Impressive, can't wait until weaponary, small nuclear generator and a program to identify friend from foe is installed. It could actually be made to hunt down terrorist. Made in the thousands this would save a lot of US lives and would be a force to deal with.

Posted by: john doe at March 8, 2006 7:35 PM

If anyone is a socialist here, it's the technophiles. After all, high technology relies on a well-established system of massive public subsidy for research, development and deployment. These subsidies primarily come from the Defense Department, but there are plenty of other agencies, as well.

Take, for instance, RFID. That technology would not exist if not for the socialist market intervention of DoD, which has been the biggest purchaser of RFID for some time now. Said another way, DoD, by insisting that all suppliers be RFID compliant and by purchasing massive quantities of related technology, has created an artificial market for it - after having subsidized the research.

Capitalists long ago realized that they hate risk, and so they transfer (socialize) risk through subsidy, especially with R&D. After all, risky investments are not a safe path to wealth. Then, when the tech is cheap enough, capitalists jump on board and implement it or privatize it. This is the stage we are in with RFID. Wal-Mart and other large companies are now coming on board in a big way.

So, RFID will bring increased "efficiency" to the workplace, but what will that mean, practically? More control over workers and distribution, to begin with, which means less freedom for workers on the job. Voila! The government has thus subsidized an attack on workers, making possible higher profits at our expense. It's socialism for the rich!

Anyhow, I suppose there's little more to say. I've offered plenty of hard examples of key technologies that work in precisely the manner I described initially. Defenders of high tech on here - or those who see it as merely neutral - seem to me to be hitting what I call the "ideological wall." You all have been taught that technology is good, just like you have been taught so many things that aren't true about America, but that the elite need you to believe. When the facts to the contrary appear, they cause confusion and a reiterating of mythology and false common sense (and some elitism emerges, as well).

It's really pretty funny, when you think about it. I could have made the exact comparison about campaign funding and most of you would have probably agreed with me. I really doubt anyone here would say that all the money rich folks and corporations give to politicians has no effect on politics. Wouldn't that be a naive position to take? But, why would technology be immune from these same forces? No one here has described to me the mechanism through which, despite all these economic and institutional pressures, technology somehow remains aloof from the interests of its funders and defenders - much less how beyond that it somehow acts as a benevolent force, lifting all boats equally.

Of course, the evidence goes quite to the contrary, so I'm not really surprised by that disconnect.

Posted by: Phoenix Insurgent at March 8, 2006 5:39 PM

"When you say, improves life, what do you mean? How do you measure quality of life? Live longer? Die Richer?"

well in my case, YES. youre damn right I do. with the added proviso of increased overall happiness. increased wealth only increases happiness to a point, but for most of the world, that point hasn't been reached yet, and only technology can help that, becuase the number of people is increasing as always, and the the resources are the same as ever.

If you don't think that technology increases quality of living, then why not stop using modern medicine and die at 50 for all I care.

I'd say people won't be any happier in a truely freer society than one like a developed country, most people are too apathetic about it to know the difference anyway. I think the best we could hope for is to increase the US and other countries contributions to the development of third world countries, even though we give the most out of any country.

anyway, I'm sleep deprived and arguing with anti-government quasi-socialist crazies on the interweb who in a bout of irony use said interweb to announse their displeasure at technology.

I've never been a fan of legged robots, but this is quite a schnazzy one. ugly summabitch though. like a brick crossed with a llama.

Posted by: Max at March 8, 2006 2:25 AM

Relevent in the news today:

'The lab is also, Moss boasts, "clearly the coolest place on the planet" to work, for those interested in how technology can change society. Its 30-plus research groups have names like Biomechatronics (how technology can enhance physical abilities), Lifelong Kindergarten (creative ways to learn), and Smart Cities (how buildings can respond more intelligently to inhabitants). Most of the lab's $32 million yearly budget comes from corporate sponsors ranging from the expected - tech giants such as IBM, Sun Microsystems, Intel, and Cisco Systems - to the less obvious, such as Campbell Soup, Philip Morris, and The LEGO Group, maker of LEGO toys.

One of Moss's top priorities is to make sure these 80 or so corporate sponsors feel they benefit from the work of the lab. In the go-go days of the late 1990s tech boom, companies could simply decide, "This is cool. We're going to put money behind it," Moss says. But today, "You have to be able to justify that [spending] as a good investment that has a return."'

300 geniuses call him boss
http://www.csmonitor.com/2006/0306/p13s01-stct.html

Posted by: Phoenix Insurgent at March 7, 2006 10:22 PM

In fact, my point is not wedded to Marx. I find his perspective informative to this discussion, but my point is wedded to freedom, and technology limits freedom in very important ways. So, yes, I cite power in the workplace because the workplace is a vital part of human existence, and instead of the dictatoriship we have now, we ought to have democracy there instead.

Technology empowers the boss, the bureaucrat and the powers that be. That's bad for human freedom. If you're on the side of the bosses, bureaucrats and the powers that be, and count yourself among those who have faith in their benevolent intentions, then you might find the future world to your liking (and you might really like China, for instance). Some others are more skeptical.

Anyhow, the truth is that technophilia is not as rampant as you suggest. Sure, the public dialogue, with a few exceptions (stem cells, GMO, nuclear power, for instance), is dominated by gushing enthusiasm. That would make sense, since the elites own the media and the professional class that manages it is thoroughly indoctrinated. Elites in general are mostly very fond of it as well, for obvious reasons I have already gone into. However, when you delve a little deeper, it turns out that there's massive distrust and alienation out there when it comes to technology.

But, it's no surprise that people under that kind of propaganda barrage exhibit a certain schizophrenia on the issue (hell, almost 90 percent of US soldiers, according to Zogby, think the war in Iraq is in retaliation for Saddam's role in 9/11!). And, sure, there are benefits from the technology that people genuinely find useful. But, our participation in these technologies is an authoritarian one because we have no input on their development, little on their deployment and are forced to accomodate ourselves to them, for the most part.

Now, you can be FOR that - perhaps you don't trust people, let's say. But you shouldn't pretend that technological development is democratic. That's precisely why you can't vote against it. Voting against technology in this society would be like voting against the state. Or voting against capitalism. Good luck. Technology is too imbedded in the state for us to use a tool of the state to eliminate it. And, technology would collapse without the nanny state, anyhow, so why bother organizing to preserve the state as a tactic to undoing technology?

You, yourself admit that labor makes wealth (which is true, though not in the limited sense you mean it), and you admit that technology helps create wealth (true, but again, not exactly as you mean it). Why is it so difficult for you to follow through your own logic? If these are all true, wouldn't it make sense that the people with all the wealth would want to keep this tool of theirs under their control and to use it for their own ends? Have they made police, armies or workplaces democratic institutions? Did the bureaucrat dictatorships of Stalin, Mao or Hitler permit such things? Why, then, would a dictatorship of capital do it either?

Here's the problem with your analysis. It isn't just, for instance, American labor that makes American wealth. Plenty of other places, like Africa, have lots of labor and even resources, and yet have limited wealth. Much of this wealth and labor has been stolen outright, through slavery and colonialism.

Much of it now is bought through artificially low labor costs maintainted by neoliberal institutions like the WTO along with compliant local leaders and, when it becomes necessary, militaries (one reason why powerful militaries are not a good thing for those people without power).

So, what you have mistaken for an information economy in which labor is less important is really an economy where labor is less obvious to YOU. Mostly because so much of it has been offshored, as Marx predicted it would be. This is not to say that I am defending industrialism or industrial jobs, but nonetheless, the neoliberal system, thanks to technology, has made it possible to accumulate vast amounts of wealth for small minorities, to manage and exploit far off populations, to pit first world workers against third world dispossessed, and to manage it all from the center of the empire.

Now, you can say that labor is less important, but that sure won't fly to a woman sewing t-shirts seven days a week for 20 cents an hour in Bangladesh. Nor will it fly with the Wal-Mart worker stocking it in your home town.

Or, frankly, with me. You're wrong if you think class war is dead. It's very much alive, and technology is a major component in the attack on workers and others without power in this society. The aim of the elite today is always, first and foremost, to stay the elite tomorrow. If you don't think technology is part of that - that technology is somehow neutral despite the immense institutional, propganda and financial pressure to the contrary, then you need to show me how that is true, which you haven't.

One big reason that the elites have the confidence here at home to transition from an economy in which industrial production transformed third world resources for a domestic market (and where work itself served as a tool of social control), to one in which production has been offshored, to be managed by foreign despots and supply chain managers at home, is precisely because of the power to control and regulate that elites derive from technology. It's no coincidence that the two transitions, economic and technological are happening at the same time.

Anyhow, maybe it just comes down to this: if I'm on the side of the workers, what side are you on?

Posted by: Phoenix Insurgent at March 7, 2006 8:40 PM