Blog Discussion on Digital Divide

#22:

Have you even encountered the ‘digital divide’ in your own lives? Give an example from your own experience (or one you have heard about).

I had erroneously believed that digital divide refers to the gap between those who have access to digital technology and those who do not, but I have come to realized that it goes beyond accessibility to technology, but benefits derived from it. That being said, I wish to give an example from my own life experience, how I encountered the ‘digital divide’ without even knowing about it then, until later date.

While I was in the high school in my village in Nigeria, we had a class on “computer appreciation”. In this class, we were taught the general functionality of the computer and other communication devices like the telephone, telex, and microfiche machines etc. We were taught how the computer receives information from the user, process the information, store the information and get back the result, how various businesses uses the computer to communicate each others, who are miles apart. We loved the computer, memorize its functions, and we can describe it without having access to the computer. One faithful day, old students of the school donated an old computer to the school. The computer was stationed in a table in what was called the ‘modern office’, because there you could find electric typewriter and other lab equipment, which were never used because there was no electricity in the school to use them. The teacher will take us to the modern office, showed us round the computer and explained how it function. We were very happy then, though we had no hand-on practice on the computer, but then we were not worried because the computer really did not have any meaningful benefit to us apart from knowing theoretically how it works. There was no electricity in the village, now good health facility, apart from occasional visit from the health officials from the headquarters of the local council to the village, no government amenities in the village, no telephone services, no presence of even private business apart from the local farmers selling their goods.

Until I came to Lagos after completing my high school when I discovered that we were really in darkness as to what ‘magic’ the computer, telephone and electricity were being used for in the city. All what we were taught in the village school was being practically used by almost everyone in the city – in the schools, at home, in various offices, people have unrestricted access to various digital technology for business transaction, for communication, especially the internet. Students come home to do their homework assignments in the computer, save it and reuse again. So in the city, they have access to these technology, and those that could not afford it borrow money to buy a computer because of the benefits they get from it, while those in the village do not think of getting it because it will be useless having it a home or in school without using them, it is of no benefit to them. They have no electricity to operate them, and when electricity was eventually given to the village, it was very erratic, not stable and there was hardly any day without interruption. The people in the village were only struggling to feed their families and pay for the tuition of their children. There was no government assistance to the education of their children, the infrastructure and school equipment were not being provided by the government to the schools in the village. This is why I strongly agree with the fact that digital divide is not so much about access to digital technology, but about the benefits derived from it. If the people know that there is little or nothing to benefit from owing or using these technology, they will not go for it and if the manufacturers of these technology knows there is no market for them in the village, they will not make any attempt to supply them and the gap will never be reduced or closed.

#23:

What role should government play in helping to overcome the digital divide? What role should school play? Can you thin of any other institutions that are important in helping to overcome the digital divide?

It is absolutely necessary now to close the digital divide that is prevalent everywhere in the world, and to do this, there must be a collaboration between the stake holders – the government, the schools, the private investors, and even the family. The government has more important role to play in order to reduce this gap. The government should first of all know that access to digital technology greatly enhances the effectiveness and affordability of efforts to improve the basic life necessity to the poor – electricity, water supply, improve rural health and education, and generate jobs. The government should therefore work very closely with the private sector to encourage them to develop these technologies and make them affordable to the rural people. The private sector should be given encouragement and incentive like tax cut to do this. While the government is doing this, it should be seen that every efforts is also being made to provide these basic life amenities. Government should make the people in the rural area know that they have some stake in the stability of the international economy. They should even encourage the farmers in the rural area, by providing them with fertilizers to cultivate their farms. The government should formulate policies that will entice the private and corporate organizations to want to close this digital divide and serve the poor.

The schools also have an important role to play. Their primary responsibility is awareness and education. The individual technology user, the information technology corporations and other investor institutions are all product of schools. Therefore the schools should take steps to close the digital divide for its students. One way they could do this is the provision of laptop computers with free Internet service so that they will bring computer technology into the homes of many of their students. The schools should train their students on how to use the computers and make them know the importance of computers. The school should contact corporate organizations and solicit for donation of computers and other technologies. The schools should arrange for their students to visit presentations of technology by computer companies. The school should encourage their students to do their homework on the computer. By doing this, the school will bring new technology into the lives of low to moderate income families and also introduce the youths and their families to technology. This will ensure that digital businesses opportunities are created and there is likelihood that educated students might want to stay in the community and work there.

Another institution that will be very helpfu; in ensuring that the gap in digital divide is narrowed or closed is the corporate organizations or the private sectors. These bodies should also make some efforts to close the digital divide as a core business issues They can actually serve the poor indirectly by helping schools and health care agencies do a better job of serving the poor. They could be involved, by funding technology in schools. They should cooperate with the government and the schools as well as other stake holders, to ensure that all efforts being made to close the gap is being supported by the corporate organization and the private sectors. They should see this digital divide as a great concern to them and therefore expressed their concern about the digital divide and instruct their corporate foundations to devise programs that will put this concern into action. These organizations should conduct its educational research in the community, to enable them understand the end users better. Multinationals should engage the poorest consumers directly to help build positive ties with the businesses and government agencies.

Effect on Media Technology on our experience

Question #20:

Pick one media technology, and say how you think it has had an effect on our experience.

I would like to pick the printing press as one media technology, which I think has had a tremendous effect on our experience. Mcluhan said that the printing press was the first mechanization of a complex handicraft; and by creating an analytic sequence of step-by-step processes; it became the blueprint of all mechanization to follow. I will agree with Mcluhan here that prating press has repeatability as one of the important quality. Printing press has actually transformed the world since Gutenberg. Printing press ensure the modernization of industrialism, it shape the production and marketing procedures of all sectors from education to city planning. Printing press removed man from his traditional cultural tribal believe and showed him how be industrialized, modernized, and agglomerated. Through the printing press, man now knows how to read and write, what is happening in other nations. Through printing press, the spread of renaissance of culture after 1450 was accelerated; growing economic prosperity, which was as a result of peace and the decline of famine, which led to the founding of schools and colleges, was made possible by the printing press. The printing press made information readily available to a much larger segment of the population who were eager for information of any variety. Libraries could not store greater quantities of information at much lower cost. The printing press facilitated the dissemination and preservation of knowledge in standardized form. This is one of the significant effects on our experience, as it certainly initiated an information revolution. It did spread new ideas quickly and with greater impact. Printing press stimulated the literacy of lay people and eventually came to have a deep and lasting impact on our private lives. It provided a superior basis for scholarship and prevented further corruption of texts through hand copying. By giving all scholars the same text to work form, it made progress in critical scholarship and science faster and more reliable. In the view of the above, it is absolutely correct to say that the printing press, as one of the medical technology has had an effect on our experience.

Question #21:

Pick one sentence or phrase in the Mcluhan interview that you find interesting or important. Say why you picked it.

In the past, the effects of media were experienced more gradually, allowing the individual and society to absorb and cushion their impact to some degree. I found this sentence interesting and important because the electric media of today constitute a total and near-instantaneous transformation of culture, values and attitudes which actually generates a great pain and identity loss, which can really be ameliorated through a conscious awareness of its dynamics. Mcluhan is saying here that if we understand the revolutionary transformations caused by new media, we can anticipate and control them, but we continue in self-induced subliminal trance, we will be their slaves. Mcluhan is trying to trace and reveal the impact of media on man, from the beginning of recorded time to the present. The new technology was supposed to aid man in doing things more easily, with less time and labor and with more efficiency, but man has totally depended on the new technology to an extent that we are now slaves to the new technology. People now want technology to think for us. Technology is now controlling us instead of us controlling technology. Mcluhan is saying that societies have always been shaped more by the nature of the media with which men communicate than by the content of the communication, and whenever a society develops an extension of itself, all other functions of that society tend to be transmuted to accommodate that new form; once any new technology penetrates a society, it saturates every institution of that society, hence new technology becomes a revolutionizing agent. This is very evident in today’s electric media and it was evidence several thousand years ago with the invention of the phonetic alphabet.

Conceptual Muddle

Question #18

Think of your own example of a ‘conceptual muddle’. Explain your example.

An example of a ‘conceptual muddle’ is the use of ‘atomic bomb’ against Japan by the US during the 2^nd world war. Conceptual muddle principles implies practical dilemma, problems; which implied that if we do not know what we are dealing with, we do not know which rules or principles we should be apply. In the example of the atomic bomb, it is true that the Japanese attacked the US’s Pear Harbor, destroyed their fleet and struck other US bases. It is also a fact that the US was very interested in stopping the Soviet by all means, and it was a fact that the US wanted to test their atomic bomb to put fear into the mind of their enemies and proof that they are the strongest, technologically, militarily and more superior in the whole world, without knowing the overall consequences. The US also gave the reason of wanting to save lives; hence they used the atomic bomb against a nation, who was already finding ways of making peace. The President of the United States then also gave reason of the casualty estimate of death given to him that made him use the atomic despite some disagreement with his cabinet to find alternative option instead of using the bomb. So in the above scenario, one can find a conceptual muddle of using atomic bomb prevent the US from using the conventional means to win the war, instead they used the atomic bomb to destroyed millions of civilians. Conceptual muddle here explains why the atomic bomb was used without even informing the Japanese of their intention to use it.

Question #19:

After reading the Machado case, what are your thoughts on our responsibilities as ‘online citizens?

After reading the Machado case, I have a strong thought and believe that online citizens do not understand their online responsibilities. It is our responsibilities to recognize that any unlawful content on the Internet lies with the person who put it there. Our responsibilities call for vigilance, we must be vigilant to identify any unlawful and illegal online contents and reports immediately to the appropriate authorities concerned. Many of us do nothing when we found something on the Internet that we thought was illegal and this will not help in combating this hate crime. What we do is delete the content without doing anything about it.

Jessica Hendrie-Liano, Chair of the Internet Services Providers Association (ISPA) said “The law recognizes those that post words, image, audio and video files – whether on websites, discussion forums or even using email – as having the same responsibility as publishers. Internet users must understand that they bear responsibility for the content they place online.” This is what Machado did not realize.

Above all, it is our responsibility not to harm other people with the use of Internet, we should not interfere with the life of other people with the use of Internet, we should not steal the joy and happiness of others, we should always think about the social consequences of the use of Internet, and the ethical implications, and we should always use the Internet in a way that insure consideration and respect for our fellow human beings.

Discussion on Human Cloning

Blog Question #15:

Whom did you find to be most persuasive on the subject of cloning? Wachbroit or Kass? Explain your answer.

The subject of cloning has generated a lot of concerns and debates among Scientists, Theologians, Physicians, Legal experts, commentators, and even governments. Among these are Leon Kass and Wachbroit. Though both of them are against human cloning, but the one I found to be most persuasive on the subject of cloning is Leon Kass.

In his article on preventing a Brave New World, Kass argued that modern medical science is poised to cross an ethical boundary that will have momentous consequences for the future of humanity. He went further to say that “the technological imperative, liberal democratic society, compassionate humanitarianism, moral pluralism, and free markets” are leading us down a path that places us at risk of losing our humanity. Kass went a step further to recommend a worldwide ban on human cloning as a means of deterring “renegade scientists” from engaging in the practice.

I found him to be the most persuasive than Wachbroit because of the reasons he adduced for speaking against human cloning and the way he gave a vivid and thorough discussion on the subject. Amongst the reasons he gave was that cloning constitute unethical experimentation; it threatens identity and individuality; cloning turns procreation into manufacturing, and that cloning is despotism over children and perversion of parenthood.

Kass argued further that there is greatly increased likelihood of error in translating the genetic instructions leading to developmental defects, some of which will show themselves only much later. He also said that scientist new agree that attempts to clone human beings carry massive risk of producing unhealthy, abnormal and malformed children. He concluded by saying that attempt to clone human being is irresponsible and unethical.

In discussing unethical experimentation, Kass said that in all the animal experiments, there are many fetal deaths and still born infants; there is a very high incident of major disabilities and deformities in cloned animals than attain live births, that cloned cows often have heart and lung problems, cloned mice later develop pathological obesity, and that other live-born cloned animals fail to reach normal developmental milestones.

On the problems of identify and individuality, Kass cited an example of inability of parent to treat a clone of himself or herself as one treats a child generated by the lottery of sex. He went further to ask what will happen when the adolescent clone of mommy becomes the spitting image of the woman with whom Daddy once fell in love? Kass said that any child whose being, character and capacities exist owing to human design does not stand on the same plane as its makers, and that human cloning is dehumanizing no matter good the product is because the scientists and the prospective parents adopts a technocratic attitude toward human children, therefore become their artifacts. He said that clone human being would further be degraded by commodification of allowing baby making to proceed under the banner of commerce. He also stressed the fact that a cloned child is given a genotype that has already lived, a wanted child who exists precisely to fulfill parental wants. Therefore cloning is inherently despotic, for it seeks to make one’s children after one’s own image or an image of one’s choosing and their future according to one’s will.

In view of the above and so many other reasons Kass advanced, I am very sure and I agreed with all his reasons that he has persuaded us enough to believe his opinions on the subject of cloning than Wachbroit, who though is against human cloning, but was always looking for something to disagree with Kass, while postulating his own reasons. I think at the end, the fears, anxiety and concerns of critiques against human cloning, as well as their arguments are enough to actually enact a worldwide ban on human cloning.

Computers and Privacy

Question #13:

What do you think is the most worrisome threat to privacy in our technological age? (Focus on a specific example).

It is very difficult to pin point the most worrisome threat to privacy in our technological age because there are various threats that are worrisome indeed. In order to focus on a specific example, and for the purpose of this assignment, I would think that the most worrisome threat is the use of modern and sophisticated monitoring devices and computerized record keeping and record processing procedures. In other words, clandestine surveillance of individuals by government and its various agencies could be regarded as the most worrisome threats to privacy in our technological age.

On their own, these various technologies should not have been any threat to anybody, but they rather make it easier for government and its agencies as well as some private individuals and organizations to invade the privacy of other individuals, by placing them on secret surveillance without their consent and even at times without their knowledge. These surveillance activities are all embracing: monitoring individual movements, phone calls conversations, finances, social life, academic life, medical records, driving records, assets, liabilities, religious activities etc. When one is under surveillance, his entire family is affected. No wonder Kant stressed that the value of a person is an end in itself, and that persons should never be used as means, and that constant surveillance diminishes one’s personhood. He said the world is no longer as one think it is, but rather a mini-world under the microscope of some larger world. Kant said that one become a means to some other end – that of governmental power or corporate profit. Even if one do not even know he is being observed, the value of what one hold in high regard is diminished and if one realized that he is being observed, this affects one actions and one is no long autonomous.

A major international privacy report published recently has concluded that governments across the word have substantially increased surveillance in the past years, specially since after 911 incidents in the US. The report wards that threats to personal privacy have reached a level that is dangerous to fundamental human rights. Besides, there is the potential of inaccurate information being spread around about a person or even accurate information that is not somebody else’s concern.

There is an increasing demand of information that could be found in government records, and information gathered through surveillance could be sold to another country or any third party to get extra revenue, no one can tell. It is true that privacy is becoming harder to maintain, and surveillance is being more pervasive, and unless some drastic and urgent action is taken, especially by privacy international, a human rights group formed as a watchdog on surveillance by governments and corporations, the worrisome threats will persist.




Question #14:

What should b done to protect privacy? Make one concrete suggestion that would help protect privacy today (you may focus on something specific like privacy on the Internet, or perhaps make a more general suggestion.

It is a well-known fact that that the Internet is very important and useful as a network, but at the same time very easy for one to give away a lot of information about oneself, no matter how careful we might think we are. It is also important to know that the Internet is internationally and largely unregulated. This means that laws of any country do not usually apply to another country on the activities of Internet network. The office of the Privacy Commissioner said that if one suffers a privacy invasion via the Internet, it would only be able to help if the matter involved an organization subjects to the privacy Act. Information could be collected in the Internet through cookies, HTTP, browsers, downloading of free software, search engines, electronic commerce, emails, Spam, chatting etc.

In view of the above, one concrete suggestion that would help protect privacy today is for the individual users of Internet to limit the amount of private information they share on the Internet. To be more specific, efforts should be made on the following areas to ensure adequate privacy protection:

SPAM: There are big anti-Spam movements nowadays and I think there should be a global Spam Act to prevent unsolicited commercial electric messages. The span Act has been enforced in so many countries and it will work if enforced globally. The government, schools, and families should embark upon awareness of the dangers involved so that the ignorant individuals will limit the amount of information they share online, especially through emails and mailing lists. Individuals could set the computer to delete the cookies file whenever one starts a browser. Cookies crusher or pal could be used to reject or manage cookies. The current use of Secure Socket Layer (SSL) is desirable, because it provides protection during transmission of credits cards numbers.

Majority of what to do to protect individual privacy on the Internet rest on individual because it will be difficult for government to implement any law regarding privacy protect on the Internet. We should not give too much private information out on the Internet.

Heidegger's Questioning concerning technology

Question #11

One particular learning experience that stand out to me from what I learnt from the website on Heidegger is his views as the danger associated with technology. He begins by say that he was questioning concerning technology in order to bring to light our relationship to its essence.” He said it is not enough to identify Enframing as the essence of modern technology, but that we need to determine how we, as human beings, stand in relation to technology. He suggested how humanity might come into the “free relationship to technology”. which is, remember the aim of his essay. He said because enframing does not utterly change humanity’s connection to the world, there is room, even within enframing, for different—we might say “renewed” orientation to the world. Once we realize that our own orientation to the world is the essence of technology, once we open ourselves, we will find an opportunity to establish a free relationship to technology. He emphasize the fact that humanity can come to realize that it, too, is ”on its way” to an arrival, and that only by reorienting itself to the way in which nature reveals itself can humanity establish a relationship with the world that is not ultimately self-destructive. Heidegger views as the danger associated with technology is not so much the direct effects of mechanization, but that humanity will eventually reach a point at which the human will become only so much “standing-reserve” if he continues on the path of enframing. He also said humanity over inflated sense of its power over the natural world might led to his believe that he has control over all existence, and that excessive pride leads to “delusion”. He concluded by say that such an orientation to thee world will blind humanity to the ways in which the word revels itself. This discussion by Heidegger is a food for thought for me after reading it. I now have a different view of what technology is all about, and in short his essay has re-enforce my re-orientation and thinking about technology since the beginning of this course.

Question #12

Enframing:

Enframing is one of the concepts in Heidegger’s essay, the question concerning technology. Enframing is the essence of technology, which “means the gathering together of that setting-upon which sets upon man, i.e., challenges him forth, to reveal the real, the mode of ordering, as standing-reserve”. Enframing tends to rule out other ways of revealing and meanings that do not fit the egocentric use of resources. Human beings begin to see themselves in the same way as they view other resources. Heidegger uses the term enframing as a challenging claim on man. Once things have been revealed to us we place them inside of a “frame” of understanding. Example is what a picture frame does to an image. Not only does the image now have a place inside the frame, but also we can call it a picture because of the frame, which it has around it. Heidegger wants us to know that we cannot neglect the surroundings, no matter how small they may appear to us at the time. He believes that modern technology, as Enframing is dangerous, that if we enframe we are losing sight of our revealing and our essence. He said our essence is concealed from us because we become users of the world as standing-reserve. “Enframing, Heidegger said is a danger that sets man on a destructive and self-destructive course, because it blocks every view into the coming-to-pass of revealing and so endangers the relation to the essence of truth”. On a second taught, enframing could makes clear the responsibility of human beings to the world if we reflect upon the it as the essence of technology, and then we find not only that we are a part of the world, but that the world needs us to care for it”.

Discussion on Jonas's Technology and Responsibility

Question #9:

Pick a passage in Hans Jonas’s paper that you find interesting. Write down the first sentence and the page number, and then say why you picked it.

I found passage I through II most interesting in Jonas’s paper. Passage 1 says, “The novel powers I have in mind are, of course those of modern technology. My first point, accordingly, is to ask how this technology affects the nature of our acting, in what ways it makes acting under its dominion different from what it has been through the ages”. (Page 120).

I picked this passage because of the meticulous way in which Jonas highlighted and discusses the characteristics of human actions, which he said are relevant for a comparison with the state of things today. He discusses all dealings of man with non-human world as ethical neutral without ethical significant, as ethical significant he said, belongs to the direct dealing of man with man. In other words, all the traditional ethic is human centered. Ethic then was of the present as occasions warrants. He talks of ethic as being base on “Love thy neighbor as thyself”, “Do unto others as you would wish them to do unto you”, “Instruct your child in the way of truth’, etc. Jonas is categorically saying that all these has changed as modern technology has brought actions of novel scale, object and consequences that the framework of former ethics can no longer contain them. The wondrous power of man has changed, the neighbor ethics of justice, love and honesty has been beclouded by modern technology’s responsibility.

Questions # 10:

Jonas argues that we need a ‘new ethics of long-range responsibility’. Do you think we would need to change the way we think to live up to this idea?

I think Jonas is absolutely right in this direction. This is a worthwhile idea and I think that for us to live up to this idea, we need to change the way we think. Jonas said that technological power has turned what used and out to be tentative, perhaps enlightening, plays of speculative reason into competing blueprints for projects, and in choosing between them we have to choose between extremes of remote effects. He had earlier said that the nature of human action has changed, and since ethics is concerned with action, it should follow that the changed nature of human action calls for a change in ethics as well. Therefore we should not be concerned only with the present; rather the future should be represented. Politics should go beyond self-interest. Government should have sufficient representation to meet the new demands on its normal principles and by its normal mechanics. For this to be achieved calls for change in the way we think. We should be thinking about the future and the effects of the ever-increasing nature of human action.