Technology as an Extension of Spaces

What is a technology?

Throughout this series, we have explored how representational spaces emerge, receive attention, leave traces through memory, organize lived time, create belonging through Jiwasa, and expand possibilities of existence through Yãy hã mĩy.

A new question now emerges:

What is a technology?

Decolonial Neuroscience proposes a simple answer:

Every technology is an externalization of internal representational spaces cultivated by a Body-Territory.

A quartz spear point.

A canoe.

A language.

A dance.

A mathematical equation.

A scientific theory.

An artificial intelligence.

All of these represent different manifestations of the same phenomenon.

Before inhabiting the shared world, they inhabited the representational spaces of a Body-Territory.

Spaces Precede Technologies

Every technology begins as experience.

A perception.

A necessity.

A curiosity.

A question.

A desire to expand possibilities of existence.

A representational space emerges.

Attention sustains that space.

Experience refines it.

Jiwasa shares it.

Eventually, the space finds a material form.

Technology appears as a consequence.

From this perspective, the history of technology can also be understood as the history of spaces that living systems learned to cultivate.

The Intelligence of Life

Many species create tools.

Birds use sticks.

Primates use stones.

Dolphins use marine sponges.

Beavers reshape entire landscapes.

Tool production participates in the dynamics of life itself.

In this view, intelligence extends beyond the human brain.

Life continuously explores, adapts, stabilizes, and transmits solutions.

DNA acts as a remarkable system for preserving and refining successful possibilities through time.

Each generation receives spaces cultivated by previous generations and expands them through experience.

Yãy hã mĩy: The Technology of Life

Observing mammals reveals a fascinating process.

Young animals observe.

Imitate.

Experiment.

Learn.

Refine movements.

Expand possibilities.

This process resembles what we call:

Yãy hã mĩy — to imitate-being in order to transcend-being.

A wolf learns to hunt.

A dolphin learns social behaviors.

A monkey learns object manipulation.

A human child learns language.

Life continuously expands itself through this process.

Yãy hã mĩy is therefore not exclusively human.

It may be understood as one of life's most fundamental technologies for generating new possibilities of existence.

The intelligence belongs to life.

DNA stabilizes this intelligence.

Yãy hã mĩy transmits it.

The UMBU Example and the Quartz Spear Point

The archaeological UMBU tradition offers a particularly illuminating example.

A quartz spear point is often described as a technological artifact.

Yet it may represent something deeper.

Before the spear point existed as an object, it existed as a representational space.

Generations observed.

Experimented.

Shared gestures.

Shared sounds.

Shared stories.

Shared forms of attention.

Shared states of presence.

The apprentice watched the master.

Repeated movements.

Listened to the sound of stone.

Perceived subtle variations in force.

Perceived subtle changes in direction.

Gradually, quartz began occupying space within the Body-Territory.

Quartz acquired Utupe.

Quartz acquired Xapiri.

Quartz became presence.

At this point something emerges that purely rational descriptions often struggle to capture.

The artisan touches the stone.

The stone also touches the artisan.

Interoception reorganizes.

Proprioception reorganizes.

Attention reorganizes.

The Body-Territory expands its experiential boundaries.

The relationship becomes participatory.

Technology emerges from that relationship.

The Sacred as High Performance

From this perspective, the sacred may be understood as a particular organization of the Body-Territory.

Ritual organizes attention.

Ritual organizes movement.

Ritual organizes memory.

Ritual organizes belonging.

Ritual organizes perception.

Through ritual, specific spaces become deeply inhabitable.

The quartz point improves.

The bow improves.

The canoe improves.

The song improves.

The group improves.

The technology improves.

The ultimate product is not merely an object.

The ultimate product is a transformed Body-Territory.

Words, Sounds, Gestures, and Symbols Are Technologies

This perspective radically expands the meaning of technology.

A word is a technology.

A song is a technology.

A dance is a technology.

A narrative is a technology.

A mathematical formula is a technology.

A scientific theory is a technology.

An artificial intelligence is a technology.

All share a common characteristic:

They are external representations of internal spaces.

Writing externalizes language.

Mathematics externalizes relationships.

Science externalizes observation.

Art externalizes experience.

Technology amplifies the sharing of representational spaces.

Science as a Technology of Observation

Science may also be understood as a technology.

Before an experiment exists, there is a question.

Before a question exists, there is a perception.

Before a perception exists, there is a representational space.

Scientific methods expand the collective capacity to observe, compare, and describe phenomena under specific conditions.

Science becomes a technology for creating shared spaces of observation.

Experience opens pathways.

Science develops rigorous ways of describing those pathways.

Together, they expand human understanding.

DNA Intelligence and Artificial Intelligence

An important distinction emerges here.

DNA Intelligence creates spaces of existence.

It generates belonging.

Identity.

Meaning.

Utupe.

Pei Utupe.

Xapiri.

Artificial Intelligence dramatically expands the capacity to reorganize existing representations.

It compares.

Models.

Simulates.

Correlates.

Processes.

Life creates spaces.

Technology expands the sharing and processing of those spaces.

The interaction between both opens a new chapter in human history.

The Future of Technology

Every technology emerges from spaces cultivated within Body-Territories.

Therefore, perhaps the most important question is not:

What technologies are we creating?

But rather:

What spaces are we cultivating within the Body-Territories that create those technologies?

Future technologies will reflect today's cultivated spaces.

Spaces of belonging.

Spaces of critical thinking.

Spaces of creativity.

Spaces of cooperation.

Spaces of transcendence.

Spaces of life.

Scientific Materiality

The ideas proposed here can be investigated empirically through contemporary neuroscience and behavioral technologies.

EEG allows observation of rapid neural dynamics associated with imagination, creativity, learning, and the construction of new representations.

fNIRS allows investigation of cortical metabolic changes during innovation, exploration, mental simulation, and model building.

HRV, respiration, and GSR reveal physiological states associated with curiosity, engagement, discovery, and belonging.

EMG can track bodily reorganizations associated with skill acquisition and technological learning.

Eye-tracking reveals how attention explores relevant elements during creative and problem-solving processes.

Multimodal hyperscanning significantly expands this scientific agenda by allowing investigation of how groups collectively construct shared representations.

Neural, metabolic, autonomic, and behavioral synchronization can now be studied simultaneously in groups of 10, 20, or even 30 participants interacting in ecological environments.

These technologies allow researchers to observe how internal representational spaces become shared spaces and eventually become materialized technologies.

Final Reflection

A quartz spear point.

A canoe.

A language.

A dance.

An equation.

A university.

An artificial intelligence.

All represent different manifestations of the same phenomenon.

Before inhabiting the world, they inhabited a Body-Territory.

Technology may be understood as the materialized memory of living imagination.

The moment when an internal space passes through Yãy hã mĩy, encounters Jiwasa, achieves collective stability, and begins participating in shared reality.

References (Post-2021)

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Liu, C. et al. (2024). Neural, Genetic, and Cognitive Signatures of Creativity. Communications Biology.

Gu, J. et al. (2025). Cognitive and Neural Mechanisms of Mental Imagery and Creativity.

Yamakawa, H. (2024). Brain-Consistent Architecture for Imagination. Frontiers in Systems Neuroscience.

Rashedi, R. N. (2025). From Academia to UX: Embodied Cognition, Creativity and Generative AI. ACM Interactions.

Deshpande, M., & Magerko, B. (2024). Reframing Computational Co-Creativity: An Embodied Socio-Cognitive Lens.

Carollo, A. et al. (2024). Hyperscanning Literature After Two Decades of Neuroscientific Research.

Grasso-Cladera, A. et al. (2024). Embodied Hyperscanning for Studying Social Interaction: A Scoping Review of Simultaneous Brain and Body Measurements.

Li, Y. et al. (2025). Correlation Between Co-Design and Psychological Need Satisfaction: Evidence from Inter-Brain Synchronization.

Vorreuther, A. et al. (2026). Reviewing Digital Collaborative Interactions with Multimodal Hyperscanning.

Dodig-Crnkovic, G. (2024). Rethinking Cognition: Morphological Info-Computation and the Embodied Paradigm in Life and Artificial Intelligence.

Parisi, G. (2021). In a Flight of Starlings: The Wonder of Complex Systems.