all can be lost: the risk of putting our knowledge in the hands of machines

[bcbm]

http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2013/11/the-great-forgetting/309516/

interesting look at automation with some useful suggestions

[ckaihatsu]

Warmed-over cyberphobia for the smartphone era.

Also, intellectual sensationalism, spouting a liberal, middle-class anxiety-mongering.

[bcbm]

pointing out machines can't do everything as well as humans yet and that automation has drawbacks is cyberphobia. that entire issue of the atlantic is like a masturbatory fantasy about progress, gimme a break.

[ckaihatsu]

pointing out machines can't do everything as well as humans


Exactly -- this is one of those things that is immediately obvious to *anyone* who uses tools of any sort, which amounts to pretty much everyone on the planet.

I'll add that the machines-vs.-humans paradigm that you've accurately identified here is the crux of the problem in presentations like this one -- it *does* create anxiety because it encourages us to think of technology as a rival, instead of as outgrowths from the original stone hand-axe.





yet and that automation has drawbacks is cyberphobia.


Instead of treating the reader as a knowledgeable tool-user it sensationalizes the obvious.





that entire issue of the atlantic is like a masturbatory fantasy about progress, gimme a break.


Well, thanks for posting the article, nonetheless.

[Sperm-Doll Setsuna]

Instead of treating the reader as a knowledgeable tool-user it sensationalizes the obvious.


GPS navigation demonstrably decreases people's ability to navigate without this aid, decreases their comprehension of space and time, distracts. Automation of certain operations are not necessarily beneficial; pilots unable to fly without crashing due to forgetting how to even do it on aimless cross-atlantic flights. Automated metros as an excuse to lay off workers, usual cost-cutting capitalism from which technology within the social context it occupies can never be free. Where in is the utilisation of the tool, then? A tool to do what? Smart-phone, shitphone, a tool to play a game while you shit.

[ckaihatsu]

GPS navigation demonstrably decreases people's ability to navigate without this aid, decreases their comprehension of space and time, distracts.


Yes, I read the article, but I stand by my saying that it's just sensationalizing -- the author picks out the rare worst-case scenarios when both machine *and* people fall short of what's needed. The world isn't perfect, anyway....





Automation of certain operations are not necessarily beneficial; pilots unable to fly without crashing due to forgetting how to even do it on aimless cross-atlantic flights.


*Or* maybe it's a problem of *implementation* -- that there should be either a clearer line as to who/what does what, or perhaps airplane flight should be *fully* automated.





Automated metros as an excuse to lay off workers, usual cost-cutting capitalism from which technology within the social context it occupies can never be free.


Agreed -- capitalism just makes things much messier than they need to be.





Where in is the utilisation of the tool, then? A tool to do what? Smart-phone, shitphone, a tool to play a game while you shit.


Um...okay, sure. Thanks for, um, sharing your personal habits with us.