The Talking Head

Yesterday an otherwise intelligent person I know expressed the idea that as a result of growing up in a push-button world he is better able to make decisions.

He actually promised an 8% return on investment if we relied on him and others 'like me' which is a connection that is baseless and absurd.

He seemed reasonable at the get-go but as he framed his argument it lost cohesiveness.  His basis for asserting, essentially, that he knew it all was drawn from what he rightfully perceives as the flood of information he is bombarded with daily.

His reference points were Twitter feeds, email and YouTube to name just three.  No encyclopedia, dictionary, atlas, textbooks or other preserved reference materials were used as a guide.  For those of you offended by paper I am referring even to electronic versions of these documents.

He posed himself, essentially, as having all the answers.  But - it seemed he had asked no questions and only sifted the materials presented to him electronically.

This is really a tragedy of thought.  The hubris (excessive pride) contained there is clear when we consider the billions now living who do not see or hear or experience what he has.  Not only that if we consider that Twitter is limited to 140 characters and pictures it would be a mistake to make decisions based solely on a Twitter post.

Expanding that YouTube is totally cool but anyone can post anything they like there.  Without a reference point of right action making decisions based on what is displayed there would also be a mistake.  Not to mention they use TCP rather than UDP to transmit so as a source of information cited by this individual YouTube is already dated and old.

As for email there could hardly be a less controlled or reliable mode of communication other than a soap box.  It is altogether possible to imagine an account solely filled with SPAM.  If the frame of reference for this individual using email as a source of reliable information comes primarily from a crook posing as a Princess who wants to give him 500,000 dollars in cash then tragicomedy may lurk nearby.

Finally, if we return to the very real circumstances that a majority of people live under right now - hunger, thirst, unemployment, war - they will not only never relent and surrender to XBox Logic, they cannot even comprehend it.  

This individual who is so sure and excited that the flow of information in has all the answers is neglecting two facts.

The first is that the surge of data has no clear reference point or individual source. It is a mass not unlike a pile of newspapers which have been torn into pieces each of which has 140 letters on them.

The second is that the landscape of exciting news and facts that is presented by all these forms of communication, if taken alone as a source of action, is as lonely, desolate and empty as a parched landscape.

The tragedy is that all these forms of communication promise unity but can cause divide.  Individuals arguing from mountaintop to mountaintop will miss the beauty of the valley below and all the wonder and joy of the people who live there and need our help.

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