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encourages us to see the natural environment as something upon which we operate, which we use as means for our own ends, as an extension of the tools we develop to interact with it. So what happens when we extend our tools to the point that they become integrated with our life, when we become the very tools themselves? That is the most salient question about the coming Internet of Us. And it raises a danger that we cease to see our own personhood as an end in itself. Instead, we begin to see ourselves as devices to be used, as tools to be exploited.
    None of this is inevitable, however. How could it be—the changes in our form of life that digital ways of knowing are bringing have yet to fully unfold. We should not fear information technology per se, or the “Internet” in the expanding Internet of Us. It is the “us” part—or our uses of technology—that we must mind. We are becoming more powerful knowers. We just must also strive to be more responsible, understanding ones.

Acknowledgments
    Over the years, I’ve been fortunate to talk about these subjects with many wise and intelligent people, including Robert Barnard, Don Baxter, Paul Bloomfield, Sandy Goldberg, Patrick Greenough, Hanna Gunn, Julian Jackson, Casey Rebecca Johnson, Brendan Kane, Junyeol Kim, Nathan Kellen, Tom Lynch, Helen Nissenbaum, Nikolaj Jang Lee Pedersen, Duncan Pritchard, Baron Reed, David Ripley, Paul Roberts, Marcus Rossberg, Evan Selinger, Nate Sheff, Tom Scheinfeldt and Daniel Silvermint. A special shout-out to the Block Island Cognitive Research Institute, who heard early versions of these ideas (over and over again): Paul Allopenna, Terry Berthelot, James Dixon, Inge-Marie Eigsti, Lisa Holle, Jim Magnuson and Emily Myers.
    Nate Sheff and David Pruitt were of great help in researching various materials in the initial stages of this project. Early drafts of the manuscript benefited heavily from comments by Patricia Lynch, Phil Marino, Kent Stephens, Tom Stone and Steven Todd;Terry Berthelot provided invaluable commentary on a later draft. Portions of this book were given as talks at the University of Connecticut Humanities Institute, the University of Edinburgh, the University of St. Andrews, Northwestern University’s Kaplan Humanities Institute, University of Cincinnati’s Taft Center, Syracuse University, Ohio State University, the American Philosophical Association, Yonsei University, TEDx, the Chautauqua Institution and SXSW. Portions of chapters 4 and 6 build on ideas I first tried to express in “A Vote for Reason,” “Privacy and the Concept of the Self” and “Privacy and the Pool of Information” in the New York Times ’ The Stone blog, as well as “The Philosophy of Privacy: Why Surveillance Reduces Us to Objects,” May 7, 2015, in The Guardian . The ideas of chapter 1 draw inspiration from “NeuroMedia, Knowledge and Understanding,” published in Philosophical Issues: A Supplement to NOÛS, vol. 24 (2014).
    Finally, I owe special thanks to my agent Peter Matson and my editor Phil Marino, who both believed; editor Allegra Huston, who clarified; my sisters Patty, Bridget and Rene, who taught; and to Terry and Kathleen, who not only understand, but help me do the same.

Bibliography
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