Learn new skills, but keep the old . . .
This afternoon, I attended the Dominican University’s Caritas Veritas Symposium. One of the presentations was entitled For Better or Worse? The Role of Computers and Technology in our Lives and in the Future presented by Esmail Bonakdarian and Mark Hodges. Hodges spoke with optimism about technology and future advancements such as self driving cars while Bonakdarian, mostly agreeing with Hodges’ point of view, also wanted to convey some potential drawbacks. I was hoping to gain some insight in regards to web design and issues of privacy.
Hodges did begin the presentation with information about car accidents and most of them being due to driver error. He then played a video of a blind man using a Google car to drive around and do errands that he normally wouldn’t be able to. He spoke about how the technology allows the cars to talk to each other and drive closer together alleviating traffic jams. Bonakdarian postulated that the algorithms behind these cars don’t account for human behaviors such as braking if a squirrel runs in front of the car or a golden retriever (for people who were okay with running over a squirrel). He also commented about a self driving Jeep that got hacked into while driving 70mph. Another concern was if the self driving cars would use the same shopping algorithms seen on Amazon to purposefully take routes past certain stores or dealerships depending on people’s search patterns.
Other privacy issues discussed were churches using facial recognition software to monitor which parishioners were going to service and lack of a free press if people are constantly being monitored and having data collected on them. Bonakdarian also mentioned a hiring algorithm that detects a depressive episode in an individual six months in advance based on their social media output and rejects their application. I don’t even know how to explain that type of discrimination.
“The fact that new technologies can have both positive and negative consequences in not to say that they should be discouraged; only that they should be applied appropriately and their negative as well as positive effects anticipated and, when necessary, ameliorated” (Rubin 225). I think this quote means that we need to learn how to navigate and benefit from advances in technology, but not at the lose of current skills. Attention and deep thought are already decreasing because of the way people read the internet and web pages, I hope society doesn’t lose the ability to write and drive as well. I think that librarians need to think about current skills that might be perceived as “useless” in the future and the benefits and consequences those skills provide.
Sources:
Bonakdarian, Esmail and Hodges, Mark. “For Better or Worse? The Role of Computers and Technology in our Lives and in the Future.” Caritas Veritas Symposium. Dominican University. Martin Recital Hall, River Forest. 29 September, 2015. Presentation.
Rubin, Richard E., Foundations of Library and Information Science. Neal-Schuman Publishers, Inc. New York, 2010.
