Consciousness in a hyperconnected world: Entanglements of human-machine cognition

Being conscious of the world around us is what many think makes us human, and we share this ability of being aware of ourselves with a few other animals. Using a broader notion to consciousness allows to further differentiate between conscious cognition, that is self-awareness of the self, others and non-conscious cognition that has been described as the “other modes of awareness” (Hayles, 2017). Applying this distinction means also that not only humans, animals and plants are cognitive “beings” who respond to their environment, but that this can also be applied to technical systems. This chapter presents ideas to do with consciousness that were presented in the book The Onlife Manifesto: Being Human in a Hyperconnected Era to discuss that hyperconnected technology and people’s cognition systems may be entangled, so much so that they affect each other’s responses to the contexts they are operating in. This chapter presents amongst others N. Kathrine Hayles’ notion on human–machine cognition and illustrates this with ethnographic accounts from a study on people’s practices, experiences and reflections of being online.