I love technology. I love the fact that computers are everywhere now, that smartphones are almost ubiquitous, that we have more technology in our watches than they needed to put a man on the moon. And yet, all of these advances have me worried, because as we rely more and more on technology it feels like we’re going backwards. It just feels like – on more and more occasions – people are willing to just check their brains at the door and blindly trust what computers tell us, even when our instincts and plain common sense say something different, as noted in the following examples.
As a result of some ownership interests I previously had, I used to get this incredibly complex and complicated document called a K-1 that I had to use to do my taxes. Figuring that thing out was no fun. In fact, if there was an opposite of fun, dealing with a K-1 at tax time was it (or came pretty darn close). Anyway, I’m doing the taxes, working with this K-1, when I suddenly realize that the information on it is wrong: there are two numbers that, based on everything else in the document, are transposed. I called the company that issued it and explain my dilemma – that these numbers just aren’t adding up. They insist that the number is right “because that’s what the system says.” (Oddly enough, they don’t disagree with my logic; as I walk them through my analysis, they concur with everything I say. They just can’t agree with my conclusion – that the numbers are wrong – because their computer system is telling them they are right.)
Frustrated, I ask to speak to a manager. (FYI: if you’re ever having trouble with a phone rep, don’t be afraid to ask to speak to a manager. Occasionally they’ll just hand you off to a colleague in the next cubicle, but most times you will get a supervisor with a bit more authority, if not knowledge.) I get the same response and ask to speak to the next level of management, and this time get a fellow who – although he spouts the company line about it being right – seems to understand and isn’t completely dismissive of my claims.
“Look,” he finally says, “we have a highly sophisticated analysis that we perform on everything that goes into this document before we issue it. It’s been check and double-checked by the computer system, and we have a high level of confidence that it’s right.”
“Can we just forget the computers for two seconds?” I ask. “Let’s just use our own eyes and brains for a moment here and see if we can figure out what’s going on.”
“Okay,” the guys says.
Me: “Now, looking at what you guys have issued and what’s in the document – and I’m following your instructions and definitions about what everything means – there’s no way those numbers are right. And using them as presented to calculate these other figures produces a completely absurd result.”
Manager: “Alright, I understand what you’re saying an I agree that what you pointed out appears to be true. But it can’t be, because the system would have caught it. However, I will kick this upstairs with a request that they review the specific items you’ve mentioned, and we will get back to you.”
Me: “When?”
Manager: “It’ll take a little while. Probably two weeks. But we’ll call you – I promise.”
Needless to say, I never got the promised call, but a few weeks later, the company issued a revised K-1, wherein they switched the two numbers that I’d said were transposed. I’m not saying it happened because of me (although if felt good to know I was right), but I lost all confidence in the company after that and divested my interests.
On a recent flight, I found myself seated next to a couple of flight attendants. It was a guy and a girl – both about 20 years old – who had seemingly just completed their initial training. They spent the entire flight chatting (and I was seriously tempted to slip the guy a note to ask her out, because she seemed interested but he wasn’t picking up on it), but around the time we landed they somehow began discussing how archaic their parents were, such as having to look at paper maps to figure out where they were going when they had to drive somewhere new. “They had to print maps on paper – can you imagine?” (The horror!)
At this point I became intrigued and asked the expected question: “You’ve never looked at a map?”
I think they both responded that they had done so for class purposes, like geography and history (eg, “Name ten states on this map of the U.S.”) but never for travel purposes. For that, they both said that they simply rely on GPS – either in the car or on their phone.
“But how do you know it’s right?” I asked. “Don’t you want even a vague idea of whether you’re supposed to be going north, south, east or west?” (For the record, I generally do this when going somewhere new. I just need to have eyeballed it and have some mental picture of the direction I’m supposed to be going.)
They seemed completely unconcerned. “No,” the girl said. “I trust the GPS.”
I then told them a little story from a few years back: I was headed to a meeting in an area that I didn’t know. There were about 30 people that were supposed to attend, and about half of them showed up roughly 30 minutes to an hour late. The reason that each of them gave? Their GPS got confused for some reason in one particular area; it kept sending them in circles, and telling them to turn where no road existed. But almost everyone who showed up on time had used a paper map to some degree.
Needless to say, this story made little impression on the flight attendants. (I think the guy said something about “making sure GPS is updated.”) Anyway, after a little more conversation, a surprising fact was revealed that might partially explain their dismissive attitude towards map reading: neither of them could read a map. They don’t know the symbols (Me: “They usually define those for you…”), they can’t tell how far anything is (Me: “There’s a scale…”), and so on. Their position was basically that there’s no need to learn or know any of that stuff when there’s an app that will do it for you. My response was that calculators can do math for you, too, but it’s still to your benefit to know it.
I went away from them shaking my head.
Just a few months back, I found myself having to call a company about some figures that weren’t adding up for an account. It was basically something along the lines of seeing 50 minus 10 on a document, and having the answer listed as 30. As in the conversation about the K-1 above, the response was that the answer had to be right because that’s what the computer said, so the conversation went pretty much like this:
Me: “You’d agree that 50 minus 10 equals 40, right? Then can you explain why you’re telling me it equals 30?”
Phone Rep: “That’s what the system says…”
Me: “Then maybe it’s wrong”
Rep: “It can’t be wrong?”
Me: “Why not?”
Rep: “It just isn’t.”
Me: “Well, who can I talk to for an explanation of what it’s doing?”
Rep: “There’s no one who can explain it.”
Me (incredulous): “There’s no one who can explain it???!!!”
Rep: “No.”
Me: “Then how do you know it’s right?”
Rep: “It just is.”
Me: “Well, there has to be someone who can explain it.
Rep: “No, sir, there isn’t.”
Me: “Sure there is. Someone wrote that algorithm. Someone put it into the system. Hopefully someone tested it to make sure it worked right. There has to be someone who understands what it’s doing and why.”
We went round about in that fashion for a little longer, but – since this was a Friday and after regular business hours – I let the rep go after soliciting a promise that a manager would call me Monday morning. I’ll give you three guesses as to whether I got that call… (And on a side note, why would I trust you or do business with you if you can’t explain what you’re doing and – by your own admission – neither can anyone else?)
Now these are just three examples (and I realize this is a bit of a rant, which I do on occasion), but it seems like I run into this mindless servitude to the machine gods at least once a month. It’s worrying to me. I mean, it’s not like Skynet is about to take over the world and we’ll all be scurrying in the sewers hiding from Terminators next week, but when did we reach the point where people are happy not to think? When did they become okay just doing things because some computer program tells them to? I mean, I understand it makes the job easier in some ways – you can’t get in trouble, because you only did what the system told you – but I can’t shake the feeling that over-reliance on computers and algorithms is dumbing us down to a certain extent. Plus, there’s kind of a soulless quality to operating like that. If you’re only going to do what the computer tells you – with no thought – there you’re basically just a computer, an extension of the machine. And in that case, don’t be surprised if they replace you with one.
Anyway, I’ll get back to the business of writing scifi/fantasy now.
I spreadsheet everything. Excel/Sheets etc can do all sorts of amazing things, but it’s very important to be able to do everything your formulas do yourself to check that they work correctly. It’s semi common to find something off or accidently damage a formula and have to go find the problem and fix it.
Computers and technology are great but even a calculator is only as smart as the person using it.
My high school computer science teacher used to always say that computers are stupid – they only do what you tell them to. As an example, he’d pretend to be a robot who could only take one order at a time, and your task was to get him to put a piece of paper in the trash can behind him. Most people would start off telling him to turn around, but then he’d just turn around and around in a circle. If you managed to get him to face the right direction and then told him to walk forward, he take a tiny baby-step forward. In short, he’d find some way to circumvent any order you gave him, which is what he said computers would do. Unless you told them exactly what you wanted them to do and in the proper way, they might do something entirely different or unexpected.
How’s that next book coming? 🙂
LOL. It’s coming along. (I’m afraid to say how quickly, because that always seems to jinx it.)