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But if we are in a moment of resistance, we should be wary of the
possibility that we are also experiencing disavowal. As I stated before,
new media is regarded as an aesthetics of infinity. And this seems
consistent with a desire to stress our own self-consciousness. Our
senses of self depend on some sense of interplay between ourselves and
the world. New media's interactive aspect seems to provide us with a
representation of this desire for self. There is a sense that the hype
of having access to limitless amounts of information is also a
possibility, more than just hype. What is interesting about this vision
is that the form of the computers, the machines through which such
experiences are even possible, are regarded as detached from the
experiences. Such forms as virtual reality include a paradoxical desire
for unmediated representation. At the end of such a project is the
erasure of the mythic aspect of unmediated experience.
![focus](../img/sb_focus.gif) focus
By remaining attentive to the interfaces between our bodies and
machines, we maintain responsiveness to the limits of representations,
while at the same time acknowledging their power. We might also be
attuned to the material conditions of their production. This would
entail placing in relation to the "clean" interpretation that we have of
computer work, the dirt associated with their production. The obsessive
attention paid to having such places as "clean rooms" in the production
of computer chips and other components draws attention to the toxicity
which is produced alongside such devices, threatening our environment
and our bodies, not just our semiconductors.
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