Spock wept

[Andrew]

If you were to try to quantify the greatest acheivments or inventions of mankind
as some have, communication is at the heart. The printing press, transportation
(i.e. the wheel), and you may even classify language. All these things bring
people together or disimenate information more efficiently. Presently, we
have the "Information Age" of rapidly distributed data. Whether via printed
mediums, broadcast mediums, the Internet and so forth, we have now at our
disposal, as individuals, more information than has ever been available to
the entire human race in all of history.

So how do we make it better?
Do we communicate faster? Do we "transimit and receive" greater amounts of
information?

The human vocal system is capable of transmitting over 14 seperate sounds
per second. Through body language and context we convey thoughts and emotions.
We can read a book and grasp the authors ideas. We can hear them read on
a radio program and understand even more by the readers inflection, modulation
and sense stress. We can view a television program and see the body language
and hear the inflection. Best of all, we can visit the author, interact,
and have an excellent grasp of the information and the context. Most people
will have no problem understanding what the author is trying to say.

_____________________________________________________

"Let's make it better", some say. "Shall we enter a trancendental realm and
invent telepathy?"

Been tried. Dosen't work.

"How about we design a machine that can interpret the vast amount of thought
cycles in our brains and dump it into the brain case of another?"

Sorry, that's brainwashing because I don't know what information you are
dumping in my head.

"How about we break down our thought processes into a rigid yet extensible
set of rules that everyone understands, send the information that we wish
to convey via this protocol, process the information received over this protocol
into a language architecture of thought processes that I understand, and
that will make us more efficient and perfect people!"

Why?

"Because nobody understands me!"

I guess you never sat with the "cool" kids in the lunch room did you. The
generation gap is too big, too, huh.

"Yes! So if we just get rid of the 'emotions' and 'humanity' behind our thinking,
and use pure logic just like computers then we don't have to worry about
being picked on because everybody will coexist and I won't have to worry
about whether my mommy loves me because it is logically just part of the
parent child data structure and we both will understand that!"

(Sigh) Don't tell me, your going to make this a psuedo-religious crusade
to find the holy grail of interpersonal communication, and when you think
that you have found it, evangelise your new way of life to the world. What
happens if there are a "few" who do not agree with your new schema?

"Then they are obviously malfunctioning evolutionary throwbacks and should
be enlightened (by whatever means necessary) or just accept there place as
inferior life forms. They will be "Legacy" beings and therefore obsolete."

So, this will be changed by a new human OS?

"Yes! There will be no more free thinking radicalistic movements, no more
hunger, this will end poverty and war. This is our Destiny."

Funny, didn't Hitler say that?

[marilyn]

"marilyn" <marilyn@harmon.com> wrote:
Well said , Andrew. Having been in the technology arena since nearly prehistoric
times
(transistors anyone?) I have observed quite a few theories that were supposed
to
revolutionize human productivity. This one is a pip! Perhaps if we drug
all the high energy children into
submission and then we program all the intelligent adults into a groove,
we will find that we can thrash
happily in a pit of well-oiled mediocrity forever. Scares me.
>