Shopping In Jail by Douglas Coupland: Notes on Surrealism, Technology, and Modern Art

Shopping In Jail

My notes from reading Shopping In Jail by Douglas Coupland:

About surrealism, the subconscious, Internet.

Surrealism today: a randomizer, throwing images and video clips at you. Like taking a snip out of time and putting these in sequence.

On Ed Ruscha. And about the insignificance of (most) of our actions and of (most) art.

About Craft and novelty. Novelty that reflects the prominent yet less powerful forces of a culture is interesting. The crafted object may be the new modern art, in a world of digital overwhelm.

A piece on Hari Kunzru’s Gods Without Men. The piece is difficult to follow, I have not read that book. It seems a literary manifestation like Harari’s Homo Deus:

Raj is whatever and whoever it is we all seem to have become: a race of time-traveling time killers Googling and Wikiing until our machines transform into something smarter than ourselves, we humans left only to hope the machines may save us in the process.

A piece about Coupland’s visit to China for the book Kitten Clone. About how China is fully embracing new technology and the western world is hesitating complacently (if complacently is a word).

I find it difficult to accept that the new iPhone 12 or foldable Samsung is necessarily a significant technological development I cannot ignore. In my opinion we are too heads-down in today to be able to make sound judgements on the historical relevance of specific, or even more general technological developments.

I understand very well why it’s located in Shanghai, but not why there isn’t also one located in Michigan, where 10 million primates needing 2,500 calories a day are sitting on top of a cold rock in the middle of the North American continent, and they’ve got nothing to do all day except go online and watch porn, TED videos, and bit-torrented movies, …

A piece about Marshall McLuhan, again difficult because I have not read McLuhans work yet. I want though. His work sounds very intriguing.
McLuhan is a futurist. Coupland sees how with all that data that “the internet” knows about us, a cloud gänger is thinkable, but he misses sentience.
The same word that Kevin Kelly uses as one of the characteristics of the Technium, the “living” body of evolving technologies.
Sentience of the Technium is not yet to be born. It is there already, says Kelly.

Singularity Is Near – Kurzweil meets Dijkstra

the singularity is near Ray Kurzweil book cover

While reading Ray Kurzweil’s The Singularity Is Near, I stumbled upon a quote attributed to computer scientist Edsger W. Dijkstra that made me pause, not because of what it said, but because of how it was used.

The Disputed Quote

Kurzweil cites Dijkstra as saying: “Computer Science is no more about computers than astronomy is about telescopes.”

It’s a clever aphorism that sounds exactly like something Dijkstra would say. There’s just one problem: the attribution is disputed, and the original source remains elusive.

Searching for the Source

I dove into the Dijkstra archive at the University of Texas, which contains his extensive collection of EWD manuscripts. Despite searching through his papers, I couldn’t find this exact quote. Wikiquote also lists the attribution as disputed.

Could Dijkstra have said it? Absolutely. Despite being a world-renowned computer scientist, he famously avoided using computers for his work, reportedly owning one only to read email and browse the web. For him, computer science truly was about ideas, not machines.

But the lack of a verifiable source matters—especially in a book making grand claims about the future.

Context Matters: Why This Quote Feels Out of Place

Kurzweil places this quote in a chapter discussing exponential growth, Moore’s Law, and paradigm shifts. But the connection feels forced. The Dijkstra quote speaks to the philosophical nature of computer science as a discipline. It doesn’t illuminate anything about exponential technological progress or the coming singularity.

This seemingly minor misplacement reveals a larger issue with The Singularity Is Near: the blending of rigorous scientific facts with personal predictions that lack the same level of substantiation.

Two Visionaries, Two Approaches

The contrast between Dijkstra and Kurzweil is instructive:

Edsger Dijkstra: An unconventional theoretical scientist known for mathematical rigor and precision. Every statement in his EWD manuscripts was carefully reasoned and documented.

Ray Kurzweil: An unconventional futuristic engineer and inventor. His predictions are bold, optimistic, and often based on extrapolating current trends.

You might expect Dijkstra to be dry and academic, while Kurzweil would be the more engaging personality. But here’s the surprise: the biggest difference between their work isn’t their subject matter or their ambition—it’s humor.

The Missing Ingredient: Humor

Dijkstra’s writings are filled with wit, self-awareness, and intellectual playfulness. He could be cutting in his criticism, but always with a touch of humor that acknowledged the absurdity of certain positions. This humor wasn’t just stylistic. It was a sign of intellectual honesty and humility.

Kurzweil’s The Singularity Is Near, despite its grand vision and fascinating ideas, takes itself entirely seriously. Every prediction is presented with confidence. Every trend will continue. Every obstacle will be overcome. There’s little room for doubt, irony, or the acknowledgment that futurism is, by nature, speculative.

The Problem with Unquestioning Optimism

This lack of humor—and the self-awareness it represents—makes Kurzweil’s predictions less credible, not more. When you can’t laugh at yourself or acknowledge the limits of your knowledge, you risk becoming a prophet rather than a scientist.

Dijkstra understood that computer science required both rigor and humility. He documented his sources, admitted when he was speculating, and never confused his hopes with inevitability.

Kurzweil’s work would be stronger if it borrowed more from Dijkstra’s approach: not just his ideas, but his intellectual honesty.

What We Can Learn

The misattribution (or at least unverified attribution) of the Dijkstra quote is a small detail, but it’s emblematic. It suggests a book that prioritizes narrative momentum over scholarly precision. That’s not necessarily wrong for a work of futurism, but readers should understand what they’re getting: a compelling vision more than a rigorous prediction.

When reading about the future of technology, it’s worth asking: Is this backed by verifiable evidence, or is this someone’s optimistic extrapolation? Are the sources documented? Is there room for doubt?

Dijkstra would have insisted on all three.

Further Reading:

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