If we take a look at the concrete manifestations of the technologically permeated present, it is noticeable that technological assistance technologies are becoming increasingly overbearing. From wearables that regularly remind their wearers to get up and move around, to TVs that switch themselves off if the user's activity is deemed “too low”, to fitness tools that adapt the difficulty of a physical workout to the supposedly unique physical condition of the individual using it.

As this introduction already suggests, such a datafied world runs the risk of degenerating into a relatively dull dystopia. The sovereignty of interpretation over something like “a good night's sleep” or “sufficient exercise” lies increasingly in the realm of algorithmic heteronomy. Gone are the days when mankind could talk itself into unhealthy lifestyles; now all the connections are seemingly out in the open. At the same time, we are increasingly failing to recognize that life is more than the sum of its parts, meaning that no amount of meticulous listing of vital data is capable of displaying a coherent context. On the contrary: contemporary studies even point to a loss of body awareness due to quantified self mechanisms (see Mau 2017, for example). How could it be otherwise? If my fitness tracker tells me that my exercise profile leaves something to be desired, what alternative conclusion to a deficient lifestyle can seriously be drawn? We are consistently trained to have a completely unnumbered self-confidence; the gap that has been torn is filled - more or less makeshift - by all kinds of little digital assistants. At the same time, the amount of data potentially supplied is becoming ever more extensive: from blood oxygen saturation and heart rate to the electrical conductivity of the skin (galvanic skin response), increasingly precise data is now available that can be read out, somewhat conveniently, in a chronological sequence that is personally curated for the individual user.

Roughly speaking, there are two general perspectives on life: one is the one that deals with the consequent generalization of all aspects of life; according to this view, the “good” life is seen as a kind of recipe that offers a sure prospect of success if followed. However, if we look at such contexts from a much more affective perspective, it becomes clear that it is difficult, indeed generally undesirable, to make such generalizations. It may start as well-intentioned advice, à la “Your current vital signs indicate increasing fatigue. Do you really want to do a full training session?”, but what all too often follows is a presumptuous decision that technological systems make instead of us - and consistently ignore human agency. Well meant is rarely well done! UX design should always take the stance that the user's experience is their own responsibility.

Virtual reality pedagogy can be described in a somewhat exaggerated way “as a closed ideology with no alternative and totalitarian tendencies” (Damberger 2023: 304): “The aim of such a pedagogy is, among other things, to enable moderation as a task of reason to be promoted, which is equally directed against intemperance, immoderation and excess” (ibid.). Anyone who has ever irrationally undertaken a supposedly hopeless endeavor and ultimately emerged as the proverbial winner with a swollen chest knows that such a request is foolish from the outset. Taking risks is a human trait, and continually overestimating oneself and one's own strengths goes hand in hand with a deep mistrust of all excessive technical control.

The regime of computerized control societies asserted by Gilles Deleuze (cf. Deleuze 1993) stands in a tradition of narratives of powerlessness in relation to technological and technical progress and is very different from Foucault's disciplinary society (cf. Foucault 1975). While the latter was still concerned with achieving socially “desirable” behavior through the threat of severe punishments, in Deleuze's theory the (all too) humanly deficient becomes the linchpin of the establishment of computer-aided control, to which one must successively submit. Where one never really begins to learn in the disciplinary society, one never stops learning in the control society. Both regimes form a hostile background noise, which in the case of computer-based control is, or can be, fully developed into submission to a datafied hegemony.

The kind of world we want to live in depends largely on our expectations of a regulated coexistence. In this sense, there is a continuum between an absolutely organic approach and completely technocratic procedures, within which we can and must position ourselves. There are various reasons for deciding one way or the other, but the respective implications should be kept in mind: Distrust of one's neighbors and their (irrational) motives, for example, is a factor that should not be underestimated when introducing corresponding quantification mechanisms. It is “essentially about the transfer of complexities into standardized order relationships” (Damberger 2023: 305), which can be used to make further predictions. What becomes particularly apparent with such an understanding is the anticipation of a future that has so far been described as indeterminate. Reducing as much of this uncertainty as possible is the fundamental (and fundamentally well-intentioned) motivation behind a general tendency to measure worldly contexts. It is therefore fundamentally about wresting more and more of the future in order to no longer remain in the realm of speculation, but rather to create verifiable facts. However, such a practice is inevitably at the expense of life in the hic et nunc, which is faced with a world in the contingent future tense I. The highly speculative reduction of complexity in the sign of preemption - i.e. the downright anticipation of upcoming consequences in future II - is demanded above all by economic actors qua self-referential profit orientation.

In conclusion, we might ask whether we want to cozy up to a world of pre-emptive presumption or whether we will have resisted it? Deciding this stands and falls with the collective reaction to the quantification of the small-scale, sometimes even inconspicuous aspects of our very own private lives.

Literature

Damberger, Thomas (2023): “Vermessung zwischen Erkenntnisgewinn und Überwachung.” In: Mandy Schiefner-Rohs, Sandra Hofhues, Andreas Breiter (Hg.) Datafizierung in der Bildung. Kritische Perspektiven auf digitale Vermessung in pädagogischen Kontexten. Transcript Verlag, Bielefeld, S. 303-322.

Deleuze, Gilles (1993): “Postskriptum über die Kontrollgesellschaften.” In: ders. Unterhandlungen. 1972-1990. Suhrkamp Verlag, Frankfurt a.M, S. 254-262.

Foucault, Michel (1975): Überwachen und Strafen. Die Geburt des Gefängnisses. Suhrkamp Verlag, Frankfurt a.M.

Mau, Steffen (2017): Das metrische Wir. Die Quantifizierung des Sozialen. Suhrkamp Verlag, Berlin.