“Knowledge Is Power,” but only when we have it in our own minds – not on floppy disks.

There’s a popular idea that the information in all the world’s printed books could eventually become available on the Internet, which seems increasingly plausible every day. The digital culture encourages people to access information easier, faster and usually with no cost incurred, in comparison to print books.


Regarding my own experience with writing a research paper, the Internet will be my primary tool for obtaining information. It allows me to reach different sources and compare diverse points of view very quickly. However, the credibility of online sources is a controversial issue. Although there are certainly reliable sources on the Internet, there is an enormous amount of unreliable information. Nonetheless, the accuracy of the information derived from such unknown sources is always questionable.

Another problem with the idea of converting the entire world’s books into one Internet book is copyrighted material. The vast amount of information available online can be used by anyone, and thus, due to the uncertainty of sources, it will be tough to regulate who uses this information and the purposes for which they do so. Plagiarism becomes feasible to achieve with the Internet; unfortunately, the recognition of this act is almost impossible. Consequently, a severe problem is posed for academia.

With the easy availability of information on the Internet, people can also lose their tendency to learn. I personally know a number of postgraduate students in Literature and Social Science that are not familiar with the MLA writing style. Despite the fact that their discipline requires them to use this style of formatting, their argument is that their computers, as a citation machine, will do the work for them. But what would happen if we woke up one day and discovered that our computers, in addition to the Internet, simply ceased to function?

Our dependency on computers is becoming terrifying. It is said that “knowledge is power,” but only when we have it in our own minds – not on floppy disks.

Another issue that I would like to raise regards the quality of the reading experience itself. I believe quality reading occurs when you are truly focused, which is best achieved by reading a book or article in print. You can underline essential information and take notes, which indicate the actual process of learning. To me, reading information online is more akin to “skimming” than it is to learning. Therefore, there is still a need for print books and journals, especially for people who actually respect the quality of the reading experience and particularly seek a professional source of information.

Nonetheless, we have to understand that the Internet and its easy access of information can actually encourage people to develop bad habits such as laziness, which could lead them to value quantity over quality. That’s a warning for today’s century.

The New Intelligent Species

With the increasing power of computers, imagine a new generation of intelligent species evolving on the earth just as human evolution has over the last 2.3 to 2.4 million years. However, in contrast, the new species would evolve to its full extent at a much greater pace, as technological progress is growing extremely fast.

As Ray Kurzweil suggests in his idea of Singularity, the whole universe will become a brain, I also predict the fast growth of technology where its empire dominates humans’ mind and eventually become antihuman.

“As we gradually learn to harness the optimal computing capacity of matter, our intelligence will spread through the universe at (or exceeding) the speed of light, eventually leading to a sublime, universe- wide awakening,” Kurzweil said.

But the question is how the evolution of computers, will affect humans. Are computers going to develop themselves into a superior source of knowledge? I believe that, humans will eventually become self destructive. They will lose their control over technology because they have become so dependent to it. For instance look at how technology shaped our lives today. The human’s mind has become so indolent with regard to so many things including calculation, the memorization of phone numbers or planning a trip with new technology, that includes the navigational system, GPS. And once you become dependent on something other than yourself, you participate in your own destruction.

Contrary to Jaron Lanier’s belief in his book, You Are not a Gadget, where he declares that “humans are real, but information is not”, I believe information is real too, because it has power. Information is alive and has affected all of our lives. It’s conscious because its effects have changed our entire life style. One case Lanier raised focuses on Wikipedia. He recalls this source as the “Oracle illusion” in which human authorship is stronger than net. True, but a point I would like to raise here concerns information access. In comparison with a human’s manuscript, Wikipedia is a much easier accessed source of information and therefore is more practical.

Therefore, I believe that eventually internet will reach a higher level than human brain and if the technologically fast pace isn’t controlled critically by humans, Singularity will happen.

"Welcome My Son, Welcome to the Machine"

It’s Friday night and all I have to do, instead of getting a new hair-cut, wearing makeup, and going out with friends, is simply change my Face book profile picture. This is 'thanks' to the digital revolution that’s increased enormously through the 21st century’s generations. As Jaron Lanier suggests in his book, you are not a gadget, people have become automatons, much like mobile robots that are controlled by technology. I am not against the new “open culture;” however, my argument is that instead of people becoming controllers of what they have innovated, they have turned into its slaves.

According to Suzanne Choney’s article, The dark side of digital 'love', within the new technology people no longer act as individuals and the nature of privacy is not what it used to be. "Technology has removed what I call the 'moral speed bumps'," she says. Before, when you went out to stalk somebody, or engaging in some other horrific act, you had to decide to go out that front door and do it, she adds. "But what technology has enabled you to do, is to sit in the privacy of your house and wreak havoc." Choney continues.

Losing our privacy has entailed different aspects which all imply to lose our identity. In other words, we are becoming a transparent society of record, one in which documentation of our past history, current identity, location, communication and physiological and psychological states are available to everyone. All of this was anticipated by Gary T. Marx in his Privacy and Technology piece back in 1999.

Looking at issue of privacy in a different way, illustrates how with the new culture we have become software’s prisoners. I suggest our privacy is our freedom when it comes to getting locked into software such as files, UNIX, or MIDI. As Lanier recalls, lock in makes us forget the lost freedom we had in the digital past, and should be resisted. For instance, Bradley Kuhn of the Software Freedom Law Center expresses his concern about the future of freedom in lock in software mobiles. “We are in a very precarious time with regard to the freedom of mobile devices. We currently have no truly Free Software operating system that does the job,” he says.

In conclusion, as the power of computers grows exponentially, domination of online culture over the traditional culture should being controlled by individuals. After all, humans are the creators of computers, not the other way around . As Pink Floyd sang- “Welcome my son, welcome to the machine” hint that although we live in a digital age and have been besieged with technology, we should use it as a gift without losing our identities in the process.

http://softwarecritics.info/
http://web.mit.edu/gtmarx/www/privantt.html
http://today.msnbc.msn.com/id/35313591/ns/technology_and_science-wireless/
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/02/13/technology/internet/13google.html