The Internet Has Transformed Our Lives

                                     

The Internet Has Transformed Our Lives

 What if someone at your side offers you mind boggling benefits?  At your request, you are given access to an unlimited amount of information about almost anything.  Your companion enables you to chat instantly with friends anywhere in the world.   Should you wish, the wireless wizard who likes to live in your pocket will entertain you with games, give you the latest news and your favorite music, act as your tutor, psychologist, doctor, list keeper, or financial advisor.

 For those of us who still remember the Twilight Zone on television, the science fiction of 50 years ago has become a marvelous reality.   We still have the habit of attributing human traits to technology, but these days the companion with amazing assets is really a network of digital networks not much older than we are.  We call it the internet. 

  I suggest that the “net” is like a wizard because its responses to our commands seem almost magical.  Yet how we make and react to those commands is embedded in feelings, emotions, and views of the world that belong uniquely to us.  Our use of the internet reveals how information and data can influence our personalities, emotions, and behaviors for better or worse.

 In his 1970 book “Future Shock”, Alvin Toffler invented the term “information overload”.  His futuristic warning was about the “shattering stress and disorientation” that we induce by overwhelming the human capacity to adapt.  Acceleration of knowledge was Toffler’s shock factor.  To cope, he told us that we must learn to deal with transience.  We must adapt and learn how to learn.

 There is plenty of challenge in Toffler’s warning because the growth in our usage of the internet has been phenomenal.  Pew surveys show that at least 95 percent of all U.S. adults are net users.  Eighty percent subscribe to high-speed internet at home.  Cell phone ownership has accelerated to 97 percent among those under 50, a proportion just 35 percent in 2011.  The rate of internet use by those 65 and older impressively jumped from 14 percent in the year 2000 to 88 percent today.

 As a senior citizen, I embrace the internet via a multitude of web sites that constantly provoke my curiosity or entertain me.   Gradually, I have recognized some nagging liabilities from hours of screen time.  Research confirms certain happenings. These trends distress educators in particular.  A chronic attempt to ban cell phones from the classroom is just one result.  Young people may be more vulnerable to social abuses or virtual addictions than I am, but the personal impact for me includes a shortened attention span, quick and faulty answers, loss of memory, and even real-time social isolation. 

 I think of the internet as a universe of information organized for access and utility on a grandiose scale.  Meanwhile, especially since the 1950s, its connections to something called artificial intelligence (AI) have been maturing.  Dependence on the internet is fundamental, but instead of just providing data and options, AI builds on data to make choices and decisions, to plan and set goals. 

 Alexa is my daily personification of AI.  She is the virtual technology assistant for Amazon and is capable of natural language processing for a growing variety of informational chores.  Typically, she tells me about information she gleans instantly from the internet. More generally, AI can perform complex tasks that historically have called for human intelligence.  Built upon machine learning, it creates algorithms which are like electronic recipes that enable computers to create patterns, relationships, and insights based on massive amounts of data derived from human experience.

There are various levels of sophistication in the expanding world of AI. Currently one of the highest is called generative.  As a photographer who has come to rely on the processing miracles of Photoshop, I marvel at the latest innovation of the Adobe company.  I can plug in my photo, and then expand its margins in any direction to produce an entirely realistic and accurately rendered addition to the picture.  Or for that matter, I can articulate in words the addition or replacement I want in a photo, and then immediately see samples of the result from which to choose. 

 Countless AI variations can make our decisions and choices seem almost effortless. It is well to keep in mind, however, that issues of data privacy and security are compelling. AI can be used to invent visual renditions based on elaborate fiction.  Whether using the internet or applying AI to it, we can tap capabilities to create wondrous conveniences and efficiencies.  My warning is that we must never fall back on allowing these digital miracles to become an easy escape from thoughtful learning.  We must remain the arbiters of truth.