Replying to LO30181 --
Dear Organlearners,
Barry Mallis <theorgtrainer@earthlink.net> writes:
>McKibbenıs observations, in part, revolve around Mooreıs
>Law and genetic research (specifically germ line research)
>which have the potential to dehumanize us. Worse, Mooreıs
>Law can hypothetically lead to an environment where
>computers have more power to learn than we do.
Greetings dear Barry,
Thank you for pointing out a bleak future which we may move into.
Allow me quickly to explain Moore's Law for some fellow learners so that
they will know what we are speaking about. This relationship was first
formulated in 1964 by semiconductor engineer Gordon Moore (who co-founded
Intel four years later). It says that for semiconductor chips the
"bits per square inch" = 2^(t - 1962)
It means that the density of bits doubles every year and so the computing
power of a chip. In the early eighties this began to slow down to eighteen
months and since the new millennium its going down to two years.
But i think that Barry did not want to talk about Moore's law as about its
consequences. It reminds me of the Chinese story of a king who wanted to
reward a wise man. So the wise man asked payment with corn as follows. The
first square of a checker board had to have one kernel, the second two
kernels, the third four kernels, the fourth eight kernels, etc. The king
thought the wise man to be too modest. But after some time the king's
officials rushed in, telling him that all the corn in the country has been
used up and they are not even half way through the checker board!
I think that Barry want to talk over the influence which this exponential
growth in computing power have over the thinking of humankind. For at
least six millennia languages, first spoken and then written, had been the
almost sole means for coding human thoughts. So important have the
influence of a language been on its people using it that we can say
metaphorically that that the culture of those people drips from their
langauge. With this i mean that a language is soaked dripping wet with the
culture of its users.
What sort of "culture" is cyberspace becoming with dripping wet? Nothing
can be accepted by a computer and computations done on it unless it is
also coded into bytes consisting of sequence of bits, 1 or 0. From this
elemental 1/0 strings to the actual entities represented (numbers, words,
icons, pieces of music) lay several layers of programming languages. But
few people are able to program in any of these levels. So the restrictions
in one level have to be accepted by those programming in another level.
Eventually all entities which have to be coded and computed according to
its own kind have to conform to the categories made available by
programmers through all the programming levels. If something does not fit
in, it requires a team of programmers on all levels to make provision for
it.
If we look at the dazzling diversity of software applications (word
processors, spread sheets, presentations, etc.) available, it seems as if
all our computing needs are covered. But what we don't realise, is that we
have to conform to what is available. For example, try to represent
through typing your own, unique hand writing in text on screen and see how
far you will get. Or another example, try to paint a scenery with a paint
program just as you would have done it with a brush and paint and see how
far you will get.
So what sort of "culture" is cyberspace becoming dripping wet with? You
will have to fit in with what the market has made available to the global
public. If you have any special needs and you are one of few with such
needs, you are left out in the cold unless you can program self in as many
levels of programming languages as is necessary or can hire a good
progammer to do it should you be rich enough. In the end it means that the
ruggedness of your thinking will have to flatten out to make use of what
is available. The existing software will dictate your life rather than you
doing what you really want to do. Your life will begin to drip with the
"culture" which the software manufacturers sell -- the "flat culture".
It makes me think of the mega-malls in which thousands of people who
wander around hundreds of shops for hours on end, often buying what they
do not need and eating what is little more than junk. They arrive tired at
home, having done not a moment's creative work.
I personally think that the e-transformation will have its most serious
effects on education. Learners will have to work through "flat" lessons,
i.e., lessons requiring rote learning. Prompting a learner in terms of a
particular response to think again and come up with a more appropiate
answer will become something of the past. Worst of all, inquisitive minds
will starve to death because how could a computer answer a novel question
which the learner may have?
It may seem that i am very negative to computers and what they can do. I
am not. I am against making cyberspace servile to the world of profit.
Fortunately, there are some people who make their programs freely
available, the so-called freeware. It is these people who try to conserve
and even to advance the ruggedness of their thinking, letting others share
in their mental joys. But will they prevent the flattening of the mental
landscapes of millions of users of commercial software?
Think again of the Chinese king and the wise man. Will all the bits of
cyberspace fit onto the checker board of cultures? Or is the present
attempt not to fit the checker board into the bits of cyberspace? How much
will computer software, available in only a few major languages, wipe out
hundreds of minor languages, each dripping with the culture of the
speakers they serve?
With care and best wishes,
--At de Lange <amdelange@postino.up.ac.za> Snailmail: A M de Lange Gold Fields Computer Centre Faculty of Science - University of Pretoria Pretoria 0001 - Rep of South Africa
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