On the 20th of April, this happened.
One day - very soon - we will be able to twitter with our brains.
(This happened just 4 days after Ashton Kutcher's Twitter feed crossed 1 million followers. I don't know if the two are related, though I would like to think of some scientist guy somewhere getting up and saying, 'enough already, dude. you need a brain to twitter!')
As a friend of mine said - it's cool, but also - in some way - sad. Is the human conversation going to go the way of the physical letter, with all it's nostalgia, memory power, emotional significance? They said that a cold heartless email could never replace it. But it did. And letters went through the ignonimity of being branded 'snail mail' on their way out. Now, it's only couriers, emails, sms's.
Conversation disappearing might seem fantastic now, but that's how they felt about the letter, too. Every generation has it's favorite means of communication - which they defend passionately, and lament it's demise in their old age, and curse the new replacement - which has been equally passionately embraced by the next generation, for whom it's as essential as oxygen.
makes you think - how many such other forms have disappeared forever, which we'll never even know about, never mind remember how to use. What might the Incan quipu have spoken, if we'd known how to listen? Not just the sight of words on a page, but texture, color, complexity...
And tomorrow - is a hive mind. When our thoughts become the primary means of communicating with the outside world... will there be another learning curve? Self-censorship? Another BBC Sitcom ripoff called Dimaag Sambhal Ke?
Self-disciplined begins with the mastery of your thoughts. If you don't control what you think, you can't control what you do. - Napolean Hill
Soon, it won't be a philosopher's aspiration, but a basic requirement for getting into kindergarten.
One day - very soon - we will be able to twitter with our brains.
(This happened just 4 days after Ashton Kutcher's Twitter feed crossed 1 million followers. I don't know if the two are related, though I would like to think of some scientist guy somewhere getting up and saying, 'enough already, dude. you need a brain to twitter!')
As a friend of mine said - it's cool, but also - in some way - sad. Is the human conversation going to go the way of the physical letter, with all it's nostalgia, memory power, emotional significance? They said that a cold heartless email could never replace it. But it did. And letters went through the ignonimity of being branded 'snail mail' on their way out. Now, it's only couriers, emails, sms's.
Conversation disappearing might seem fantastic now, but that's how they felt about the letter, too. Every generation has it's favorite means of communication - which they defend passionately, and lament it's demise in their old age, and curse the new replacement - which has been equally passionately embraced by the next generation, for whom it's as essential as oxygen.
makes you think - how many such other forms have disappeared forever, which we'll never even know about, never mind remember how to use. What might the Incan quipu have spoken, if we'd known how to listen? Not just the sight of words on a page, but texture, color, complexity...
And tomorrow - is a hive mind. When our thoughts become the primary means of communicating with the outside world... will there be another learning curve? Self-censorship? Another BBC Sitcom ripoff called Dimaag Sambhal Ke?
Self-disciplined begins with the mastery of your thoughts. If you don't control what you think, you can't control what you do. - Napolean Hill
Soon, it won't be a philosopher's aspiration, but a basic requirement for getting into kindergarten.
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