Up until now, media studies have been concerned with programming and content, rather than with the effects of the media themselves on the social and psychic make-up of their users. The recent awareness of the twin hemispheres of man’s brain has also drawn attention to the fact that the dominance of one or the other of these hemispheres depends upon the man-made environments to which they respond. Julian Jaynes attributes the rise of private consciousness and human individuality to the coming of the literate environment which broke down the tribal or bicameral unity of the two hemispheres of the brain. Today the split between the hemispheres is being mended by the new simultaneous environment of electric information. Nuclear man may be on the verge of abandoning his civilized institutions and their function in providing guidelines, goals and objectives. Now is the time to examine sociologically the peculiar and unique impact of the numerous extensions of our own bodies and nervous system.

The sociological approach to the human environment began with Sputnik in 1957. So far, society has meant hardware, and supplies, and quanitification of things and people. Now the time is ripe to scan the software environment, the planetary surround of electric information and its effects on the diverse populations of the globe.