Writers' Corner

Error Haiku
by Dave

You step in the stream
but the water has moved on.
The page is not here.

"Everything from telegraphy and photography in the 19th century to the silicon chip in the twentieth has amplified the din of information, until matters have reached such proportions today that for the average person," Postman argues, "information no longer has any relation to the solution of problems. The tie between information and action has been severed."

Information is now a commodity that can be bought and sold. It is used as a form of entertainment.. It comes indiscriminately, directed at no one in particular, disconnected from usefulness. We are glutted with information, drowning in information, have no control over it, don't know what to do with it.

Dr. Postman posits that there are two reasons we do not know what to do with it. First, we no longer have a coherent conception of ourselves, and our universe, and our relation to one another and our world. We no longer know where we come from, where we are going, or why. That is, we don't know what information is relevant, and what information is irrelevant to our lives.

Second, we have directed all of our energies and intelligence to inventing machinery that does nothing but increase the supply of information. As a consequence, our defenses against information glut have broken down; our information immune system is inoperable. We don't know how to filter it out; we don't know how to reduce it; we don't know to use it. According to Postman, we are suffering from a kind of cultural AIDS.

Is the world in which we live very nearly incomprehensible to most of us? Is it true that we are willing to entertain the notion of almost any fact, actual or imagined, because we have no comprehensive and consistent picture of the world with which to compare it that could render it an unacceptable contradiction? Do we believe because there is no reason, no social, political, historical, metaphysical, logical, or spiritual reason, not to believe? Perhaps the computer just distracts us from facing what we most need to confront, i.e., that we live in a world that, for the most part, makes no sense to us.

In her book, Release 2.0, Esther Dyson points out technology has, and will continue to, fundamentally impact our lives and institutions, but it will do little to change our natures. Even as dependence on, and addiction to, our machines has increased exponentially over past 100 years, our need for community, family, meaningful work, and dignity has changed little over the past 1000. In fact, it could be argued that most of our societal ills could be traced to the loss of these things, not on our lack of access to gadgets and gizmos.

So what are we seeking? The truth is, what ails us, what causes us the most misery and pain, at both personal and social levels, has nothing to do with the sort of information made accessible by computers. The computer and its information cannot answer any of our fundamental questions or provide an organizing moral framework. Maybe what we are seeking is a way to make our lives more meaningful and humane. The computer cannot tell us what questions are worth asking and using computers will not make us wiser, more decent, or more noble. In this age of vast and instantaneously available, digitally-enabled information, the highways to knowledge of ourselves, each other, and our world apparently are still the ones less traveled.

* * *

5. Wiring the schools will not save them.

The problems with America's public schools -- disparate funding, social promotion, bloated class size, crumbling infrastructure, lack of standards -- have almost nothing to do with technology. Consequently, no amount of technology will lead to the educational revolution prophesied by President Clinton and others. The art of teaching cannot be replicated by computers, the Net, or by "distance learning." These tools can, of course, augment an already high-quality educational experience. But to rely on them as any sort of panacea would be a costly mistake.

6. Information wants to be protected.

It's true that cyberspace and other recent developments are challenging our copyright laws and frameworks for protecting intellectual property. The answer, though, is not to scrap existing statutes and principles. Instead, we must update old laws and interpretations so that information receives roughly the same protection it did in the context of old media. The goal is the same: to give authors sufficient control over their work so that they have an incentive to create, while maintaining the right of the public to make fair use of that information. In neither context does information want "to be free." Rather, it needs to be protected.

7. The public owns the airwaves; the public should benefit from their use.

The recent digital spectrum giveaway to broadcasters underscores the corrupt and inefficient misuse of public resources in the arena of technology. The citizenry should benefit and profit from the use of public frequencies, and should retain a portion of the spectrum for educational, cultural, and public access uses. We should demand more for private use of public property.

8. Understanding technology should be an essential component of global citizenship.

In a world driven by the flow of information, the interfaces -- and the underlying code -- that make information visible are becoming enormously powerful social forces. Understanding their strengths and limitations, and even participating in the creation of better tools, should be an important part of being an involved citizen. These tools affect our lives as much as laws do, and we should subject them to a similar democratic scrutiny.

NOTE BENE:

The Principles of TechnoRealism were first published on-line at MEME on March 11,1998 and are still posted on the Web site www.memex.org. This "set of declarations" was written by a group of 11 prominent journalists in the computer industry. According to David S. Bennehum, editor of MEME and first-listed author of the document, this "set of principles was meant to go beyond the bi-polar visions of cyber-utopianism and neo-Luddism." The work was signed as a show of support by thousands but it received some scathing opposition in the press.

According to its authors, "Technorealism demands that we think critically about the role that tools and interfaces play in human evolution and everyday life. Integral to this perspective is our understanding that the current tide of technological transformation, while important and powerful, is actually a continuation of waves of change that have taken place throughout history. Looking, for example, at the history of the automobile, television, or the telephone -- not just the devices but the institutions they became -- we see profound benefits as well as substantial costs. Similarly, we anticipate mixed blessings from today's emerging technologies, and expect to forever be on guard for unexpected consequences -- which must be addressed by thoughtful design and appropriate use.

"As technorealists, we seek to expand the fertile middle ground between techno-utopianism and neo-Luddism. We are technology "critics" in the same way, and for the same reasons, that others are food critics, art critics, or literary critics. We can be passionately optimistic about some technologies, skeptical and disdainful of others. Still, our goal is neither to champion nor dismiss technology, but rather to understand it and apply it in a manner more consistent with basic human values."