In my never ending quest, perhaps Quixotic, to expose the seedy underbelly of all things techie, I offer “Just a Tool, Two” or “2.0” for you Big Tech enthusiasts.
The scene in the 1980’s movie is this: the hero has tracked the irascible killer to a remote area in Los Angeles where he is burying his final victim whom he thinks dead but is not. The place is too remote for a scream for help to be effective.
This scene is not believable and would be not written, directed, acted, or sold today. The ubiquity of the smartphone, or even just a flip phone, means no one would write this scene or even think it. Think how far back not just in writing but in thinking the story would be different.
I tried, fruitlessly I might add, to sound the warning bell on this in the early 2000s. I said, “Think how many 70s detective shows turn on the sleuth or the criminal finding a phone. Think how much time is spent in the search for these stationary items.”
I know what you’re thinking, and you’re right. When writing Westerns you better know when the telegraph, telephone, and electricity reached the area your story is set in. If the telegraph was available, lines will need to be cut. If the phone was, the rapidity of the response will need to be factored in. If electricity is available, working in the “dark” will be thought of, written about, and used differently.
And now it’s time for the big, “So what?” I got the same response when I ranted on the dangers of the QR code, and this to conservative, confessional, liturgical Lutherans! You know, as much as possible, you avoiding signing your right to litigation away, not because you’re litigious, but because who signs away a right before you know what exactly it will pertain to? With the QR you are signing away “the right” to access your content. The tech is saying, “Trust me. This code I’ve just generated which you cannot read or understand which communicates, and can communicate, absolutely nothing to you, but does to ‘me’ will give you access to your content whenever you want and will never be altered by anyone but you. Sign here.”
When you write a story about different era, you adopt to the tech of that era. You know you’re doing it. You have to do it, but you do it your way. Not so when the tech is developing at the speed of nanoseconds. Tech develops too fast for a human to process all the ramifications of using it. Not in these words but to this effect my father, who worked for IBM for over 30 years and has been in heaven almost that long, said that tech adapts you and uses you.
But don’t worry. AI to the rescue. And that’s what makes the latest tech different from the upgrades, innovations, and inventions found in every generation. Neither the telegraph, telephone, typewriter, nor computer could compose, write, and speak for you; AI can. It can ‘think’ quicker than you [I offer the latest Google Chip for proof here: https://blog.google/technology/research/google-willow-quantum-chip/. Full disclosure, one of my sons disputes this assertion vigorously.], more accurately than you, and take into account more variables than you. I don’t think AI can think better than you, but it definitely ‘thinks’ differently than you.[1]
Cue the hymn for the tech revolution: “In the year 2525, if man is still alive
If woman can survive, they may find”. Note the song never tells you what they may find, and that’s my point. We don’t know. God in Christ surely does, but we should probably find out more before unilaterally and uniformly embracing the AI beast slouching towards us.
[1] Right now some techie or non-techie is screaming at their screen: “You fool AI doesn’t really ‘think’ at all.” Well, I’m sorry. I don’t care how tech arrives at “I’m sorry Dave, I’m afraid I can’t do that” it will boggle your mind.
