the machine stops

Back in high school, as part of our English curriculum, we read a number of short sci-fi stories, one of which was the amazingly prophetic The Machine Stops by E.M. Forster.  Instead of living in cities, everyone lived in the machine, in rooms where they were all interconnected via Skype and they never went outside.  Never.  You can read it here.  You can download a custom copy and see people's comments here.

I think just turning you on to this story would be good enough but I feel compelled to make at least some kind of comment.  When I was a kid, the new technology was tv.  My parents grew up without it and saw it come of age and I think the general feeling about tv was very good.  In some sense, it was very educational and informative.  Back then, you got your news from the newspaper and you could only find out what happened in the world once a day.  So tv was in every way better than the newspapers or radio.  As a family, we'd spend most of our evening (once my homework was done) from about 7 to 9 watching prime time.  Most people did.  And Saturday morning we'd watch cartoons until they went off the air.  In our innocence, we never wondered if watching all that tv was good for us.  And I think our parents agreed in general all the while noting we didn't go outside to play much on Saturday mornings any more.

I don't want to belabor the comparison here but pretty much the same thing happened to me as a parent.  There was no internet or computer gaming when I was a kid and so when the Mozilla web browser and Commander Keen came out, we were all thrilled to enjoy their delights.  Back in the 56K modem days, the internet was mostly a promise waiting to be fulfilled but it was not too many years before that promise came through.  And simple side scrolling sprite-driven games blossomed into gorgeous and seductive 3D renditions of beautiful and fantastic landscapes.  All the while my kids were going from toddlers to teens.  I also noticed that Saturday morning (the time my kids didn't want to play outside) had extended itself as well.

What can I say?  Tv and the internet and video games are all good things and there's no going back.  No one wants to go back anyway.  We have to learn to live with these innovations and control them.  But everything makes using our time wisely harder and harder.

So I want to close with another classic work:  the movie Brainstorm.  I think most of what needs to be said have been said by these two works.  In Brainstorm, a scientist (Christopher Walken) discovered a way to record people's experiences on something like videotape.  Their sight, hearing, balance, emotional state, taste, smell--everything, the total experience.  And at first everyone is delighted and it makes Christopher Walken fabulously wealthy and respected overnight.  And for awhile everything's cool but as time progresses, a lot of real unhealthy things start to grow out of it.  The ending is rather unusual and it does not resolve any of the issues, it just reminds us of the judgement day coming.  Recommended.