Sign in with Facebook
Loading...
403rd out of 436 books
—
960 voters
TechGnosis: Myth, Magic & Mysticism in the Age of Information
by
Erik Davis
“A most informative account of a culture whose secular concerns continue to collide with their supernatural flip-side.”—Voice Literary Supplement
In this dazzling book, writer and cyber guru Erik Davis demonstrates how religious imagination, magical dreams and millennialist fervor have always permeated the story of technology. Through shamanism to Gnosticism, voodoo to alch...more
In this dazzling book, writer and cyber guru Erik Davis demonstrates how religious imagination, magical dreams and millennialist fervor have always permeated the story of technology. Through shamanism to Gnosticism, voodoo to alch...more
Paperback, 372 pages
Published
March 1st 2005
by Five Star
(first published 1998)
Friend Reviews
To see what your friends thought of this book,
please sign up.
Community Reviews
(showing
1-30
of
499)
In this 1998 book, Davis traces the reciprocal relationship between information media and apocalyptic aspirations both spiritual and secular, beginning with the handwritten codices of the early Christians, through the 19th-century 'internet' of telegraphy, up to the state of the World Wide Web and persisting dreams of networked virtual reality at the end of the 20th century. Along the way, we see that the messages perceived by those with eyes to see remain much the same, whether their medium is...more
Drawing a connection between the human quest for transcendence and spiritual oneness through belief/religion and technology, Davis presents an incredible amount of theory, philosophy, history, and research from ancient times, when the latest technology was cave drawings, to the relative present. Written in 1998, the book's descriptions of online gaming, virtual reality, and the Internet is sometimes comical, but it's also a great reminder of just how fast technology develops when building on its...more
I first read this shortly after it came out, but I have periodically been back to it and I think it's still as relevant as when it came out - which is no mean feat for a book that deals with a fast-moving area like technology. I think the reason it has stood the test of time so well has to do with its focus on our own attitudes to technology (as much as on the technology itself). We like to think of ourselves as having attained a level of sophistication that has taken us beyond the kind of primi...more
One of my all time favorite books, though I do agree with some of the criticisms I have read - Erik Davis chooses to show examples that support his ideas on the links between spirituality and technology/media, but never really puts in any solid conclusions. Also, the language can be fairly dense. It's worth the effort though, and manages to get my mind rattling off a million ideas a minute, every time I read it.
I got to the end of this book like one of those staggering marathon runners who collapse just after they've made it past the finish line. So breathlessly in love with its subjects, and so full of labrynthine and endless sentences. I now resemble one of those constricting snakes right after it's eaten some giant, unfortunate mammal. I'm just going to rest here for awhile until I can metabolize some of this. Peace!
Less satisfying than I'd hoped. Though Erik Davis makes the case that technology and spirituality are and have been inextricably linked throughout human history, he doesn't really offer a theory as to why this is so or take a position on whether this is a good or a bad thing. I would have preferred less of his supporting his argument and more analysis of it.
Dense book with complicated ideas and deep meanings. Makes me question the importance of eloquence when meaning is possible to be lost in the transmittance. TechGnosis shows how technology, digital media and computers have not made magic and mysticism obsolete but merely replaced them with something else, at times proving themselves to be great catalyst for the fusion of the two worlds (like technopaganism or scientology). Unfortunately, I can't remember much of it book because of the way it's w...more
This book is an essential new frame of reference, managing to expose the relationship between spirituality and technology that has never been absent... More: http://dreamflesh.com/reviews/techgno...
One of my all-time favorite books, Techgnosis traces the weirder elements of information culture, from ancient roots to subcultural foundations.
Love this book.
This book is the jam.
Davis doesn't really pose a single hypothesis so much as gather and articulate the historical relationship between mysticism and technology.
This is one of those books that introduces you to all the left-field thinkers you need to have read. And it offers a compelling mythology about the nature of this monkey man -- we've been using tools to make better tools for so long... what are we really building?
Davis doesn't really pose a single hypothesis so much as gather and articulate the historical relationship between mysticism and technology.
This is one of those books that introduces you to all the left-field thinkers you need to have read. And it offers a compelling mythology about the nature of this monkey man -- we've been using tools to make better tools for so long... what are we really building?
A wide-ranging and open-minded examination of the subtle and not-so-subtle spicing and splicing effects that esoteric impulses have had on technology developments. Given the rapid pace of technology evolution, some of the content and observations are already a bit outdated (published in 1998), yet still thought-provoking and retrospectively relevant.
Emerson called Spiritualism,"the rat hole of revelation."
"Both religion and the occult derive much of their power from simultaneously stimulating and managing dread -- the anxieties that dog the perpetually shifting boundaries of the self, and especially the ultimate borderland of death..." Erik Davis.
"Both religion and the occult derive much of their power from simultaneously stimulating and managing dread -- the anxieties that dog the perpetually shifting boundaries of the self, and especially the ultimate borderland of death..." Erik Davis.
perhaps dated at this point (with regard to the tech info) , but still an interesting read for anyone into the holistic science of occult interconnected-ness that has to be the science of this century if we're to have any shot...Davis is captivating.
i need to re-read this .... my signed copy from carmen all mouldy from island hopping <3
You won't look at your computer the same way. Wands and cups my ass.
Erik Davis has proposed that forms of communication shape social and individual consciousness of reality. IMHO, Techgnosis is worth another look now that social media (Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, etc.) has spread so rampantly across our culture. The tracks of what we have followed tends now to define what is presented to us.
Jun 15, 2013
Netz
marked it as to-read
Jun 13, 2013
Sarah
marked it as to-read
Jun 10, 2013
Magdalena
marked it as to-read
Jun 10, 2013
Dean
marked it as to-read
Jun 06, 2013
James Murphy
marked it as to-read
May 31, 2013
Amber Martingale
marked it as to-read
May 25, 2013
Pearl
is currently reading it
May 22, 2013
Georgiana
marked it as to-read
May 15, 2013
Alex
marked it as to-read
May 12, 2013
Rodrigo Barbosa
marked it as to-read
There are no discussion topics on this book yet.
Be the first to start one »
