IEEE Technology and Society Magazine - Summer 2014 - 39

our behaviors were recorded? We often have different
personae that change over time; and it is often necessary
for an individual to have one personae for work, one for
family, and yet another for the Internet [15].
The human experience cannot be captured and interpreted easily; we are highly complex and astoundingly
dynamic beings. This is the great stuff of humanity. We
are ever-changing. We embellish to affect laughter. We
create what didn't exist. We make stuff up. We make
up rules so we can play games. We make up institutions so we can coordinate problem-solving collective
action. Data, especially when so abundant and extensive, can easily undermine such invention. One only
needs to ask siblings to describe their shared childhood
experiences; one could compare their stories and be
exceedingly perplexed. Each sibling has created his or
her own narrative; each may have invented a slightly
different back story. Can algorithms or a fallible human
who chooses how to personally interpret the synthesis
of data, appropriately process reality [16]? Moreover, if
it can be said that "history belongs to the winners," then
while there exists lifelogging asymmetry (some do,
some don't), perhaps it could also be said, equally cynically, that "personal history belongs to the lifeloggers"?
Issues arise with this historical record because a lifelogger could easily omit, misrepresent, or even distort and
deceive; he or she can willfully create inaccurate narratives which could go unchecked and unchallenged.
The most delightful aspect of visiting that grandma
wasn't the amusing humor derived from her comedic
idiosyncrasies, but rather it was her rich storytelling.
Her husband often had a different take on events. She
admitted she chose to forget the painful aspects of the
depression era. Yet, she wonderfully verbalized a narrative of her life and times from her perspective. Just
as forgetting is an essential part of the human psyche
(without which we cannot begin to function), so is the
ability to create narratives [17]. In the event of universal lifelogging, could this be lost and replaced with
machine-perfected recollections? Without narrative,
we have no mythos, and so we have no more explanation for the human condition than logos. We would
have much less ability to create a shared sense of
community through a commonly told story, and may
be stuck instead with a single unalterable personae
deterministically crushed by the unbearable tyranny
of mundane facts captured through devices.
There are negative ramifications when we allow
technology to commodify social concepts, and
diminish social relations like privacy, friendship, and
loyalty. The resultant consequences, such as the fragmentation of communities, the dissolution of trust,
and the diminution of our ability to solve collective
action problems, are serious enough. However, such
invasive technologies as wearables and bearables are
doing something else: they could deprive us of the
IEEE TECHNOLOGY AND SOCIETY MAGAZINE

SuMMEr 2014

ability to create personae and narratives [18]. We may
discover the obsessive literalism is an axe being taken
to the very essence of what it means to be human.

Author Information
Christine Perakslis is associate professor in the Alan
Shawn Feinstein Graduate School at Johnson & Wales
university, Providence, rI, u.S.A.
Jeremy Pitt is a reader in Intelligent Systems in the
Department of Electrical & Electronic Engineering at
Imperial College London, u.K.
Katina Michael is an associate professor in the
School of Information Systems and Technology at the
university of Wollongong, NSW, Australia.

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Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of IEEE Technology and Society Magazine - Summer 2014