Thursday 10 January 2013

Where is #Cyberspace

Someone recently asked me where cyberspace is.

I will reply by asking where are these words? To answer my question I will highlight how these words are simultaneously at endlessly varying points around the globe, they are in homes, offices, cinemas, on trains, buses, and walking down the street. So these words seem to occupy a significantly different spatial position to normal words. These words are not written traditionally with ink. The computational construction and transmission of these words via artificial electronic devices constitutes the foundations of cyberspace.

Consider your online profile picture, your avatar, which is connected to your digital presence, it is in my home and many other homes, furthermore the digital you can vary in size from approximately 1cm square to 8cm. The digital you can also fill an entire screen. Humans can not exist in normal space as pixels or squares therefore clearly your digital personality exists in a spatial dimension decidedly different to normal spatial existence. Cyberspace could be called a "cloud" but this is not the typical definition of a cloud, it is not a natural cloud regarding precipitation. The usage of "cloud" to describe cyberspace is appropriate due to the amorphous constantly changing shape of cyberspace.

This new reality we are contemplating is everywhere and nowhere. Some people call our current cyberspace a rudimentary virtual reality to distinguish it from normal reality, note also the definition of a personal profile picture being an avatar, there is clearly something decidedly different happening with reality regarding cyberspace. When virtual worlds and real worlds intermesh we call it augmented reality. Cyberspace is a new type of reality for a new type of human interaction, which some people call Transhumanism. Transhumanism is significant technological argumentation of human abilities via artificial methods.

Our new cyber-spatial reality exists collectively on all devices, in electricity, on servers, in processors, in computational memory, on hard drives, in phone lines, and in our minds where all concepts are constructed.

Hopefully I have helped you understand the meaning and location of cyberspace. Dictionaries are also helpful for understanding new words, therefore if you are continuing to struggle then note these definitions:

http://www.thefreedictionary.com/cyberspace
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cyberspace
http://www.thefreedictionary.com/cyber-
http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/cyber
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transhumanism
http://oxforddictionaries.com/definition/english/transhumanism
http://www.thefreedictionary.com/Transhuman
http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/virtual%20reality
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cloud_computing
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Self-image#Residual_self-image

The Free Dictionary provides a good definition of avatar, which also mentions cyberspace:

Avatar: "3. (Electronics & Computer Science / Computer Science) a movable image that represents a person in a virtual reality environment or in cyberspace."

If you have more questions on this topic then please post to Singularity Thinkers.

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