How the Internet of Things will help us understand a fundamental truth we have ignored for too long
“The Butterfly Effect”… rings a bell?
Have you seen the movie 10 years back? Or maybe just heard of it in a scientific documentary? Well, just in case you don’t know what it is all about, let me explain quickly. The concept itself come from the Theory of Chaos but the metaphor refers to the Ray Bradbury novel “Sound of Thunder” (1952). In a future where time-machine exists, time-travel safaris are organized for tourists. An excursionist from the future exploring a prehistorical land accidentally treads on a butterfly: the result is a chain of disastrous consequences for human history.
Although this is an equally fascinating and scary idea, and intuitively may seem to make sense to many, I tend to believe most of us have never considered it seriously.
Now let’s turn the page for a minute to one of the many buzzwords of the tech world: the Internet of Things (IoT), in other words the absolute protagonist of the so called Industry 4.0, or the Industrial Revolution based on Cyber-Physical Systems (CPS). Here’s a pick from an article I read a few days ago:
“The Internet of Things will allow us to connect everything with pretty much everything else”
Your refrigerator will know what you want to have for dinner over the next few days, and automatically order it for you. Your car will drive itself, it will know what all the other cars will do and predict the potential movements of pedestrians, bicycles and even (this is true) animals around it. Companies will have a continuous flow of real-time data that will drive their operations and services to take decisions in a timely and efficient manner.
But here’s my point: for the first time in the history of the human race, we hear that “everything can be connected to everything else” in a semantic land which is not connected to philosophy, physics, religion or spiritual teaching.
Indeed, this time it is about Technology… And so what?
Well, well. Technology is visual, tangible, present in our daily life. You might be atheist, agnostic or totally ignore the most basic concepts of physics. You might not even know who Aristotle is.
BUT: you cannot ignore what surrounds you and permeates your sense perceptions. And technologies DO surround you.
So here lies my hope: having continuously in front of our eyes the evidence that ‘things’ are connected with us and/or interconnected, will help many of us awaken to a much deeper truth: that everything IS (already) connected with everything else.
Everything IS (already) connected with everything else
Why many human beings cannot see it, yet? Simple, we are so entrenched in our mind-constructed world that we are unable to feel the thread that connects everything to everything else. A world where everything can be measured and mostly IT IS measured doesn’t have space for that awareness. Cause every space should be filled with some sort of content. A world where money, success, appearance and more in general the DOING and the HAVING vastly dominate our lives and respective self-identifications, penalizing the BEING (consciousness), which is the real ultimate source of fulfillment.
The Little Prince expressed this in very simple words. The words of a child. The words of innocence.
“The essential is invisible to the eyes”
What if the new Industrial Revolution will finally help human race stepping up to the next level of Consciousness?
Interconnection means that there is no hiding. It means that every action and every thought counts. A smile to a stranger, a little gesture of kindness, but also a malevolent word about someone else or just a negative judgement or condemnation. An act of compassion or forgiveness as well as hanging onto anger or resentment.
We are responsible for all of these. And they are connected with everything else, too. Do not underestimate their (your) power. This awareness can make all the difference in the world.
Once more it is all in our own hands, and this time not just metaphorically speaking. Next time you have the chance to observe the gentle fluttering of a butterfly, will you remember?
VALE
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