To be is to be seen. This statement as it relates to what is public and private and consequently to the dynamic of power is particularly interesting. Windows, originally designed to allow light to enter a home, now exhibit less of their elementary function and are instead more simply a vestige of an old custom. Is the existence of windows anything more than a tradition? Do they serve any other purpose? While not as practical a function as lighting a home, windows do serve to illuminate something else. In Thomas Keenan’s Windows of Vulnerability and Bentham’s Panopticon it is suggested that windows can be utilized, in the form of a structure they reference as a panopticon, to exert power over individuals who might otherwise behave in a way considered unacceptable by society. It is thus implied that without this threat of being seen, these individuals would do exactly what the panopticon prevents, that which is unacceptable. The necessity of the threat of observation in order to exert control over human beings implies either a flaw in the power trying to be exercised, or an inherent flaw in humans themselves.

In the panopticon, it is theorized that the inmates need the threat of constant observation in order to facilitate the development of a self-regulated sense of proper behavior. Consequently, it is implied that without this threat the conduct of the inmates would be opposite, they would descend into anarchic behavior. Keenan references Bentham’s Panopticon in his Windows of Vulnerability describing this phenomenon,

Unverifiable: the inmate must never know whether he is currently being looked on; but he must always be sure that he may always be seen… He who is subjected to a field of visibility and who knows it, assumes responsibility for the constraints of power; he makes them play spontaneously upon himself; he inscribes in himself the power relation in which he simultaneously plays both roles; he becomes the principle of his own subjection (Keenan, 128).

The concept of the panopticon as it relates to control can be extended to the dynamic of power as it acts in society. In the metaphor, the central tower serves to represent the governing body with its rules and regulations while the inmates in the surrounding cells represent the governed. In society, if there were no consequence for certain actions of self interest there would be nothing preventing people from indulging in such actions. The speed limit is a good example of this dynamic at play. If one could drive as fast as he or she wanted there would be nothing preventing them from driving at speeds that put not only their own life at risk, but also endangered the lives of the other people using the road. These types of behavior, ones that do not take into account the negative externality they inflict on a third party, result in inefficiencies in society. The goal of any society can be indisputably summarized as maximizing efficiency, and therefore it is quite apparent that self-indulgent behavior is not beneficial to society. To this end it can be concluded that, since the governing body acts in the best interest of the people, there is nothing wrong with such regulations. If there is nothing wrong with the regulations, this leaves one remaining option; there is something inherently wrong with the people being governed. To return to the example, even when there might not be a police officer present in the vicinity, generally people tend to abide by the rules of the road. When under surveillance, “If they are madmen there is no risk of them committing violence upon one another; if they are school children there is no risk of copying, no noise, no chatter, no waste of time; if they are workers, there are no disorders, no theft, no coalitions, none of those distractions that slow down the rate of work, make it less perfect or cause accidents” (Bentham 60-64). It is thus only in spaces where the “window of vulnerability” is removed that true human nature is unveiled.

One of such spaces where the actions of the individual cannot be monitored and hence controlled by the rules of society is virtual space such as that created by the “second life” application. In such a space, there are no consequences for impulsive, self-interest-oriented actions. When section is held in “real life,” the setting is very controlled; the section leader runs the discussion, students raise their hands when they have something to say that is relevant to the discussion but otherwise remain obediently quiet. When section was held in the second life application, the section leader had absolutely no control over the conversations taking place. People could talk out of turn and about whatever they wanted whenever they wanted with no ramifications. This type of behavior, while harmless when taking place in second life, is no different than natural human behavior in a real world not subjected to rules and accountability. Without the system of a governing body people act in such a way that propels furthest personal benefit.

Since rules enforced by the government can generally be proven to act in the best interest of a society, the only remaining conclusion is that humans are inherently bad. The need for a government to ensure that people do not act in ways that harm others proves that humans as a whole are flawed. If humans were inherently good, there would be no need for a government; society would simply run itself in its own best interest. However, this type of society requires the opposite of natural human behavior, self-sacrifice instead of greed. In a perfect world there would be no need for the power dynamics as outlined in Windows of Vulnerability and Panopticism, but we do not live in a perfect world.

Assignment 1

Starring a Text:

1) Of Other Spaces * Is he referring to a space outside of where his audience is presently? Or does he instead imply that the spaces he will speak of are completely outside the realm of human understanding? It could be possible he may even talk about “other space” as outer space which would be an interesting way of differentiating the space two spaces despite the fact that they are inherently one and the same.

2) The nineteenth century found its essential mythological resources in the second principle of thermaldynamics- * I would assume that by thermaldynamics Foucault is referring to thermodynamics. Following this logic it is assumed that he is talking about the second principle of thermodynamics, one that outlines entropy, a constant move from order to disorder. An attempt must be made at understanding what he refers to as “mythological resources.” If the phrase is to be taken literally we can say that the source material for mythology during the 19^th century was somehow tied to entropy. However, for most the word “mythology” does not signify the 19^th century, it instead signifies ancient Greek or Roman mythology. Therefore Foucault must be addressing something else. It must be instead that he is referring to entropy itself as the myth of the 19^th century.

3) The present epoch will perhaps be above all the epoch of space * How can only the present time be the time of space? Space and time are intertwined in what has been labeled as the space-time continuum. ** Referring to the present as the “epoch of space” forces one to wonder what happened during the time before space. Will there be time after space? In this sentence Foucault has disassociated time and space. Dissociating the two calls into question the irreversibly linear notion of time. If there was a time before space then there must also be a time after space at which point the space that we live in will no longer exist. So if space has a beginning and an end, it can be thought of as anything else that has a beginning and an end. The street you drive your car down has a beginning and it has an end. You, the driver of your car are free to drive forwards or, perhaps illegally, drive backwards along this road. What is to prevent space itself from moving however it desires forwards and backwards along its own road or timeline, just as we are capable of moving freely within our own space? Take a one-dimensional object on a line. In this case as the line moves along a plane it experiences changes, the one-dimensional being would consider these changes that occur as it moves alone the plane to be time passing. But is “time” in the sense that we define it really going by? What a one-dimensional being would consider to be the entirety of its existence a two-dimensional being would consider as an instant in its own concept of time. A moment in time is the instant at which everything in the universe takes place, but at the next instant, is the previous instant really replaced and gone forever? In a two-dimensional universe, this instant would be a massive plane. As the instants of time proceed in two dimensions, the plane changes and defines a new plane. As the successive planes are stacked the two-dimensional universe’s concept of time unravels and a three dimensional space is defined. Even though the two-dimensional universe exists in three-dimensions, a two-dimensional being cannot step out of the plane of its own existence and peer down at a moment (a plane) of “two-dimensional time” and watch it unravel. But couldn’t a human, a three-dimensional being look around in this three dimensional space defined by the two dimensional universe’s passing of “two-dimensional time” and see the beginning middle and end of its existence? So as “time” went by each successive instant of two-dimensional time did not replace the previous, it merely built upon it. Now extend this analysis another step. Every moment in the three-dimensional universe is a cube, sphere, or whatever three-dimensional object you like. As time as we know it unravels this three-dimensional space changes and a new space is defined. So isn’t the entirety of the existence of the three-dimensional universe defining a four-dimensional space? To this end, every moment of time that happened before, and every moment of time that has yet to come, already exists in this four-dimensional space.

4) We are in the epoch of simultaneity * so while we exist in our moment of three-dimensional time, every other moment of three-dimensional time is happening simultaneously. Every moment from the big bang, the “bottom,” so to speak, of the four-dimensional space, all the way to the end of the universe, the “top,” if you will, of the four-dimensional space. If this is the case, could not a four-dimensional being look around in this entire space defined by our concept of time and see the beginning middle and end? Could this being not move freely around in this four-dimensional space? The frightening consequence of this idea is that it subjects to the concept of fate. If everything we have yet to experience is already defined in a four-dimensional space-time then we really have no say in our decisions, they have already been made for us.

5) we are in the epoch of juxtaposition, the epoch of the near and far, of the side-by-side, of the dispersed. We are at a moment. * We are merely a consciousness that connects consecutive instants of the three-dimensional universe; the result of these consecutive instants of three-dimensions is what defines who we are and our understanding of time.