TY - BOOK AU - Peters, John Durham TI - Speaking into the air: a history of the idea of communication SN - 9780226662763 U1 - 302.201 PY - 2000/// CY - Chicago PB - University of Chicago Press KW - Communication--Philosophy KW - Mass media--Social aspects KW - Communication--Social aspects KW - Communication N1 - Introduction : the problem of communication. The historicity of communication -- The varied senses of "communication" -- Sorting theoretical debates in (and via) the 1920s -- Technical and therapeutic discourses after World War II. 1. Dialogue and dissemination. Dialogue and eros in the Phaedrus -- Dissemination in the synoptic gospels. 2. History of an error : the spiritualist tradition. Christian sources -- From matter to mind : "communication" in the seventeenth century -- Nineteenth-century spiritualism. 3. Toward a more robust vision of spirit : Hegel, Marx, and Kierkegaard. Hegel on recognition -- Marx (versus Locke) on money -- Kierkegaard's incognitos. 4. Phantasms of the living, dialogues with the dead. Recording and transmission -- Hermeneutics as communication with the dead -- Dead letters. 5. The quest for authentic connection, or bridging the chasm. The interpersonal walls of idealism -- Fraud or contact? : James on psychical research -- Reach out and touch someone : the telephonic uncanny -- Radio : broadcasting as dissemination (and dialogue). 6. Machines, animals, and aliens : horizons of incommunicability. The Turing test and the insuperability of eros -- Animals and empathy with the inhuman -- Communication with aliens. Conclusion : a squeeze of the hand. The gaps of which communication is made -- The privilege of the receiver -- The dark side of communication -- The irreducibility of touch and time ER -