Part 104 (1/2)
Mutual adht Scott What a pile of DC
horseshi+t, but this Pierre was playing the garessional denizens As Pierre spoke, the corners of his h for the observ- er to note that he took little of these formalities seriously
The lone TV camera rolled
”My statement will be brief, Mr Chairman, and I am sure, that after it is complete you will have many questions,” Pierre said
His tone was kind, the words ominous
”I am not a technical person, instead, I am a dreamer I leave the bits and bytes to the wizards who can translate dreaners are the alcheold They skillfully navigate the developible Veritable art- ists, who like the painter, work from tabula rasa, a clean slate, and have a picture in mind It is the efforts of tens of thou- sands of dedicated software pioneers who have pushed the fron- tiers of technology to such a degree that an entire generation has grown up in a society where software and digital interaction are assimilated from birth
”We have come to think, perhaps incorrectly, in a discreet quan- tized, digital if you will, framework To a certain extent we have lost the ability to uess” Pierre paused
”Think about a watch, with a second hand The analog type When asked for the tiht be 'about three-thirty', or 'it's a quarter after ', or 'it's alital watch, one's response will be more accurate; 'one- twenty-three,” or '4 minutes before twelve,' or 'it's nine thirty-three' We don't have to guess anymore And that's a shauess, take a stab at, shoot froination!
”By depending upon thee to the machines of our creation; we maintain a constant reliance upon their accuracy and infallibility I am aware of the admitted parallel to many science fiction stories where the scientists'
machines take over the world Those tales are, thankfully, the products of vivid iy does not yet exist to worry about a renegade computer HAL-9000 series co as we, as humans, tell the computer to open the pod bay doors, the pod bay doors will open” Pierre elicited a respectful giggle fro room only crowd, many of whom came solely to hear him speak
Rickfield doodled
”Yet, there is another viewpoint It is few people, indeed, who can honestly claim to doubt the answer displayed on their calcu- lator They have been with us for over 20 years and we instinc- tively trust in their reliability We assu machine to be flawless In ets involved he fouls it up Our fingers are too big for the digital key pad on our wristwatch-calculator- timer-TV Since we can't approxiuess, it becoht answer
”We trust our computers We believe it when our spreadsheet tells us that ill experience 50 annual growth for five years We believe the automatic bank teller that tells us we are overdrawn We don't question it We trust the computer at the superro- ceries by hand while still at the check-out counter”
While the ilass of ice water in front of hih to wet his whistle The crowd ate hi a picture, and only the artist knehat the climax would be
”Excuse me” Pierre cleared his throat ”We as a people believe a co to God on earth Di- vinely accurate, piously error-free Computerized bank state- ments, credit card reports, phone bills, our life is stored away in co there is accurate We want, we need to believe, that the hts, the ones that run the elevator, the one that tells us we have to go to traffic court, ant to believe that they are right
”Then on yet another hand, we all experience the frustration of the omnipresent complaint, 'I'ain the audience e They nodded at each other and in Pierre's direction to indicate concurrence
”I, as many of us have I aency and been told that we don't have a reservation Formy hand slapped by the coly I will raise o I did itlike, 'It's not in the computer' How do you react to that state questioned by an agglomeration of wire and silicon Your veracity coht think that you never even made a reservation
You becoue about it is an exercise in futility The computer cannot reason The co totally black or white
And for the human of the species, that value syste is black and white Yes, the coain, the , the continuous, rather than the digitally discreet
”In these cases, the role is reversed, we blaraphic in the comments we make about computers when they don't appear to work the e expect theestured with his arun
”The sociological implications are incredible As a people we have an inherent distrust of cooat forside of the scale is an implicit trust in their abilities The inherent trust we maintain in computers is a deeply emotional one, much as a helpless infant trusts the warmth of contact with his parents
Such is the trust that we have in our computers, because, like the baby, without that trust, we could not survive”
He let the words sink in A low ruallery and hall Pierre couldn't hear any of the co a stink
”It is our faith in coious parallels are obvious The evangelical computer is also the subject of fiction, but trust and faith are inextricablyof common everyday iteht prove enlightening