{"title":"Life Online","description":"","products":[{"product_id":"quarterly-essay-72-paperback","title":"Net Loss; QE72 by Sebastian Smee","description":"\u003cp\u003eWe live in an age of constant distraction. Is there a price to pay for this?\u003c\/p\u003e\r\n\r\n\u003cp\u003eIn this superb essay, renowned critic Sebastian Smee explores the fate of the inner life in the age of the internet. Throughout history, artists and thinkers have cultivated the deep self, and seen value in solitude and reflection. But today, with social media, wall-to-wall marketing and the agitation of modern life, everything feels illuminated, transparent. We feel bereft without our phones and their cameras and the feeling of instant connectivity. It gets hard to pick up a book, harder still to stay with it.\u003c\/p\u003e\r\n\r\n\u003cp\u003eWithout nostalgia or pessimism, Sebastian Smee guides us from the apparent fullness of the app-filled world to a more complex sense of self. Considering everything from Facebook to Chekhov, he evokes what is valuable and under threat. If we lose the inner life, Smee asks, what do we lose of ourselves? \u003cbr\u003e\r\n \u003cbr\u003e\r\n“Every day I spend hours and hours on my phone . . . We are all doing it, aren’t we? It has come to feel completely normal. Even when I put my device aside and attach it to a charger, it pulses away in my mind, like the throat of a toad, full of blind, amphibian appetite.” Sebastian Smee, \u003cem\u003eNet Loss\u003c\/em\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\r\n\r\n\u003cp\u003e \u003c\/p\u003e\r\n\r\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eCorrespondence discussing Quarterly Essay 72, \u003cem\u003eNet Loss\u003c\/em\u003e:\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\r\n\r\n\u003cul\u003e\r\n\t\u003cli\u003e\u003ca href=\"https:\/\/www.quarterlyessay.com.au\/correspondence\/corresondence-bri-lee\"\u003eBri Lee\u003c\/a\u003e\u003c\/li\u003e\r\n\t\u003cli\u003e\u003ca href=\"https:\/\/www.quarterlyessay.com.au\/correspondence\/correspondence-briohny-doyle\"\u003eBriohny Doyle\u003c\/a\u003e\u003c\/li\u003e\r\n\t\u003cli\u003e\u003ca href=\"https:\/\/www.quarterlyessay.com.au\/correspondence\/correspondence-raimond-gaita\"\u003eRaimond Gaita\u003c\/a\u003e\u003c\/li\u003e\r\n\u003c\/ul\u003e\r\n","brand":"QE","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":39460767891591,"sku":"9781760640712","price":29.99,"currency_code":"AUD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0313\/7211\/6103\/products\/qe72_cover_online_b0b023ae-663a-4d64-a09c-08fef344beb3.jpg?v=1625796780"},{"product_id":"how-to-do-nothing-resisting-the-attention-economypaperback","title":"How To Do Nothing by Jenny Odell","description":"\u003cp\u003eA galvanising critique of the forces vying for our attention – and our personal information – that redefines what we view as productivity and reveals what we’ve been too distracted to see about ourselves and our world. \u003cbr\u003e\n \u003cbr\u003e\nNothing is harder to do these days than nothing. But in a world where our value is determined by our data productivity, doing nothing may be our most important form of resistance.\u003c\/p\u003e \n\n\u003cp\u003eSo argues artist and critic Jenny Odell in this field guide to slowing down. Odell sees our attention as the most precious – and overdrawn – resource we have. Once we start paying a new kind of attention, we can undertake bolder forms of political action, reimagine humanity’s role in the environment, and arrive at a more meaningful understanding of happiness and fulfilment.\u003c\/p\u003e \n\n\u003cp\u003eFar from a simple anti-technology screed,  How to Do Nothing  is an action plan for thinking beyond capitalist narratives of efficiency and value. Provocative, timely, and utterly persuasive, it shows us how to preserve our inner lives and bring about change in a world that needs this more than ever.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Black Inc.","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":39619589800071,"sku":"9781760641795","price":32.99,"currency_code":"AUD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0313\/7211\/6103\/products\/How_20to_20Do_20Nothing_20_28online_29_0.jpg?v=1636455363"},{"product_id":"copy-of-preorder-courting","title":"Faking It by Toby Walsh","description":"\u003cmeta charset=\"utf-8\"\u003e\n\u003ch3\u003eA prescient analysis of what makes artificial intelligence so … artificial\u003c\/h3\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eArtificially intelligent machines are set to play an increasingly important role in our lives. They will take the dirty tasks of life off our hands, as well as the dull, the difficult and the dangerous – which is a good thing.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eBut at the heart of AI is a fundamental deceit: its goal is to imitate human intelligence. Although AIs like ChatGPT are powerful and convincing, they are fakes. They lack true understanding, sentience, consciousness and common sense, the very traits that make our human intelligence so special. The phoniness of AIs is a great weakness, and should be of concern to everyone.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eCan AI systems be creative? Can they be moral? What can we do to ensure they are not harmful? Will they ever develop consciousness – and if they do, what does this mean for humanity?\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eIn this fascinating new book, leading AI expert and author Professor Toby Walsh explores the artificiality of artificial intelligence, and considers the impact it is having on society. The fakery of AI, he argues, threatens to blur the distinction between what is real and what is simulated. It might even throw into question the very essence of what it means to be human. The stakes, therefore, are as high as they could be.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Black Inc.","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":40466700402823,"sku":"9781760644826","price":34.99,"currency_code":"AUD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0313\/7211\/6103\/files\/FakingIt_online.jpg?v=1682657161"},{"product_id":"the-last-best-place-on-the-internet-by-richard-cooke-preorder","title":"The Last Best Place on the Internet by Richard Cooke (PREORDER)","description":"\u003cdiv class=\"form-group col-lg-12 col-md-12 paddeql nomargin\"\u003e\u003cstrong\u003e\u003cspan class=\"book-detail-text-formating\"\u003eA playful and provocative exploration of mighty Wikipedia: how it was built, why it thrived and what we lose as its ideals disintegrate\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/div\u003e\n\u003cdiv class=\"form-group col-lg-12 col-md-12 paddeql nomargin\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"book-detail-text-formating\"\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/div\u003e\n\u003cdiv class=\"form-group col-lg-12 col-md-12 paddeql nomargin\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"book-detail-text-formating\"\u003e\u003cmeta charset=\"utf-8\"\u003e\n\u003cspan\u003eOne of the keystone inventions of the twenty-first century, Wikipedia is the largest repository of human knowledge ever made, with editions in 343 languages read by millions every day – all created by unpaid, mainly amateur and mostly anonymous volunteers.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cspan\u003eIn this entertaining book, journalist Richard Cooke delves into Wikipedia's fabled creation, its extraordinary success and its profound effects on politics, business, literature and society. He explores the site's shifting role in establishing fact in a time of deep uncertainty about truth and authority; the often hilariously fierce debates between 'Inclusionists' and 'Deletionists' about what is worth knowing and preserving, and who gets to decide; and the great peril Wikipedia faces today from bots, political division and artificial intelligence.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003ci\u003eThe Last Best Place on the Internet\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cspan\u003e is a fascinating journey into the hidden world of one of the most vital – and most endangered – cultural achievements of our time.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cspan\u003e'Wikipedia is \u003c\/span\u003e\u003ci\u003esui generis\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cspan\u003e, one of the strangest and most outlandish successes of its time, quite unlike what came before it, or anything set to succeed it. Since its birth twenty-five years ago it has become part of the fabric of everyday life, quietly indivisible from the experience of seeking information, a default with no obvious precedent or competitor. For most of its lifespan, it has enjoyed a unique supremacy – not only an encyclopedia, but the encyclopedia, a reference work to end all others.' —Richard Cooke, \u003c\/span\u003e\u003ci\u003eThe Last Best Place on the Internet\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/div\u003e","brand":"Black Inc.","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":44553697099911,"sku":"9781760643317","price":36.99,"currency_code":"AUD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0313\/7211\/6103\/files\/TheLastBestPlaceontheInternet_online.jpg?v=1777595003"}],"url":"https:\/\/shop.schwartzbooks.com.au\/collections\/life-online.oembed","provider":"Schwartz Books","version":"1.0","type":"link"}