“Learning to Deal”

            I was admittedly quite skeptical when it came to this course, especially after seeing the title of the required reading!  I have endured countless smart aleck comments regarding the actual “shape” of the earth because of this book.  In the beginning I would just smile and nod and say, “I know, I know”.  Not very far into the semester however, my opinion began to change, and I would say, “Actually it really is flat, believe it or not!”

            How incredible that it took thirty-four long years for me to learn this one really life changing fact.  I have mentioned in previous blogs about being on the receiving end of the dreaded phenomenon called outsourcing.  I was a happy passenger on the “dang foreigners are swooping in and stealing our jobs” train.  This course has opened my eyes to the reality of what was actually happening.  I was too mired in my own frustration to look around and see how truly amazing it was that technology was changing the face of the landscape.

            Although it is still extremely upsetting when you are on the unemployed side of things, I now have a better understanding of the necessity of it all.  Technology is very nearly an unstoppable force.  It is really about who can get the job done the best, in the smallest amount of time, for the least amount of financial burden.  When looked at from a distance, who can really argue with that logic?  Demand, OUR demand, has fueled the fire that has led to the incessant push for such drastic measures.

We live in a world of instant gratification.  We want what we want, when we want it, and not a second later.  We have all dug our own theoretical holes, and the time has come to get in and deal with the repercussions.  We have created this monster that virtually begged for the inevitable solution of things like outsourcing and offshoring.  (Those are actually two distinctly separate things. Another little tidbit I got from this course!)  I am not in any way advocating moving job resources from here in America to other parts of the world, I am however saying that I can see the sense in it from a strictly business standpoint.

I learned a greater respect for technology and the people that fuel its progress.  I gained a deeper appreciation for the luxuries, big and small, that innovation has provided.  I have considered the seemingly outlandish possibility that one day the very machinery we create could grow too powerful to control. What? Yes, I did, I really did!  Nothing is out of the realm of possibilities any longer.  When looking backwards with the extravagance of 20/20 hindsight, it is very easy to see the incredible upward march that has been slowly but steadily progressing toward where we sit today.  Who can say what tomorrow will bring, when all things are considered?

One thing is very clear.  Technology is progressing.  We can either use it to our advantage, or sit stagnant and be trampled under its tidal wave.  Every coin has two sides, and as long as we remember to deal with the negative aspects that go along with the indisputable advantage provided through technology, the progression will continue.  The trick, again, is learning to deal with the changes as they come.

“How to Boil a Frog”

While reading through the first part of this article, a series of thoughts kept running through my head.  This sounds vaguely like the story of cooking a live frog.  I have never, and do not intend to ever cook, boil, or eat a frog.  But just about everyone knows the theory that if you drop a frog into a boiling pot of water it will simply jump right out.  If, on the other hand, you set the frog in a pan of tepid, or even cool water it will feel comfortable.  As you slowly and gradually raise the heat by small increments the frog will not notice the change, supposedly, and will eventually be boiled to death.  Now the reason I bring this up is the similarity between the poor frog’s predicament and our own.  When faced with the daunting reality that technology may very well be on the verge of taking control, the author’s friend Danny Hillis said simply and calmly that “the changes would come gradually, and that we would get used to them.” 

The frog does not recognize the imminent danger posed to it because the changes are so miniscule it escapes attention.  Are we, as a society, really all that different?  If we look back even a mere decade, can we not see that the temperature in our pot has been in a continuous incline?  If a huge leap had been made we might have had to pause and say, “Wait a minute, is this REALLY a good idea?”  But small, step by step actions allow us time to adjust, and again become comfortable with the surroundings, just like the about-to-be-boiled-to-death frog.

Bill Joy states in his article, “Perhaps it is always hard to see the bigger impact while you are in the vortex of a change.  Failing to understand the consequences of our inventions while we are in the rapture of discovery and innovation seems to be a common fault of scientists and technologists; we have long been driven by the overarching desire to know, that is the nature of science’s quest, not stopping to notice that the progress to newer and more powerful technologies can take on a life of its own.”  In other words, like the frog in the pot, if we enjoy the water and the temperature that it is at right now, just imagine how much more we would enjoy it if it was just the tiniest bit warmer! But the important point that is being overlooked is, who is controlling the heat?

As a society we often get so caught up in whether or not we CAN do something that no one ever stops to ask if we SHOULD.  New and amazing scientific breakthroughs have almost become a mind numbing everyday occurrence.  I am also reminded of the article from a couple weeks back called “A Logic Named Joe”.  I can almost guarantee that this interesting and creative writing was met with harsh skepticism about the crazy idea of computers having a mind of their own.  Just as easily, we can write Joy’s fears off as being the fodder of science fiction movies.  The scary truth that many do not want to face is that technology is, in fact, increasing at a rate so rapid I believe it is a legitimate possibility in the very near future the hypothetical “point of no return” will be crossed.

Who are we to look to as a moral compass?  Who will draw the line in the sand that cannot ethically be crossed?  Without clearly defined limitations, we are all just sitting frogs.

“The Net”

        I honestly had never seen any of the movies that were listed as examples for this week’s module.  I wracked my brain trying to think of a movie that I had access to that dealt with computers in a major way.  I finally remembered a show that I had seen many years ago that was related to the topic, called “The Net”, starring Sandra Bullock.  The irony of the whole situation is that I do not own this movie, so I ended up looking it up on YouTube and watching it on my computer!

            This movie is basically a story about a reclusive computer programmer named Angela Bennett.  She doesn’t get out much and keeps mostly to herself, no fraternizing with neighbors, no dating.  She does get out to visit her mother, who unfortunately is in a mental institution and has no idea the person visiting her is her own daughter.  (This becomes important later when her life essentially gets erased)

She lives her entire life through the computer, being sent beta version programs with problems, and fixing the glitches.  One of her contacts sends her a disk with a program that appears to have a virus.  It just happens to get there the night before she is leaving on vacation.  When the pi symbol in the corner of the page is clicked, it connects with some very high profile and extremely classified sites.  Angela’s contact does not want to discuss this program over the phone and decides to fly his small plane there that night to meet with her before she leaves.  The computer navigation system on the plane “mysteriously” glitches and causes him to crash and the plane explodes.

            The next day as she is trying to fly out, there is also a problem with the computer system at the airport and so all flights end up cancelled for quite some time.  While she is waiting, there is the appearance of a person watching her from a distance. 

            On her vacation she is sought out and seduced by a handsome man who is, of course, the wolf in sheep’s clothing.  He arranges to have her purse stolen while they are on a date, and gets his hands on the disk containing the program.  She inadvertently manages to get the disk back, but not before sleeping with the guy and having him try to kill her!  She somehow gets back to her hotel and finds that, again, the computer systems are malfunctioning and show that she checked out days before.  All of her information has been changed and she, in essence, no longer exists.  She gets a temporary visa using another name in order to get back into the U.S. but finds that her car is missing from the airport, and her house is empty of all her belongings and up for sale.  She calls the police who obviously think she is completely crazy and run her record just to be sure.  These records have been changed as well and she now has a very extensive criminal record, which puts her on the run from the police, and cut off from help.

            The rest of the movie basically details her attempts to find out who is after her and what exactly they want from her.  The “bad guys” turn out to be a group of cyberterrorists called the Praetorians, and she manages at the last minute to beat them at their own game by infecting their program with a virus she had been working on in the beginning of the movie. 

            In watching this movie so many years later, I had a similar reaction to it as when reading the article from last week.  The technology shown is almost comical by today’s standards. Again, though, it is somewhat creepy to realize that as much as the story was made fantastical for entertainment purposes, it could, in all reality, happen.  At one point, she is sitting in jail, speaking to her appointed attorney and she says something along the lines of this: “ Think about it, everything about us, our whole lives are on the computer.  Our DMV records, our social security, our medical history, our credit cards.  It’s all just sitting there, waiting, asking for someone to come along and mess with it!”  If we stop and think about it, that is so much more true today than even 10 years ago.  Everything about us, who we are, is tied up in computers.  In the wrong hands, that can be a very powerful thing.