(Image: Brian Smale for New Scientist)
Does it matter that we often experience the natural world through technology? Peter Kahn untangles our tangled and evolving relationship with nature
You study “technological nature”. What do you mean by that?
It’s technology that mediates our experience of nature: TV wildlife programmes, online games such as FarmVille, in which players plant and harvest virtual crops, digital projections of wood fires and skies for our homes, robotic dogs and electronic pets such as Tamagotchi. Technological nature is becoming increasingly sophisticated and pervasive. At the same time, we’re destroying real nature very fast. These…
