old chinese curse - trinity college dublin · 3 computers & society -brendan tangney technology...

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Computers & Society - Brendan Tangney Technology & Society 1

1BA6

COMPUTERS & SOCIETY

Course 1BA6

Brendan Tangney

Room 316/317 Lloyd Building

e-mail [email protected]

www.cs.tcd.ie/tangney/ComputersAndSociety

Old Chinese Curse

“May you live in interesting times!”


The Future of Society

http://www.uvm.edu/~artclass/cyborg/NateCloutier.html

“We are engaged in a revolution; a

technological revolution. We have commenced

an era where computers, databases, and the

internet handle tasks formally completed by

the human hand and mind. We live in and at our

computers. We do not have to leave the comfort

of our own computer station any longer.

Everything imaginable can be found on the

internet; from research, to shopping, to business

transactions, to love.

It is not us that makes technology obsolete, it is

our technology which is making us obsolete.

We are the computers, the computers are us.”


Negroponte’s View

� The change from atoms to bits is irrevocable and unstoppable. P4

� Computing is not about computers any more it is about living. P6.

� Early in the next millennium your right and left cuff links or earrings may

communicate with each other by low orbiting earth satellites and have more

computing power than your present PC. Your telephone won’t ring

indiscriminately; it will receive, sort, and perhaps respond to your incoming

calls like a well trained English butler. P6.

� On-demand information will dominate digital life. We will ask explicitly and

implicitly for what we want, when we want it. P169.

� The information superhighway is more than a short cut to

every book in the Library of Congress. It is creating a

totally new, global social fabric. P183.

� [Being Digital. N. Negroponte, 1995.]


The Future of Society

Think of your life before the answering machine, the ATM, e-mail. Think of your grandparents' lives before the television and the airplane. Think of your great-grandparents' lives before the telephone. All told, the shift will be that substantial. Machines will recognize our faces and our fingerprints. They will watch out for swimmers in distress, for radioactivity- and germ-laden terrorists, for red-light runners and highway speeders, for diabetics and heart patients.

Imagine devices that monitor the breathing rhythms of infants in cribs, watch toddlers at day care, and track children as they go to and from school; that can keep an eye on our home supply of orange juice and let us know when the milk is sour. Machines might watch our calorie intake and burn-off, monitor air quality in our homes, and look out for mice and bugs.

Envision sensors as large as walls and as small as molecules in your bloodstream sending quiet signals to nearby computers, which will process and relay information to you, your doctor, your lawyer, your grocer, your building manager, your car mechanic, your local fire or police department. As time and technology march on, less and less will escape the attention of sophisticated machines. They'll have us covered.

http://magma.nationalgeographic.com/ngm/0311/feature1/index.html

http://www.janis-purucker.de/3dgallery/utopia.jpg


XYZ in 2030

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A QUESTION?


Guess what?


One of these


Our view of the world is

filtered through ideas and mental models


Other Examples


Ideas

“An unexamined life is

not worth living.”Socrates

http://www.felix-en-sofie.nl/images/socrates.jpg

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Oscar Wilde

The purpose of education is to

“become one who plays

gracefully with ideas and

does not arrive at a

conclusion by the force of

opinion merely.”


The expression of ideas

/www.todayinliterature.com/assets/photos/s/george-bernard-shaw-180x255.jpg

“I am sorry for writing such a

long letter but I did not have time to

write a short one.”George Bernard Shaw


Educational Objectives of a BA(mod)

� All moderatorship degree programmes seek to impart the following:

� (a) a strong broad base of knowledge that introduces the student to all the main aspects of the

� discipline or disciplines concerned, and to relevant aspects of closely related disciplines;

� (b) advanced expertise in the major subject that provides the students with a thorough

� understanding of the basic principles and methodology of the discipline and of the means

� by which the frontiers of the discipline can be expanded and new knowledge discovered;

� (c) a range of intellectual skills that develop as fully as possible the complete range of mental

� abilities, i.e. the enlargement and proficiency of mind that has long been a fundamental goal

� of university education.

� These skills may be divided into two categories:

� (i) Thinking skills

� These include:

� A — the capacity to make sense of what one learns, to analyse and sort data and solve

� problems

� B — to extend what one has learned, to generate new ideas and concepts, to apply what

� one has learned to new contexts

� C — to deal with knowledge in a critical way, to develop the capacity to evaluate information

� and ideas.

� (ii) Communication skills

� These involve the capacity to organise information and arguments and conclusions, and to

� present them in a clear and well-reasoned manner.


Who controls who?

“We shape our buildings and

afterwards they shape us.” Winston Churchill.

www.tickintsofcentralohio.org/images/Historical/Horseless_carriage_ca._1915.jpg

www.hasekamp.net/thailand/thailand1.jpg


What was the role of

(information) technology in Sept 11th?

http://media.guardian.co.uk/gallery/image/0,8560,-10904255171,00.html

http://www.ptb.be/scripts/center.phtml?section=A1AAAABS


Electronic Voting!!

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Explain what a computer is to….


1BA6

COMPUTERS & SOCIETY

Course 1BA6

Brendan Tangney

Room 316/317 Lloyd Building




MODUS OPERANDI

� Single two hour slot per week

� Lecture/Discussion

� Course reading material.

� Examined by continuous assessment.

� Attendance and contribution at lectures is a pre-requisite.

� Written assignments

� Group presentations

� Minor written examination

� Tight feedback loop on assignments and presentations.

� Written supplemental exam, if required, in the Autumn.


Course Objectives

� You should be able to demonstrate an understanding of

the complexity of the relationship between technology and

society.

� You should be able to articulate well reasoned and well

structured arguments

� On paper

� Verbally

� You should show some understanding of working in

groups.


Resources

� The class WWW page

www.cs.tcd.ie/tangney/ComputersAndSociety/

� Computerization and Controversy: Values Conflicts and

Social Choices. R. Kling (ed.) Academic Press. 1996. 2nd

Edition. ARTS 301.24 N64

� Class reading material.


First Assignments

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A Variety of Views

http://www.filmarchiv.at/events/lang/metropolis.htm

http://www..pensacolabeach.com/ domeofahome/


Dawn of a new age….

� “Within a few short decades, society

rearranges itself - its worldview, its basic values,

its social and political structures, its arts, its key

institutions. Fifty years later there is a new world.

And the people born then cannot even imagine the

world in which their grandparents lived and into

which their own parents were born.”

�Peter Drucker. Post Capitalist Society, 1993.


Negroponte’s View

� The change from atoms to bits is irrevocable and unstoppable. P4

� Computing is not about computers any more it is about living. P6.

� Early in the next millennium your right and left cuff links or earrings may

communicate with each other by low orbiting earth satellites and have more

computing power than your present PC. Your telephone won’t ring

indiscriminately; it will receive, sort, and perhaps respond to your incoming

calls like a well trained English butler. P6.

� On-demand information will dominate digital life. We will ask explicitly and

implicitly for what we want, when we want it. P169.

� The information superhighway is more than a short cut to

every book in the Library of Congress. It is creating a

totally new, global social fabric. P183.

� [Being Digital. N. Negroponte, 1995.]


Cybernetics

� “I was born human. But it was an accident of fate – a

condition merely of time and place. I believe it’s

something we have the power to change…..”

� www.kevinwarwick.com


Ireland in the Info Age

Ireland in the information age will be

“a unique community, rich in culture, learning and creativity where the Information Society is embraced: to support the talents of our people; to create employment, wealth and vibrant, inclusive communities; and where citizens participate more actively in government.”

“Information Society Ireland : Strategy for Action” December 96. Page iii. Initial publication of the Information Society Steering Committee set up by the Minister of Enterprise & Employment in 1996.

http://www.isc.ie/


Chris Evans’ View (1980)

In the home in the short term future (early 1980s) there will be

� “speaking bathroom scales, freezers which remind you to restock

them, cookers which tell how the meat is coming along, telephones

that tell you how many people have rung in your

absence……thermometers which advice you what to wear before you

get up."

(p79)

� “The first practical shift will be reflected in a cut in the working week

to an average of 30 hours, a retirement option at fifty five or even

fifty, and annual vacations of at least six weeks”. (p95)

� [Evans C., The Mighty Micro, Cornet, 1979]

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Thoreau (1850)

� Technology for Technology’s Sake?

“...so with a hundred other ‘modern improvements’

..... our inventions are wont to be pretty toys which distract our attention from serious things.

They are but an improved means to an unimproved end..…”

“Walden” by Henry Thoreau 1818-1862


Kling’s View

� The Seductive Equation of Technological Progress with

Social Progress.

“Social Revolutions are based on changes in ways of life, not

just changes in equipment…..”


Steve Talbott

“No law seems more certain than this one: the next generation of computers will be better than the last. Yet no law conceals a more socially devastating lie.”[Netfuture, #1, Dec, 1995]

“I recently heard an industry pundit say, "As voice recognition technology gets more sophisticated, we can expect computers to become more user-friendly.“ Self-evidently true? Let's consider. Perhaps the most conspicuous application of voice recognition today is in telephone answering systems. The idea, of course, is that better listening skills will enable the software to deal more flexibly with your and my needs. The notorious klunkiness of the current answering systems will yield to friendlier capabilities.

In a sense, this is true. When I call a business in the future, the options will be more numerous, and I'll be able to negotiatethose options with voice commands more complex than "yes" and "no." But this is to ignore an obvious fact about the new capabilities: their reach will be extended. Where earlier software eventually routed you to a human operator, the "friendlier" version will replace the operator with a software agent who will attempt to conduct a crude conversation with you.

So the earlier frustrations will simply be repeated -- but at a much more critical level. Where once you finally reached a live person, now you will reach a machine. And if you thought the number-punching phase was irritating, wait until you have to communicate the heart of your business to a computer with erratic hearing, a doubtful vocabulary of 400 words, and the compassion of a granite monolith!

The technical opportunity to become friendlier, in other words, is also an opportunity to become unfriendly at a more decisive level. This is the prevailing law of technological development, underlying nearly every claim of progress. “

[Netfuture, #1, Dec, 1995, http://www.netfuture.org/1995/Dec1495_1.html#3]


Digital Age Nonsense

I sometimes wonder whether the folks at the M.I.T. Media Lab are pulling our legs. Are they stand-up

comedians in disguise? It seems that a lot of energy at the prestigious lab (which claims to be

"inventing the future") is going into the redesign of the American kitchen. For example, one project

involves training a glass counter top to assemble the ingredients for making fudge by reading

electronic tags on jars of mini-marshmallows and chocolate chips, then coordinating their

quantities with a recipe on a computer and directing a microwave oven to cook it.

Dr. Andrew Lippman, associate director of the Media Lab, says that "my dream tablecloth would

actually move the things on the table. You throw the silver down on it, and it sets the table."

One waits in vain for the punch line. These people actually seem to be serious. And the millions of

dollars they consume look all too much like serious money. Then there are the corporate sponsors,

falling all over themselves to throw yet more money at these projects.

Nowadays this kind of adolescent silliness is commonly given the halo of a rationale that has become

respected dogma.

[Netfuture, #87, March 30, 1999, http://www.netfuture.org/1999/Mar3099_87.html#2c]


Views of/on Technologists

� “Computer Science … is the systematic study of

algorithms….” [ACM task force quoted in Kling p33].

� “A man trained in computer science alone is by any

definition an uneducated man” – [C. Holland, The Idea of

A University].

� “Whether or not it draws upon new scientific research,

technology is a branch of moral philosophy, not of

science”, [Kling, p33].


The Punchline(s)

� Computers operate only as part of a larger technical and

societal context.

� The relationship between computers and society is very

complex.

� An understanding of the complexity of that relationship is

necessary to develop technological solutions/artefacts.

� We view the world through a set of (unquestioned)

assumptions or filters.

� One of the purposes of education is to critically examine

that set of assumptions.

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1BA6

COMPUTERS & SOCIETY

Course 1BA6

Brendan Tangney

Room 316/317 Lloyd Building.



old chinese curse - trinity college dublin · 3 computers & society -brendan tangney technology...

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