Difference between revisions of "Technology Solution"
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==Problem== | ==Problem== | ||
| + | * The introduction of new technology will always disturbed the existing civilizations. Some, like the introduction of the printing press, do so in radical ways. | ||
| + | * Legislation is typically reactionary. When a civilization becomes unstable as a result of any change, the lawmakers are compelled to act. It is unlikely that the existing lawmakers can understand the causes of the instability, particularly when the root cause is a new technology. The easiest solutions are to make minor adjustments to ameliorate the impact of the technology. Changes that fail to address the root causes of the instability are not likely to have any discernible effect at reducing the instability. In fact whenever an unstable condition exists, more change will, most likely, create more instability. This is a well known effect in control theory. | ||
==Social Solutions== | ==Social Solutions== | ||
Revision as of 11:54, 29 November 2019
Contents
Full Title or Meme
As new technology is introduced, it is often viewed as providing solutions to existing problems, but its record at that is not good.
Context
Problem
- The introduction of new technology will always disturbed the existing civilizations. Some, like the introduction of the printing press, do so in radical ways.
- Legislation is typically reactionary. When a civilization becomes unstable as a result of any change, the lawmakers are compelled to act. It is unlikely that the existing lawmakers can understand the causes of the instability, particularly when the root cause is a new technology. The easiest solutions are to make minor adjustments to ameliorate the impact of the technology. Changes that fail to address the root causes of the instability are not likely to have any discernible effect at reducing the instability. In fact whenever an unstable condition exists, more change will, most likely, create more instability. This is a well known effect in control theory.
Social Solutions
Fixing Problems created by Technology
Good Intentions
Tim Berners-Lee is trying to tell us that his intentions for the web were honorable and somehow the catastrophe is not his fault.[1] He claims 'I wanted the web to serve humanity." But the contemporaneous reports were that he was focused on the information sharing within the scientific community. Commercial traffic on the internet was not even encouraged until 1994, about the same time that the Netscape Navigator was released.
Let's look at several other cases of where good intentions did not bring the desired result:
Americans in the early 19th century indulged in the fantasy that Technology could bind all peoples of the world together. In 1858 a cable laid between the US and England was to be the beginning of this Utopia. Samuel F B Morse believed the telegraph enable world peace. [2] "One of its effects will be to bind men to his fellow men and to put an end to war. War is a shortcoming that could be overcome by way of a machine." He believed that simply laying down a telegraph cable across the continent would bind all American together in a eliminate regional differences. The civil war was in full swing within a decade.
The Gatling gun was touted as and end to war. The machine gun continues to the the most lethal hand held weapon of human slaughter. This enables lone gunmen to inflict wartime levels of causalities in civilian settings.
The Atom Bomb was dropped on Japan to save lives of warfighters. Humans have succeed in creating a weapon to wipe out all of humanity.
Artificial Intelligence is adopted by Military organizations to save the lives of their warfighters. It is also used by totalitarian regimes to segregate out people to be marginalized or killed. It is now being placed into obsolete warplanes in place of pilots, not only to save lives of warfighters, but to lower the cost of killing others.
Now Mark Zuckerberg tells us that his intentions with Facebook were to bind mankind together. The results are similar to those above.
Complexity
Results
- ↑ Tim Berners-Lee, I Invented the World Wide Web. Here’s How We Can Fix It. New York Times (2019-11-24) https://www.nytimes.com/2019/11/24/opinion/world-wide-web.html
- ↑ Jill Lepore, These Truths. W. W. Norton (2019-10-31) ISBN 978-0393357424
