The World Beyond Your Head

Crawford discusses the transformation of car design from a hands-on, engaging experience to one that is insulated and mediated by technology, which he critiques as diminishing genuine interaction with the world. He uses examples like Mercedes’s Attention Assist and advanced braking systems to illustrate how these technologies create a driving experience where the car does much of the work, which potentially disconnects the driver from the act of driving.

Crawford argues that this trend toward automation and ease in vehicles reflects a broader cultural shift toward safety and convenience, influenced by a consumer ethic that values disconnection and ease, echoing Kant’s notion of autonomy. He also discusses how road design can influence driving behavior, mentioning research that shows more “dangerous-looking” roads actually improve driver attention and reduce accidents because they encourage drivers to be more cautious and engaged. Crawford contrasts this with the over-engineered safety features in modern cars, which can lead to a false sense of security and a detachment from driving dynamics.

Moreover, Crawford explores how two-dimensional representations—such as photographs, paintings, and screens—limit our perceptual engagement with the world. Unlike interacting with the physical environment where movement allows us to gain different perspectives and understandings—what J. J. Gibson refers to as “extracting invariants from the stimulus flux” (86)—representations confine us to a static viewpoint.