Digitized Lives: Part 3

At the end of his book, Reed really wraps up everything with an extremely important point: technology does not control us, we control it. The future is not some sort of risky, unknown, unpredictable thing. It is completely controlled by us and the choices we make now. We have all the power.

This means that the biggest problem we face is not how to respond to the future, it is how to think critically about not just what we can do, but what we should do. Based on our problem solving skills alone, humans can do just about anything. But rarely do we stop and think about whether or not we should. We can create nuclear weapons that can destroy the entire planet if one man gets mad enough. But should we create these kinds of weapons and put the trigger in the hands of a fallible, corruptible human?

One of the most interesting thoughts that Reed shares during this section is how technology moves rapidly from strange and new to commonplace and everyday. When TVs were invented, they were huge, limited, space-eating devices. Now, if you go into someone's house and they don't have a TV, they are considered strange. Most homes even have more than one TV. When I lived with my parents, we had four TVs: one in the living room, and one in each of our three bedrooms. That is one TV per person, which would have been considered extremely excessive back when TVs originally were introduced into the home, but are now considered the norm. Same goes for computers, cell phones, etc. These technologies are wonderful and we use each of them daily. I do 90% of my homework on my computer, I couldn't survive without it. But is that healthy? Is having each of these technologies so interwoven into our daily lives worth it in the long run? Or does it hurt us?

Reed introduces the idea that we are in total control by talking about artificial intelligence (AI). When we think of AI, we think of movies like 2000: A Space Odyssey where the computer H.A.L. starts to think for itself and take over, only to result in it's own death: "my mind is going. I can feel it." We invent these extremely capable technologies and then fear them because perhaps we programmed them a little too well. But therein lies the problem. We programmed them. We programmed them to be like us. We chose to design them like us. I had never considered the fact that this programming was a conscious choice until Reed brought up the idea that it may have been smarter to consciously program AI to be different from humans in major was so that we could distinguish them from us. Instead, we are left wondering whether or not H.A.L. can really feel his mind going, whether or not H.A.L. is really alive.

At the end of it all, T.V. Reed is absolutely correct: the future is in our hands in every way. We can choose to pursue technology with reckless abandon and craft an unpredictable and potentially terrifying future, or we can pause and take a moment to think critically about where technology is going, and whether or not that is the direction we want to take it. We still have the choice. And pretending that we don't is foolish.

Digitized Lives: Part 2

In chapter 4, Reed focuses on gender and racial inequalities and how they make themselves known on the internet. Early on in the chapter, he poses an important question; "if we are truly in a post-racial, post-sexist era, why would one want to disguise one's race or gender?" Although anonymity has it's benefits, such as preventing bias, it's very existence should be questioned. True equality would have no need for anonymity, because no one's thoughts/opinions/etc. would be considered less than someone else's. The idea that minority groups must disguise certain aspects of themselves in order to be accepted as an equal was not created by the existence of the internet. One of the reasons that J.K. Rowling published under her initials is because her gender could not be determined based on initials, and she was more likely to get published if people thought she was a man.

A lot of this chapter reminded me of our class discussions about Gamergate, and how many members of the gaming community are actively supporting gender inequality. What is particularly remarkable about this is the fact that Gamergate is trying to pass itself off as a group in support of proper gaming journalism and critique, and many people believe that, because why would a bunch of heteronormative, white, middle class males lie?

I like Reed's point about how nobody woke up one day and decided to embed all of these inequalities into the internet/computer. It wasn't a consciously racist or sexist choice, it was an unconscious recreation of a society with existing systematic inequalities. Most people support or promote inequalities subconsciously, because our society just enables us to. "Going with the flow" is the path of least resistance, and we will always choose the path of least resistance because it's easier. It's just a shame that that path happens to be a dark one.

These inequalities are designed to perpetuate themselves, and if we don't actively try to change them, then they will never change.