I love the pervasive public privacy worshipped in Seattle. The rudest people in my everyday life are those who intrude upon me in any way, with their loud voices or their body odor or- god forbid- by physically contacting me. The privacy of any individual in a public environment is sacred. This privacy is wonderfully facilitated
by the iPod and the iPhone. By closing off the auditory portion of potential interaction, the level of public privacy increases tenfold. Every day is made more manageable by this small closing off of an avenue of interaction. The other senses are all that's left to eliminate before true social harmony can be achieved. While sight is relatively essential to moving around and being productive in day to day life, perhaps touch can be eliminated from interaction. Specially designed suits could make it so that individuals could feel things in a public environment only for entertainment. I'll let your mind consider the ramifications of such technology. Smell can also obviously be seconded into the realm of private entertainment in a public environment. Roses, chocolate, feet, whatever one might prefer to smell over that dirty bum three rows ahead who peed his jeans in a drunken haze six days earlier and hadn't bothered to change clothes since. Unless he's what you want to smell, which would always be an option. Taste... That's a fun one. Eating that tbone all the way home while riding the 49 up the hill would be too tempting for most of us, especially if the sensation of food in the mouth could be properly falsified. Mmm...

Successfully existing in a large, closely-interlinked society relies on an extremely well-developed internal universe. This works well in Japanese culture, and is easily facilitated by modern technology. The iPod and iPhone are obvious examples of this. If the other senses can be equally coopted, harmony would be inevitable.

Posted with LifeCast