Thursday, June 14, 2007 Ng: A perfect world through technology By Wilson Ng Wired Desktop
THIS week, instead of giving you the usual technology updates and analysis, I will be doing something basic, or maybe throw some futuristic thoughts.
I will try to give my thoughts on the role of technology not only in our life and work, but as technology progresses to touch every inch of our existence, on how much we think and to what extent we should allow it into our lives.
The reason I am reflecting on this is that I read a book titled, The Giver, by Lois Lowry. This book is actually for children and, in fact, have won a good number of awards, including the John Newbery Medal for most distinguished contribution to American Literature for Children. It was originally read by my son who told me it was good.
The story is quite thought provoking, and basically centers on a community in which the people, years into the future, use technology to try to create a world where everything is perfect. It might seem bizarre, but overall, it does seem plausible that if we are too overzealous and if we could do it, we will be headed in that direction.
The policymakers in this book noted that a lot of grief comes from pain, so they were able to work out the perfect medicines that will cure pain and disease. Much grief comes from love, envy, anger and greed, so basically they develop the pills to control those emotions as well. Since people become sorrowful when they make wrong choices, they eliminated choice as well.
In short, this was supposedly a story about a society where there is supposedly no fear, no pain. There is nothing unexpected, unusual or even inconvenient. Everything works according to plan, just like clockwork.
The author perceives that we cannot only use technology to improve our lives, but we will be moving towards using it to shield us from everything that would cause sadness or grief.
The hero, a 12 year old boy, was selected to receive special training which allows him to experience true pain and pleasure.
He later tries to opt out of the system, because he believes being “human” is something that is different.
This raises the question that if you don’t know sorrow, would you know happiness? If you don’t know or haven’t experienced failure, would you appreciate what it is to be successful? If you have never experienced hunger, would you know how lucky you are to always have food on the table?
Now, more and more, as our society advances, we start being able to get practically everything we want. We think we are doing our children a favor by doing everything to shield them from the bad things that we as parents also have experienced before. We shield them from pain, from hunger, from anything inconvenient or anything closely resembling hard work.
But are we using technology the right way? Is that how we envision technology to increasingly play in our lives — shield us from the real challenges of the world?
