Humanities 125 Main Page

College of San Mateo

Technology / Current Society / Human Values

Course Info


Course Description	Readings	Required Materials	Other Resources	Grading Info

Course Description

This is a course on the relation between Technology, Culture and Human Value. Ultimately, we will be examining the impact of technology on modern society and our lives. This will mean an informed, historical examination of human society. We will begin with some hisotical context. What is technology and its role in the development of human society? Then we will look at the development of technology and its impact on social institutions such as economics, philosophy, art, science and religion.

Syllabus Copy

Homework / Notebook update 1
Homework / Notebook update 2

Guns Germs and Steel Documentary (When you go to this site, look on the left under "Anthropology.")

Guns Germs and Steel Handout (Plants and Animals)

Gun Germs and Steel Handout Big Map of Ideas

Guns, Germs and Steel Handout (Types of Societies)

Sapolsky article on Monotheism v Polytheism

Sapolsky on OCD and Religion

The Power of Myth Part I. - Part II - Part III

Singularity Conference

Multi-tasking

Writing Center Workshops

ESL Workshops

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Required Materials

There are two required texts,

Ishmael, by Daniel Quinn, ABE Books

(There is a website devoted to the ideas in this text. http://www.ishmael.com/ )

Brave New World, by Aldous Huxley. ABE Books

There are three other texts of which you must choose one to read. They are

1) A Language Older Than Words by Derrick Jensen, ABE Books

(Derrick Jensen has a website with more of his writing. http://www.derrickjensen.org/

2) The Biotech Century by Jeremy Rifkin, and ABE Books

3) The McDonaldization of Society, by George Ritzer. ABE Books

In addition to my lectures and discussions of those ideas, we will read the first two novels together and discuss the ideas. The first two exams will contain questions that require knowledge of the books.

The third portion of the class will include group presentations. The groups will be created by the interests of the students on any approved topic.

You will also be required to keep a Humanities Notebook. There will be regular assignments made for the notebook given in class.

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Reading Order

Begin by reading Ishmael, by Daniel Quinn. The first exam will contain an essay question having you related the ideas of the book to the lectures.

Second, read Brave New World, by Aldous Huxley. The second exam will contain an essay question regarding this book.

Select and read one of the three recommended books. These will compose the information for the final exam.

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Here is a cool photo of a chalk drawing. Another

This is another. And a side view to prove it’s flat.

There are some web sites that are applicable to this class. (If you find others please let me know so that I can add them to this list. danielson@smccd.net )

Propaganda

Propaganda a Philosophy Talk interview with Orville Schell

Mother Jones Magazine

A film on Edward Bernays (It's called Century of the Self; it's the 1st of a 4 part documentary by Adam Curtis.

The Trap: Adam Curtis' documentary on game theory - Amazing

This website takes a critical look at Public Relations. http://www.prwatch.org/

This one monitors Multinational Corporations. http://www.essential.org/monitor/

This page has an article by Malcolm Gladwell on Cool Hunting.

Here is culture jamming headquarters. Adbusters

Exxon Secrets looks at the money links from Exxon to Anti-Global Warming Scientists
http://www.exxonsecrets.org/

They Rule.net shows the interlocking boards of directors
http://www.theyrule.net/

Columbia Journalism Review allows you to see what the Media Companies own.
http://www.cjr.org/tools/owners/

Science

Here is an article by Jared Diamond on Pandemics.

This three part video is well worth watching Part 1 (You will need to click on the other two once you are at the first one.)

This is an article on the uses of World Resources called "Tracking the Ecological Overshoot of the Human Economy"

This is an essay written by Bill Joy co-founder of Sun Microsystems that was published in Wired magazine.

A website on Nanotechnology

This one has scientific information on many topcs. http://www.fas.org/

This page graphically displays world economies.

Article on Bottom Trawling HERE

Sapolsky article on religions

Sapolsky on OCD and Religion

Here is a site that tests your biases. HERE

Medieval Help Desk

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Grading Info

(Each of the %'s are approximations to give relative values. There is a certain amount of ambiguity purposely included here.)

There will be three exams. The 1st is worth 10%, the 2nd is worth 30% and final is worth 10%. (50% of total)

There will be homework assignments/ unannounced quizzes worth 25% of the total. [See below for homework assignment due dates, read that section carefully.]

There will be a notebook for you to keep worth 10% of the total.

You will participate in a group presentation of a relevant topic which is worth 10% of the total.

Participation counts as 5% of the total grade.

A good reference on Plagiarism is located HERE

Extra Credit: Read one of the following books and write a 5 page summary analysis. This assignment is due by the last day of regular class meetings.

"Guns, Germs and Steel", Jared Diamond, W.W. Norton, New York, 1999

"Up From Eden" Ken Wilber, Quest Books, Wheaton, Ill, 1996

"Technopoly", Neil Postman, Vintage Books, New York, 1993

"The Cult of Information", Theodore Rozak, University of California Press, Berkeley, 1994

"In the Absence of the Sacred", Jerry Mander, Sierra Club Books, San Francisco, 1991

"Four Arguments Against Television", Jerry Mander, Quill Press, New York, 1978

"Fast Food Nation", Eric Schlosser, 2001

"One Nation Under Television", J. Fred MacDonald, Pantheon Books, New York 1990

"ADCULT USA", James B. Twitchell, Columbia University Press, New York,1996

"1984", George Orwell, New American Library Classics, New York, 1990

"Human Natures", Paul R. Erlich, Island Press, Washington D. C., 2000

"The Human Blueprint", Robert Shapiro, St. Martin's Press, New York, 1991

"The Double Helix", James Watson, New American Library, New York, 1968

"Genome", Matt Ridley, Harper Collins Publishers, New York, 1999

"Our Stolen Future", Theo Colburn Plume Penguin, New York, 1997

"Deadly Feasts", Richard Rhodes, Simon and Schuster, New York, 1997

"Spoiled", Nicols Fox, Books, New York, 1997

"The Coming Plague", Laurie Garrett, Farrar, Straus and Giroux, New York, 1994

"Silent Spring" , Rachel Carson, Houghton Miflin, Boston, 1962

"Manufacturing Consent", Noam Chomsky and Normal Soloman, Pantheon Books, New York,1988

"When Corporations Rule the Earth", David C. Korten, Berrett-Koehler Publishers Inc. San Francisco 1995

"The Case Against the Global Economy", Ed. Jerry Mander and Edward Goldsmith, Sierra Club Books, San Francisco, 1996

"Necessary Illusions", Noam Chomsky, South End Press, Boston, 1989

"Robot", Hans Moravic, Oxford University Press, New York, 1999

"The Age of Spiritual Machines", Ray Kurzveil, Viking Press, New York, 1999

"Faster", James Gleick, Pantheon Books, New York, 1999

"Silicon Snake Oil", Clifford Stoll, Anchor Books, New York, 1995

"Why Things Bite Back", Edward Tenner, Alfred A. Knopf, New York, 1996

"The Web of Life", Fritjof Capra, Anchor Books, New York, 1996

"The Turning Point", Fritjof Capra, Bantam Books, Toronto, 1982

"Trust Us We're Experts", Sheldon Rampton and John Stauber, Tarcher/Putnam, New York, 2001

"The Image", Daniel Boorstein, Vintage Books, New York 1992

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Date of last update 1/13/09

Direct Questions or comments about this page to danielson@smccd.net

This page was developed and is maintained for the Collegeof San Mateo by the Philosophy Dept.