Originally Posted by
Standalone
there's that emergency word again, Ken.
And your point is? You deny that something has value when it is used daily to help people. And you seem to be trying to use the fact that it does help people to "prove" that it is useless.
my own brain is a veritable intellectual and communications device, too...
The cell phone connects that brain to almost anyone, anywhere, anywhen in the world. You can call up wisdom from the dawn of writing on your phone and download the latest news. If your brain cannot see the value in that you undercut your own premise.
I've read Dune several times. I'm a long time sci-fi fan. Even the old school stuff-- just finished Asimov's Foundation and Empire the other night.
I also love the David Lynch movie and think that it does no dishonor to the book. Children of Dune and God Emperor of Dune did bore me, though.
There is no accounting for taste. If the movie thrills you and the other books in the series bore you then as I said you don't know Dune. The movie is abominable but that is par for the course in SF movies made from books. Find heart plugs in the book for me, tell me what useful purpose this dimwitted Hollywood intrusion served. I don't believe Dune is terribly specific about the Baron's sexual practices. The author's son was in his expansion of the series and his portrayal of the Baron is far more inventive and terrifying than the movie's heart plugs. Heart plugs have nothing to do with the Litany Against Fear.
So why is my cell phone opinion based on an "immense lack of knowledge?"
You show no real understanding of whatever knowledge you have.
There are ways in which technologies have come to use US rather than the other way around. I don't care if it's the triangle shirtwaist factory or devotion to the automobile or obsessive/addictive texting.... we should remain aware of where that line is and retain our power over technology.
...edit 2: your dogs can compose poetry or kiss your significant other better than you can, for instance?
Technology has no means whatsoever to use me. I use it, it is incapable of using me. It is pretty hard to do anything without using human technology and it has been for 250,000 years.
My dogs cannot compose poetry. Human language is a technology they do not possess (although they understand a fair number of words). Poetry is a technology they do not possess, since they have no language. Human writing is a technology they cannot use or have any use for. The implements by which human language is recorded are another collection of human technologies they cannot use, except as chew toys. If you don't understand this, and I can't see why you would have tried to use this as an example if you did, then you are hardly qualified to comment on technology. Technology is so pervasive and so ancient among us that we use a thousand technological innovations every hour without even realizing it. Technology does not use us, it is us, the most profound expression of the human experience possible.
My female dog will slip you the tongue without warning. Is the experience better? Define better.... Dogs are very adept at expressing emotions including affection. Put a naked human being and a dog both in the deep northern woods in the depth of winter and which is most likely to be alive a month later? The dog. The dog has no technology, it can only use non-technological survival skills and adaptations and it has them in abundance. You can't even survive a night without clothes or at least a fire, and both are human technology. Your only hope is to somehow recreate stone age technology from the ice ages over a period of hours and days. Of course you increase your chances of survival a lot if you befriend the dog but animal husbandry is another ancient technology.
That is what "living without technology" would really be like. I'll take my life with a double dose of technology. If we stripped all the technology out of your bike you would be left with a small pile of worthless looking rocks and organic materials. It took a quarter million years of technological development to turn that into a human powered vehicle. It should not take that long to convince you of the value of a cell phone, all the hard work has been done. All you have to do is open your mind and that is not technology, that is intelligence, the wellspring of technology.
Ken