenomenology of bodily awareness. In
D. Woodruff Smith and A. Thomasson (eds.), Phenomenology and
philosophy of mind. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 295–316.
• Brewer, B. (1995). Bodily awareness and the self. In J.L. Bermudez, T. Mar-
cel, N. Eilan, (eds), The body and the self. Cambridge (Mass.): MIT Press.
• Carman, T. (1999). The Body in Husserl and Merleau-Ponty. Philo-
sophical topics, 27, 2, 205–226.
• Feinberg, T. E. (2009). From axons to identity: Neurological explora-
tions of the nature of the self. New York: WW Norton.
• Legrand, D. (2006). The bodily self. The sensori-motor roots of pre-
reflexive self-consciousness. Phenomenology and the Cognitive Sci-
ences (5), 89–118.

14. D. Transcendentalism
• Walden; or, Life in the Woods, ed. Jeffrey Cramer, New Haven: Yale
University Press, 2004. Originally published in 1854. Parenthetical
citations indicate with roman numerals which of Walden’s 18 chapters
is the source of each quotation.
• Emerson, Ralph Waldo, 1993, “Nature,” in Essays: First and Second
Series, ed. John Gabriel Hunt, New York: Gramercy / Library of Free-
dom, 282–297. Originally published in 1836.
E. Other Philosophy
• Descartes, René. 1965. Discourse on Method, Optics, Geometry, and
Meteorology, trans. Paul J. Olscamp. Indianapolis: Bobbs-Merrill. Origi-
nally published in French in 1637.
• Freud, Sigmund. 1994. Civilization and its Discontents. New York: Do-
ver Publications.
• Sartre, J.P., 1943, Being and Nothingness, trans. H.E. Barnes. New
York: Philosophical Library [1956].

15. 7. Project Proposal
A. Questions
B. Goals
C. Exploring Modes of Intervention
in a Technologically Dominated World
i. Meditation/Introspection
ii. Tactile Experience
iii. Non-Programmed Time/Going Off the Grid
iv. Creative Exercises - Writing, Drawing, Making, Building
v. Social Interaction - Experience/Experimentation

16. D. Implementation/Applications
i. Interactive Design
ii. Sensory Deprivation/Enhancement/Distortion
iii. Optical Illusion
iv. Virtual Reality Simulation
v. Revisioning of the Self - Voice/ Image Alteration
vi. Explorations in Sensory Documentation
a. Biological Signals
-heart-rate, brain-waves, perspiration, stress level, mood
b. Writing/Drawing about Sensory Experience
c. Rating/Charting/Graphing Experience
d. Cognitive Performance Tests
8. Conclusion