Reflections on The Horizon Report and McLuhan's Wake

I must confess that after reading the Horizon Report, I have come to realize that every move we make with technology is of utmost importance in our future lives. Furthermore, humans are in a constant pursuit for the globalization of knowledge, which seems to be in the eyes of technologists in the coming years in the implementation of collective intelligence and social operating systems. The millions of actions that we make using the network will contribute to create a clean representation of a person’s identity at the click of a button. I have the impression that technology is pushing everyone in a movement to improve the quality of knowledge that we have of ourselves. As a result, we have seen improvements in the way data is acquired, transmitted, processed, accessed and visualized by others. The old image of the fortune teller sitting at a table with a round crystal ball telling you what your future will be, is actually being replaced now by a computer in front of you to guide your decision making.

Technology is quickly taking over and making people realize that academia, as understood by many in the world, is not structured to meet the needs of the 21st century. The widespread of possibilities of sharing information through mobile communication and the Internet will make it possible to acquire knowledge in cyberspace virtually from anywhere. Education costs will tend to decrease and thus become accessible to the great masses, who generally tend to be the ones who suffer the consequences of illiteracy. The new cyber school opportunity will probably prepare people to focus on aspects of instruction that are entirely linked with a person’s motivations and basic needs.

As a result of this technology, there is a sense of developing a telegnostic mind. Our normal sensory channels are not capable of processing the huge amounts of information that come to our brain. With the use of systems such as the social operating systems, we will be able to be ahead of our own perceptions and take quick decisions to modify our paths. The feeling of power that one has when the information is at the tip of our fingers is truly frightening.

In contraposition to the augmented feeling of control, I think that if technology is over-extended and not adequately justified, it will bring forth questionings about privacy issues. We have developed our ethics and moral based on beliefs, creeds of different natures and principally on respect to one another. The shifting of certain paradigms in the ways that we build our relationships with others will definitely be of a shock to many. Decision making should be accompanied by the incentive that technology will contribute to bring people closer together with their consent and not set them apart, otherwise its application will be rejected or delayed. To conclude, I firmly believe that technology has become a tool to increase human motivation in a quest for knowledge perfection, nevertheless it requires to be sensibly used by mankind.