Influence Peddlers

I'm not normally a big fan of bumper stickers as a way of getting a message out; most are a waste of time and many are just plain obnoxious. Still there's one that might persuade me to change my mind: the “Hang Up and Drive” sticker that urges cell phone addicts to put the damn thing away and pay attention to the 2,000 pounds or so of metal and plastic they're supposed to be controlling.

I'm not the only person who feels this way. As reported in a recent Computerworld article, many states are taking action to ban cell phone use while driving and researchers are pointing out that other distractions - including MP3 players, internet access devices, GPS and even video players - have the potential to make the problem far worse. It's bad enough that we still have people hurtling down the freeway while intoxicated; now we've got to take into account jokers who are watching TV at the same time.

Unfortunately, legislation aimed at specific sources of distraction misses the main point. An automobile is a big, potentially dangerous machine. The operator of that machine needs to be focused on using it in a matter that is safe both for him/her as well as for other motorists. What really needs to be illegal is, for lack of a better phrase, Driving While Impaired.

Current drunk-driving laws address one form of DWI, but the explosion of technology-based forms of impairment clearly demands modernized legislation that penalizes any form of impairment, regardless of the source. Simply passing more laws targeted at specific sources of distraction (such as cell phones or GPS) is just playing "whack a mole" with the problem; as soon as you ban one, another one will pop up.

Operating a car isn't a right. It's a privilege that carries with it certain responsibilities. That's why we have tests on driving skills and laws as requirements for a license. That's also why we have periodic vision tests at license renewal time. Driving unimpaired is just another one of those responsibilities and, considering the loss of life and limb that results from failing to live up to that responsibility, it's probably the most important one.

Sound Bytes

Every now and then I come across an item that spans the divide between my technology blog and my performing arts blog - which is why I'm publishing this little essay in both. Case in point: this interesting item from the New York Times about the use of all-digital orchestras by small companies.

The technology is intended, supposedly, to supplement a small live orchestra. As the author points out, however, there's nothing to prevent it from replacing live musicians entirely.

On the one hand, it might be a boon to small, cash-strapped companies that can't afford to hire many (or any) musicians or community theatres with volunteer orchestras that leave something to be desired in terms of competence. On the other hand, it could make real musicians an endangered species, which is hardly a desirable outcome.

In any case, you'd think it would be an interesting topic for discussion. I expected, therefore, a flurry of responses when I posted the following question to two local theatre email lists: newlinetheatre and stlouistheatre: Would you use an all-digital orchestra for a production?

What I got was a whopping total of one response from New Line Theatre's founder and artistic director Scott Miller, who stated categorically that he would "never do a musical without live musicians". That was hardly surprising, by the way; I've known Scott for some years now and was well aware of his disdain for canned music.

I'm not sure what to make of that. There are a number of musical theatre producers on both lists. Surely at least one of them has an opinion on this. It's not an academic issue, after all. High schools are already using all-digital or mostly-digital orchestras. Surely it's only a matter of time before those small companies referred to above find themselves asking whether or not they should go digital.

So why the silence? Is it because they're all in agreement with Scott? That would be the happier explanation as far as I'm concerned. Or is it because, given the potential cost savings, they wouldn't even bother to think about it before going digital? Could commerce really have trumped art to that degree?

Scary thought, that. Are we facing a future like the one Walter Miller described in his Hugo Award-winning story The Darfsteller? Film extras have already been supplanted by digital animation in big-budget pictures. Could real, live performers of all kinds go the same way?

Will we eventually get to the point where we have made ourselves obsolete?

The Humanoid Boogie

[Thanks to The Bonzo Dog Band for the title.]

A couple years ago, on an internal company blog, I commented on the ways in which the right hand of the information technology industry not only doesn't know what the left hand is dong but often seems unaware that there even is a left hand. Breathless dispatches in technology trades about mashups, Web 2.0 (or is it 2.1.0.5 SP 2 now?) and other ways for everyone to connect to everyone else sit cheek by virtual jowl with sober articles on how we're losing the cyberwar with spammers, malware distributors, identity thieves and other net.swine. Don't the people who write these things ever talk to each other? It's as though they live on different planets.

I had similar When Worlds Collide experience the other day, albeit on a different technological front. It happened as I was listening to NPR's Science Friday talk show. The guest was “futurist” Ray Kurzweil expounding, as he usually does these days, on advances in computer and medical technology that will make us all cheerful cyborgs, living longer and happier lives through the integration of humans with computers. Listening to Kurzweil paint a rosy picture of the posthuman future, it's easy to forget to ask some fairly simple questions about it; questions that host Ira Flatow never thought to bring up.

Questions like: where are we going to get the power for the man/machine hybrid? Or: how much will this wonderful cutting-edge biomedical technology cost? Who's going to pay for it? And, for that matter, who's going to be able to afford it?

Given that in 2005 (the most recent year for which data are currently available), nearly 47 million Americans (just under 16% of the population) had no health insurance - and therefore no access to health care - those are hardly irrelevant questions. Indeed, even Americans with insurance are seeing their out-of-pocket costs increase. Add in the fact that employer-based health insurance is quickly turning into a luxury and you have to wonder how many of us really will get to be posthuman.

This was brought to my attention rather dramatically a few weeks ago when I got a new CPAP machine. A CPAP (Continuous Positive Airway Pressure) device is a fairly simple bit of technology that effectively eliminates snoring and sleep apnea. Those of us who suffer from those conditions know only too well how beneficial these little devices are. Not only are we less tired, but we're also less at risk for serious health conditions in later life, including stroke and cardiovascular disease.

Once the newer machine was delivered, of course, I had no use for the old one. As I'd had it for over six years, my insurance company had long since declared it my property. I therefore decided to give it away on freecycle.org.

What happened next was a stark illustration of the difference between Ray Kurzweil's future and everybody else's present. Within less than five minutes of making the offer on freecycle, I received well over a dozen replies - and kept getting them even after I posted a notice that the machine had been taken. All of them told essentially the same story: they had sleep apnea, they had insurance - and their insurance refused to pay for a CPAP machine.

Bear in mind that this is well-established and relatively inexpensive technology with a proven track record of correcting a condition which, left untreated, can lead to serious illnesses which are much more expensive to treat than sleep apnea. If insurers are so focused on short-tern costs that they won't even cover something this basic, how likely are they to ever cover the kind of Buck Rogers stuff discussed on Kurzweil's web site?

Meanwhile, the millions without any insurance are lucky to get a flu shot.

That doesn't mean the posthuman future won't happen. It will just happen to the shrinking percentage of the population that can afford the latest and greatest nanotechnology. Without drastic reforms to America's health care system - which delivers less care for more money than that of any other first-world nation - Kurzweil's future will be a dystopia of nearly immortal elites governing the destinies of highly mortal masses.

On the other hand, maybe we commoners aren't supposed to have acsess to that stuff. Maybe we're just supposed to buy the high-priced nutritional supplements Kurzweil is hawking on another site.