PlaneShift
Fan Area => The Hydlaa Plaza => Topic started by: emeraldfool on January 28, 2007, 08:03:28 pm
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(Before she says anything - yes, Atomica coined the phrase, and I stole it off her :P)
We live in an age where so long as you have internet access and about 2 minutes of reading-time, you can essentially know anything. Wikipaedia, as I'm sure you know, is designed around communities, meaning every line in every entry for everything under the sun has usually been debated by the respective community and/or forum, and decided to be most accurate.
Personally, it seems really unfair to those of us who really do know everything :P
I can just see it in the near-future: Eyeglasses like those that the politicians use to display their speeches, connected to a tiny mobile phone with internet access, and the latest voice recognition software. The phone would be able to pick out keywords in your dinner conversation and display the wikipaedia entries for them in real-time. All you have to do is stare into space for a few seconds and you'll know everything.
A world where everybody has equal intelligence... could there be anything more horrible? :P
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god I feel another debate coming on o.O
So will say one thing:
Intelligence is different from just knowing stuff.
You might know every single King and Queen of England and Scotland in the correct order. But does that make you intelligent? or does it just mean you have a good memory?
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Equal knowledge maybe, but far from equal intelligence.
<.> Blah beaten to it.
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Keep in mind that having access to knowledge doesn't make you intelligent - it's putting that knowledge to use that matters. If you hear an unfamiliar word at a dinner party and tell a computer chip in your glasses to look it up, that's just awesome. I personally can't wait for such technology to come about, and I don't see the danger of such progress - where do you?
You might be interested in Dan Simmons' Hyperion books. They're my absolute favorite of the sci-fi genre and the world is rich with the sort of gadgets you mention.
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Wikipaedia isn't a good source of information. It's just a convenient one.
You cannot know everything about anything after merely 2 minutes.
I don't see how easy access to information makes life unfair for you.
I see access to information as a good thing, so long as it's accurate information - and not instructions on how to build an atomic bomb etc. If there is a diversity of opinion on a particular subject, a person should be wise enough to explore all the differing opinions before feeling that they are educated on the topic.
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Keep in mind that having access to knowledge doesn't make you intelligent - it's putting that knowledge to use that matters. If you hear an unfamiliar word at a dinner party and tell a computer chip in your glasses to look it up, that's just awesome. I personally can't wait for such technology to come about, and I don't see the danger of such progress - where do you?
You might be interested in Dan Simmons' Hyperion books. They're my absolute favorite of the sci-fi genre and the world is rich with the sort of gadgets you mention.
I see what you mean, but what I mean is that rather than having a human conversation, it's two people spouting off paragraphs or re-wording facts and figures compiled by other people. It's borrowed 'knowledge'.
Now, I know most people think of intelligence as people's cognitive ability, or the ability to manipulate information and make sense out of it, and that's essentially right, but ultimately that's all intelligence would be if technology like this got around - there would no longer be varying degrees of intelligence among the common people: it would be a simple division between those who understand the simple user-friendly language of wikipaedia and those who do not (and then, of course, the absolute experts and geniuses who would run wikipaedia and provide the knowledge).
Because - considering that wikipaedia got better and better over time - there wouldn't be much need for schools or training, at least on the basic level, for nearly every skill or profession would have context-sensitive on-the-fly in-depth instructions which could be accessed in minutes. (No longer do you memorise complex procedures from textbooks - simply say "Wikipaedia, show me brain surgery. Frontal Lobe Tumor Removal. How about... the latest techniques from the Indian Neuroscience Association. Thanks Wiki!" - because what's the difference between taking a course in real-life, and doing an audio-video interactive ultra-realistic simulation where not only does the best Neurology expert in the world guide you through the procedure personally, but you actually get to perform it in real-time on a virtual brain as many times as you want for practice.)
...
I forgot what my argument against this was :P
Anyway, the important thing is - I find it very annoying when people obviously just skim through a Wiki article on a topic and then post as if they were born knowing about it...
I'm sure we've all done it at one time or another, but it just seems... wrong.
Oh yeah, and I've heard of Hyperion. I've been meaning to read a nice sci-fi novel... lately it's been mostly crime and thrillers... In fact, I don't think I've ever read a decent sci-fi... I'll keep a look-out.
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It's not just about wikipedia - there are other sites on the internet that are far more reliable sources of information. If someone browses through a topic and then comes in talking as though they've studied it their whole lives, that's their problem. It's not the fault of the technology nor access to such information. Personally I think that the more and quicker access we have to various material, the better. And if in the distant future "schools" in the traditional sense will be obsolete, is that really so bad? A lot of things have been made obsolete by expanding technology over the last century, and aside from fanatical contemporary luddites most agree that our lives have been significantly improved.
My own personal concern is over the growing dependency on technologies that can and do break down. While it's true that machinery and electronics are being enhanced and strengthened all the time, thinking about a massive collapse is rather frightening. But it's part of the risks everyone is aware of, I believe, particularly those who work on the various technologies - and thus the goals for endless betterment.
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It's not just about wikipedia - there are other sites on the internet that are far more reliable sources of information. If someone browses through a topic and then comes in talking as though they've studied it their whole lives, that's their problem. It's not the fault of the technology nor access to such information. Personally I think that the more and quicker access we have to various material, the better. And if in the distant future "schools" in the traditional sense will be obsolete, is that really so bad? A lot of things have been made obsolete by expanding technology over the last century, and aside from fanatical contemporary luddites most agree that our lives have been significantly improved.
My own personal concern is over the growing dependency on technologies that can and do break down. While it's true that machinery and electronics are being enhanced and strengthened all the time, thinking about a massive collapse is rather frightening. But it's part of the risks everyone is aware of, I believe, particularly those who work on the various technologies - and thus the goals for endless betterment.
"Education through the Internet can be easily controlled by Ingsoc, it is doubleplusgood!"
Malreported, doubleplusungood. Ref lead crimethink. No control ref, no oldspeak.
"Ingsoc online educsys bring goodthink n' largeinfo to proles n' comrades!
Unonline educ gone, more rations n' prolefeed! Miniplenty doubleplusgood."
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Yeah, I know, I was just sorta using wikipaedia as a metaphor for online information in general.
The thing that bothers me is that very few humans can resist the urge to appear all-knowing, especially when all they have to do is read a few paragraphs and re-phrase them. And the few people who would resist that urge would probably be seen as unintelligent. It's the idea that all this information is put up by other people, each one with their own opinions and prejudices - and we just eat it up as fact. And the more technology like this is accessible to more people, the more opinions and prejudices get dumped into the eternal pool of 'knowledge' - old Nazi farts who think the Fourth Reich is coming, people who think all non-Christians should be pitied, people suffering from mental illnesses thinking they have the answers to life - and for every opinion, there's the potential to impact upon someone.
Free speech is great and all, but it gets to the point where so many people are 'speaking freely' at once that there's no point listening.
I'd be interested to know just how much total bull-crap we actually believe because of the internet - all those interesting articles we've read could easily have been made-up on the spot. Many of them have been. What's to stop me from saying I've managed to successfully disprove evolution, or clone a human, if I make it sound really professional, complete with fabricated statistics? You better believe someone out there will believe me.
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The ironic point is that the same technology that can be used for "free speech" can be use for opposite as well.
When you're reading a book in your bedroom, who will know what is this book about?
When you're browsing a site, your IP is logged(Of course there are proxies, but look at this (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Internet_Censorship) )
It is much easier to block access in the Internet and forbid proxy use than to hunt and erase "subversive" books in a country.
You can hide a book and the fact you readed it, but can you hide a site and the fact you browsed it?
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The net is definitely a breeding ground for all sorts of misinformation as well as factual material. It's been around for ages and ages, but now since it's so easy to find, learning to weed out the false claims from actual stories is a necessary skill. At the same time, there are magazines and books and television programs made public that are already full of false information and bloated statistics. They're not hard to find. Some of them have massive followings (Sylvia Brown). So perhaps the only actual schooling we really need is Critical Thinking.
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The net is definitely a breeding ground for all sorts of misinformation
www.uncyclopedia.org \o/
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Good points all around. Emmy's pretty much summed up (or long-winded, really :P) what I meant with that 'wiki-regurgitation' comment (So I'll forgive ya for stealing it... for now). Mainly I was just amazed at how extensive Mr. Zanzibar's knowledge is, from porn to god-knows-what...
An' I'm surprised to see Madamemoiselle Karyuu actually getting involved in a debate... usually she's all like 'Must... hold tongue. Remain... neutral... or die.' :P
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The net is definitely a breeding ground for all sorts of misinformation as well as factual material. It's been around for ages and ages, but now since it's so easy to find, learning to weed out the false claims from actual stories is a necessary skill. At the same time, there are magazines and books and television programs made public that are already full of false information and bloated statistics. They're not hard to find. Some of them have massive followings (Sylvia Brown). So perhaps the only actual schooling we really need is Critical Thinking.
But that's what I mean. As more and more generations are born into the internet sub-culture, 'misinformation' and useless opinions (like the latest 'weblogging' craze) will stream in 10 times faster than 'factual material', and the internet will turn into a giant cesspool of porn and dissociative rantings.
It isn't like books in a library - the information on the internet will NEVER degrade or disappear on its own, and there's no limitations in paper, ink, publication costs, etc.
All you need is the ability to hit buttons and press 'send'.
It's bad enough as it is, with viruses, spyware, etc. to boot, and it'll only get worse...
Eventually we'll need censorship, otherwise the internet will be a giant warzone of opinions and advertising
Edit: Haha, that's a brilliant site Miadon...
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First as Miadon mentioned, and the "wikigurgitation" thing:
http://uncyclopedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia (http://uncyclopedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia)
"Eventually we will need censorship"
Q: Who will define what should and should not be censored in the Internet?
A: The way "Democracy" works, probably the government and the corporate media.
Q: What will be the consequences?
A: In U.S. for example, with things like the Patriot Act I (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Patriot_Act) and Patriot Act II (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Patriot_Act_II) , it may be the beggining of a long journey to censor sites that are dubbed as "terrorists" or as threats to the "democracy". South, in the Latin America, where military dictatorships were common during the Cold War, it is obvious to guess too. In other words, ask them to censor lies, they will turn the Internet in another mean of communication to broadcast exclusively their lies, like in the TV.
I hope that the Internet becomes like the Corporate Mass Media on TV. *Cough* Outfoxed (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Outfoxed)
P.S.: I think I am wikigurgitating too much, 3 links just on this post :innocent:
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Well, I don't consider the net that sullied of a cesspool, nor one that difficult to climb out of. My own "research" on the web was flimsy at best when I just got started, but with time you begin to understand what to look for in terms of source backing and accuracy. If the internet were our only source of information, we'd be in a pretty bad situation - luckily though we have a plethora of others, and they're not going anywhere. There are plenty of "opinion battles" online, but there is also a very good number of websites that we know can be depended on.
I don't think we are going to have global efforts to limit the overall free speech on the internet, no matter how "dirtied" it may seem. It's a big place, but we have, and are, guides to wade through it.
@Atomica: This isn't a debate..! (http://img147.imageshack.us/img147/6632/grinby0.gif) It's a formal discussion... I'm still good!
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Knowing about a subject and understanding it are two completely different things. In understanding, one can extrapolate further information and knowledge by use of common sense and reason. This is creative and critical thinking.
Knowing where to find the information is even a step below knowing about it, as it is not committed to the same thought processes, and requires less thinking, and no understanding.
I give a simple example. Say three people are going to New York. One has never been there, but looks up road maps and info as he goes without committing anything to memory. Cut off his stream of data, and he is lost. You do not need intelligence or knowledge in this case, just be good at following instructions, or spitting out data you read. Wiki-gurgitation at work.
The second has been there, and knows where things are, so does not get lost as long as he does not wander out of his area of knowledge. This is knowledge, and can come from many sources, including -yes- Wiki. One does not need intelligence to have great knowledge.
The last person may or may not have access to the first person's data stream, or the second person's knowledge. But, they can take what they do know, and extrapolate the bigger picture, thereby predicting where things might be, and being able to reason their way out of being lost. In time, they could understand the city and its workings to the point where they could design one themselves, or figure out ways to make the existing systems work better. That is intelligence.
Note: The above was written without looking up anything anywhere, and was stated just on my knowledge of people. That being said, I could be wrong. :)
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Now, I know most people think of intelligence as people's cognitive ability, or the ability to manipulate information and make sense out of it, and that's essentially right, but ultimately that's all intelligence would be if technology like this got around - there would no longer be varying degrees of intelligence among the common people: it would be a simple division between those who understand the simple user-friendly language of wikipaedia and those who do not (and then, of course, the absolute experts and geniuses who would run wikipaedia and provide the knowledge).
Conclusion: We should get rid of all our libraries.
Because - considering that wikipaedia got better and better over time - there wouldn't be much need for schools or training, at least on the basic level, for nearly every skill or profession would have context-sensitive on-the-fly in-depth instructions which could be accessed in minutes.
No, because as Karyuu said earlier, you can have access to a lot of information and yet not understand that information's implications and significance. Also, it takes a lot more to be good at something than to simply have a good guide book.
The thing that bothers me is that very few humans can resist the urge to appear all-knowing, especially when all they have to do is read a few paragraphs and re-phrase them.
I haven't noticed this phenomenon.
Good points all around. Emmy's pretty much summed up (or long-winded, really :P) what I meant with that 'wiki-regurgitation' comment (So I'll forgive ya for stealing it... for now). Mainly I was just amazed at how extensive Mr. Zanzibar's knowledge is, from porn to god-knows-what...
I'm a genius who is worldly. What can I say?
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Looking up things from Wikipedia and pretending you've known them form years is rather pointless. But saying "you got to believe me cause I've studied the subject for X years" is rather pointless too.
Having said that, I consider the free information flow on the internet to be nothing but a blessing. Not only because of the entertainment value, but primarily because it gives people easy access to a massive pool of information so they can develop themselves.
Of course there's a lot of nonsense on it, but I consider that something positive too. Why? Because it raises the chance that you'll find conflicting information and conflicting opinions. That in turn forces you to think for yourself. Which sources are trustworthy? What are the differences in the arguments given? Why does a website argue something, while most of the others state the opposite? You learn how to answer these questions by experience. (A Critical Thinking course may not always be available. ;)) It teaches people that there usually is more to each discussion than it appears on the first glance. It teaches people not to believe everything. Those are skills of extreme importance. Without those skills, you're a sheep, and you extremely vulnerable to be abused by people with charisma or authority.
War and ethnical or religious tensions are always fed with disinformation.
People are made believe that the Jews are behind 9-11 (to blame the Muslims).
People are made believe that the Americans purposefully brought AIDS to Africa to disrupt the continent and to keep them poor. (AIDS = American Invention to Discourage Sex)
People are made believe that 'blacks' are evolutionary closer to monkeys then 'whites' are.
People are made believe that the people in Africa are starving to death because they are dumb and lazy.
People are made believe that the world is less then 10,000 years old.
You can say the internet is harmful because it provides ways to distribute these forms of disinformation. That's true, but I don't consider the effect to be very big. If somebody only searches for sources that support his own opinions and biases, he is already a victim of wishful thinking and we can only hope that his search yields enough counter evidence that he'll reconsider his position.
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Any source of information should be approached with healthy skepticism, be it Wikipedia or a school text book. Its fine knowing effects, thats common sence, but knowing causes is what matters. Why do you put so much weight on intelligence any way? Is people having access to information not good? If you raised a child would you keep it away from school so it could learn things for itself?
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I am certainly one of the people who briefly glances at a wikipedia article before posting a link. Mostly I do it to see if it confirms what I already think, exists at all and has not obviously been vandalized at the moment. I do not intend to indicate that the link is somehow authoritative, it is merely a prop to whatever statement I have just made. For example in the "how is Canada seen" thread I posted a link to Fernando Poo in the context of a joke. The link there was to indicate that such an improbable place-name actually existed and not to suggest that such a place could actually wage war on Canada. That would be a case of the "exists at all" category of link. Other times I will scan the page to see if there is a quote that can be used to justify whatever point I am trying to make.
The main reason I use Wikipedia is that it is easy and fairly comprehensive in its breadth of topics, perfect for a forum like this which for a large part consists of people sitting around shooting the bull. That is not all that happens here but it does seem to be the main purpose of the Hydlaa Plaza and to a lesser extent the General Discussion fora in practice.
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Well, I don't consider the net that sullied of a cesspool, nor one that difficult to climb out of. My own "research" on the web was flimsy at best when I just got started, but with time you begin to understand what to look for in terms of source backing and accuracy. If the internet were our only source of information, we'd be in a pretty bad situation - luckily though we have a plethora of others, and they're not going anywhere. There are plenty of "opinion battles" online, but there is also a very good number of websites that we know can be depended on.
That's pretty much what I was suggesting - libraries are almost totally obsolete now; when people want to learn about something specific, there's usually 1000s of articles on anything from the Renaissance to Reasons why George Bush is the Anti-Christ on the internet, so who wants to worry about returning books and all that hassle? Even books are usually bought over Amazon.com or something, so there's no real need for them. The libraries around town are almost completely deserted here. I'd say it's only a matter of time before they go, just like bath-houses and blacksmitheries, or other obsoleted buildings from the past.
I don't think we are going to have global efforts to limit the overall free speech on the internet, no matter how "dirtied" it may seem. It's a big place, but we have, and are, guides to wade through it.
My prediction is that the internet as a whole will become so much a part of our society, that it will be treated almost like real life. Cyber crime will no longer be a 'grey area', and will be as standard a charge as Larceny, Tax Fraud, Breaking & Entering, etc.
Every online shop will have to conform to online versions of health & safety regulations (i.e. regulation anti-virus software and all that),
But more importantly, everybody will be required by law to clean-up their own garbage (i.e. useless spam), just as if they had dumped their trash-can in the middle of a scenic park.
You all laugh now, but you'll see! You'll SEE! The end is nigh!
Or something...
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The Internet is full of BS, but censorship is far from the best solution, as it is an instrument that could be easily used to commit abuses against freedom of speech, and to turn the Internet in another corporate mass media of communication to(according to Captain Obvious): bring biased facts to support the interests of government and corporations.
Do you read tabloids with cheap rumors about actresses? Do you watch or read ridiculously biased and manipulated media coverage? Remember, if the Internet is full of similar or worse things, it is because there are people that read them. It is here that intelligence enters: the capability to see the judge which one is closer to reality: a lies-flooded "unbiased" CNN(or any other corporate media) report on Iraq or an Indymedia admitedly leftist report on it. In the Internet you have the right to choose what kind of bias would you like to read on something(In my opinion the concept of imparciality is just an abstract and unreachable concept, there is always a point of view when an information is passed, but in some cases it is really discrete), in TV you choose where would you like to hear lies from. That's the difference, although it brings worse things then corporate media, it also brings a space for questioning the "unbiased views" of those and for countering them with opposing world views of what they wish us to believe in.
In the end, everything depends on us, if there is a site that claims that the Middle Ages never existed for example, but everyone boycotts it, it will suddenly make its creator disappointed, until he decides to take it out. Would there be "White Power" sites and forums if no one browsed them? The Internet is a mirror of human ideas, emotions among other things, where the most "absurd" and mainstream conflict themselves, and where those not deserving of being there should simply be ignored.
But that is far from happening, with the number of visits on sites that spread gossip about famous people, with the sales of that cheap literature, with the more cheesy conspiracy theory ever invented, called "Da Vinci Code" and with the amount of useless blogs spreading(Thanks to the "Voyeur" that is slowly becoming a mainstream tendency). But we are not forced to access them, that is what makes Internet different from TV(Where you have to choose between a limited amount of channels and consent to their programs). Then if you dislike the worst of it, you are not forced to see it(Of course there are some :@#\ spams, banners and popups around, but nothing a decent browser like firefox can't solve with some extensions).
Books, as an way of organizing information, will never become obsolete, perhaps they may receive new forms like E-Books for example, but few places have the organization, uniformity, and consistency of a book. Most site contents are at best superficial and sometimes the informations will contradict themselves.
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I hate CNN. How dare they tell the public that the war in Iraq is going poorly?
Btw: What Americans call leftist is most often centralist.