The Steamroller of Progress
As I was sitting in the waiting room at the oral surgeon today (yep, there again — I could probably be mayor of this place on FourSquare if I actually used FourSquare), I managed to look up from the Cracked article I was reading on my iPhone long enough to realize that there were, indeed, other humans in the waiting room as well. As I waited for the shock of that revelation to subside, I noticed that the lady sitting across the aisle from me was texting from a really old phone.
Now, it wasn’t a Motorola Micro-Tac or anything. It was a smaller phone with a slide-out keyboard, so it couldn’t have been any older than, say, six or seven years. And still, the words that popped into my head were that’s a really old phone. Six years ago, I looked essentially the same as I do now. I haven’t gotten really old in the interim. So why did I find myself wondering how this lady could survive in today’s world with such ancient technology? It wasn’t even a smartphone. It wasn’t even a Blackberry.
I read a theory that the only way most humans can deal with the huge ramp-up in technology over the past decade or so is to treat it as if it was a completely normal development — as if it’s no big deal. And that’s exactly what I think my brain was doing — it treats my iPhone 4 as something akin to the base level of normal technology, not as a fantastic device my puny brain couldn’t have conceived of ten years ago. My Kindle Fire is just a thing I read books on, not something that would have made someone my age in the 1970s shit himself with awe. And that’s our defense mechanism — greeting fantastic advances in technology with a halfhearted “meh.”
Ever catch yourself doing that? If you do, just think for a moment how far we’ve come just since you were a kid.
My defense mechanism doesn’t work well because I totally freak out (usually in a good way) when I see cool technology. If there’s any side of me that’s “meh,” about it, it’s that I rarely by the first generation of new things, simply because…well, it’s expensive and the second version usually has bugs worked out.
My iPhone still amazes me. I know some say the iPad crushes the Kindle Fire, but my Kindle Fire does all I need it to do. (Not that it’s a competition — they are two different devices. If I want a photo, I won’t use a Kindle Fire or iPad, anyway — I’ll use my phone.) Then when you see things like this: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8zh-bS5SDpw or this: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-16844432 … I damn-near run around the apartment like a crack Muppet, absolutely astonished at what things will be like in 10 years.
With writing…the first time I saw somebody reading a story on their old Palm PDA, while others scoffed, I thought, “Man, what will that be like in 5 or 10 years.” And now we know. I have a library just out there somewhere that I can retrieve on my phone or Kindle Fire. I can read a sample of a book and buy it just like that.
So I may not drive a flying car to work, but at the same time, people are scary enough in traffic on the ground — I can only imagine the terror in the air! (Assuming, or course, a Jetson’s future and not a more realistic computer-controlled flying car.) No jet pack, but we DO have food in bags, even if it’s not so good. And we have so many things I couldn’t have thought of, and I’m geeky enough to have tried. I love technology because it really IS the stuff of imagination, and…it makes me appreciate just getting away from it all and hiking even more.
Just think Gaming Systems from when I (being about 10 years older than you). I had a “top of the line” Atari 2600 Gaming system.
Compare THAT to even a Playstation 1 and its amazing the difference.
I had both. The difference was huge — but I really felt that one. I was amazed by the PS1 back in college… the PS3 didn’t even get a “meh” from me.
I’ll give you that. From 8 bit to “WHOA ! REALISTIC !” is pretty amazing. But from Realistic to MORE realistic isn’t as exciting…