Telephonicus domesticus

Alexander Graham Bell’s telephone from 1877 bears about as much similarity to the modern smart phone as an abacus bears to a PC or Mac. There are just about as many leaps in technology in both cases. It’s funny how a major jump in technology happens (like the actual invention of the phone). Then there are some refinements over a few years or decades until it gets to a useful stable form. Then it stays virtually the same for many years with only minor innovations. The telephone was virtually unchanged from sometime before I was born until I was about forty. Push-buttons were replacing the rotary dial, but that was about it. (Isn’t it interesting though that when we call someone, we still call it “dialing?” I have never seen a dial on a cell phone.)

Cell phones were introduced and (once they became cheap enough) they changed the way we phone each other. New advancements followed soon after, texting and then smart phones. Personal computers were also becoming commonplace and were themselves being used for communications. The boundaries between phones and computers became blended. These advances not only changed the way we use phones, they changed the whole idea of communication. But I think the huge conceptual leaps in communications are over for a while now. I think in the foreseeable future we will get small incremental advances.

In my new novel Star Liner which is set in a far future, I put a communication device that everyone uses. They are called arm pads or “pads”. I am a little chagrined to admit the pads in my story are not a terribly great technological leap. Think of a modern tablet miniaturized to fit on your wrist with a holographic projector. Except for the holographic projector part, my pads are not much advanced from what is attainable right now. It is hard to visualize the next big leap in communication technology. Perhaps there will be devices hardwired into your brain where you only have to think about the person you want to talk to and then just think about what you want to say and it will be done. You could carry on two conversations at once . . . or maybe not. It is hard to see that as much of an advantage. Despite protestations to the contrary, humans are not very good at multitasking. Until our brains change, we are destined to remain a mostly single tasking species.

(My novel Star Liner, is now available as an e-book or paperback through Amazon, or the other usual online sources)

Star Liner

Comments

The Trip Home

My wife and I recently returned from a trip to New York to visit my son and his wife. What follows is an excerpt of my notes from that trip. Departure day. So we and the kids (adult kids) leave by 5:30 AM. These “kids” are night owls. They rarely wake before 10:00 if they don’t have to, so we appreciate the sacrifice. Daughter-in-Law (DIL) drove us the 30 minutes to the train station. Hugs and good-byes for her (we love DIL. DIL is an irresistible force). Son navigates us a route to the platform with fewer stairs than the way we came. We get a ticket and get on the train headed for the big city and Grand Central Station. I soon realize that this train is not an express train like the one we took coming out. Instead of taking a little over an hour like we did before, this one would take a little over an hour and a half. We stop at places with names like Cold Springs and Peekskill (on this trip we saw a lot of place names that ended in “kill” including Kaatskill, i.e. Catskill, and

That 70's Decade

Can a decade become a caricature? My teen years were in the 1970’s and none of us who lived through the 70’s thought our decade was going to be a figure of fun. When you are a part of it, you don’t realize what people are going to make fun of later. I think there are two reasons why people snicker when the 70’s are mentioned: clothing styles and Disco. Both things could be called extensions of trends that started in the 60’s. When the hippy styles of the 60’s became more formalized for the dance floor, the result was (in hindsight) rather bizarre. They did not seem bizarre at the time. People following present fashion trends never understand that they are wearing something that will be laughed at in ten years. Yes, I did have a pair of bell-bottom blue jeans (are they making a comeback?) The mere mention of the 1970’s conjures up someone in a ridiculous pose wearing a disco suit. We who lived through the 70’s just went about our normal life. There were quite a lot of things that ha

Tyranny of the Masses

I was listening to Benjamin Netanyahu on the radio. He was justifying his change in the law that removed power from the Israeli Supreme Court, saying that it was the will of the people. Majority rules. This made me think of “Tyranny of the masses,” a concept that notes: just because a majority of people are for something, that doesn’t make it right. I am sure you can think of historical examples where the people of a country supported a policy that was demonstrably wrong. When everything is completely governed by majority rule, the rights of the minority can be subverted by the majority. The framers of our American Constitution knew this, and tried to put in some checks and balances into our system of government. This was to guard against all forms of tyranny whether from a dictator, or from tyranny of the masses. One of those checks is that we have a representative government. The people themselves don’t pass laws, but instead elect representatives at the federal and local level t

A speculative mind

Search This Blog