First off I wanted to start out on a lighter mood and introduce an example of the Good.In John McWhorter's Ted talk; "Txting is killing language.JK!!!", he argues that texting is actually a linguistic miracle that is happening under our noses. He points out that language, speech and writing are very different things. Language he argues, is more important. In casual speech we don't use many words and it is more casual and loose when conversing with others. He says that because we see language written, we think that is what speech is. But in fact it is not. If people spoke how they wrote it would not be casual loose conversation, it would be like giving a presentation or writing a paper. With the idea of texting which is supose to imitate speech, it should reflect the casual loose structure the way that speech is. He says that texting is fingered speech. We are able to write the way we talk, and this should not represent some kind of decline in education or lack of rules on our part. What is going on here is an emergent complexity. He talks about how we uses things such as slashes or lol to create new information markers. The use of LOL does not mean laughing out loud, its a marker of empathy and accomodation. These are called pragmatic particales. My favorite part of his speech what when he pointed out that it was not the rise in technology that sparked the idea of the decline in writing skills. He uses examples that date all the way back to 63 A.D that prove that there are always people worrying about the loss of structured writing and speaking. In 1871 a president of Harvard complained about lack of skills in writing and reading and there wasn't even electricity during this time! Overall John feels that texting is a linguistic miracle happening under our noses.
http://www.ted.com/talks/john_mcwhorter_txtng_is_killing_language_jk.html
Now for the bad...
http://www.ted.com/speakers/marc_goodman.html
In Marc Goodman's Ted talk : Global Security First, he talks about how the future of technology can look very dangerous when devices are in the hands of the wrong people. He talks about how the drug dealers an terrorists are building their own networks and using modern technology to committ terrible crimes. An interesting point he brought up was “All the drug dealers and gang members with whom I dealt had [a cell phone] long before any police officer I knew did. ” He talks about they ways that terrorists are taking advantage of the fact that our world has become so open through the use of technology. It is a very scary idea that he points out how a search engine can determine who should live and who should die. In terms of crime, it is is now easier to commit crime against a much larger group of people at one time. For instance he talks about the Sony Playstation incident where over one hundred million people were robbed. If technology wern't involved it would never be possible for one person to rob so many people at one time. He is warning us about the progressing dangers that these advances will lead to in the future as it only continues to get worse as we progress technologically.
And for the Ugly...
As I am sure most of you are familiar with the Boston Marathon Bombings that happened just a few weeks ago leaving hundreds wounded and three dead. This was a tragic and disgusting thing that happened and it left a lot of people thinking about cyber war and terrorism. In the case of the two brothers who produced these awful attacks, there was chaos after the bombs went off in fear that another bomb could be triggerd by the use of cell phones. Although the cell phones may not have been the exact thing that set these explosive off, it is a scary thought that that is a potential option for terrorists who want to inflict this much harm on a large group of people. Cell phone service was shut down at the moment of the bombing as a precaution that it could be the cause of another explosive. This is an ugly aspect of technology because of how powerful it can be in situations like terrorism or hate crimes. Technology has the power to get thousands and thousands of people without access to communication or even get them in one area in order to target them in a harmful manner.
http://www.policymic.com/articles/35359/boston-marathon-bombing-cell-phone-service-shut-off-in-boston-area
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