Today, we'll continue to talk about technology, but with an almost "philosophical" point of view. The MIT Technology Review looks at how and why George Orwell's nightmare never came to light.
1984, that dreaded Orwellian year, has finally arrived. The phenomenon George Orwell predicted reached full bloom around 1989, and has been straggling to completion ever since. Few people noticed, however, because of a simple error in Orwell’s prediction. His analysis was right, but he got the sign wrong.
His novel 1984, written in 1948, contained the foremost prophecy of the cold war: that technological advancement would render Stalinism unstoppable, with individual liberty the inevitable casualty. However, when the technologies that would enable this totalitarian global village reached fruition, the victim was not democracy, but totalitarianism itself. What went right?
Orwell’s error was remarkably simple: he assumed that only the state would be able to afford high-tech -- an assumption shared by virtually every prophet, science-fiction writer, and futurist. But it has proven to be wrong. As late as the 1970s, the driving force for electronic technology in the U.S. was the military; now the Department of Defense has difficulty getting industry to respond to its needs, since they are dwarfed by the consumer market. The military, whenever possible, now orders commercial off-the-shelf technology rather than 'mil spec.' Many of the GPS receivers used in Desert Storm were bought at Radio Shack. Radios have become so inexpensive that Intel is now planning to engrave a miniature one on the corner of every silicon microchip, at no extra cost . Most of us cannot even count the number of computers we own, because we don't know how many are hidden in our microwave ovens and automobiles.
To be sure, technology has introduced problems. Like anything out of control, it does not always lead us where we want to go. It is particularly difficult to predict its long-term effect on the environment. But in a time when technology is frequently under attack, it is worthwhile to notice its role in spreading truth. It was not Stalinism, but the flow of information that proved to be unstoppable.
Source: Richard A. Muller, MIT Technology Review, July 12, 2002
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