[20:46]
(…) we call it “virtual world“ for a reason, but we’re not really aware just how profoundly odd it all is. The punctuation and the speech bubbles, the emojis, gifs, social media profiles, and video calls are all desperate attempts to return to our natural state: talking. We want to talk. After all, one theory on the origins of language is that we developed mouth-communication, so that we could have our hands free to work *and* exchange thoughts and emotions at the same time. Our natural state of being is to be talking, live, face-to-face, drawing on all the assistants we possess, because we have a body: tone of voice, hand gestures, facial expression, posture. It’s a sophisticated nuanced symphony that is conversation. All of this is gone in writing. In fact, it’s doubly gone in computer-mediated writing.
[06:12]