Tech Paradox?

For the past few weeks, I’ve been finding some interesting facts and insights related to the technology, especially the internet. And I cannot help but find the conclusion that somehow, while we’re glorifying technology, we’re gradually degrading our own intelligence level due to technology overuse. And all of them are paradox-like

• We’re alone together

With internet and its ever-developing social media, we’re isolating ourselves from our real social life and prefer to connect to our internet and interact online. I’ve seen this one of this speech/talk from TED by Sherry Turkle, “Connected, but Alone”

Like she said, we’re underestimating the importance of conversation and social interaction, since the online interaction offers safer interaction. You may control what you’re saying and you can have the interaction, anytime and anywhere you want while you’re doing something else. And at some extents, you can interact without having a partner to interact to.

But however, our ability to have a real interaction and conversation is the cost on having those fancy online interactions.

Because of technology, we’re enjoying having interaction all the time we want. But at the same time, we’re also alone.

• We forget to remember

I’ve also seen another TED talk by Joshua Foer about memory. He’s curious about how some certain people can have a great memory. It turned out that there’s no secret or difference on each of our brain.

I found an interesting point he pointed out at the final third of his speech, that nowadays we get help from our devices to remind us about almost everything. You don’t have to remember your daily schedule because your calendar in your phone can remember it for you. And with notes feature, you can keep a load of information inside your device.

In the speech above, it’s being told that in order to have a good memory, we have to remember to remember. But we just forget to remember, and we somehow love to do it.

• We grow smarter just in order to be outsmarted

The most advancing knowledge is obviously the knowledge of computer and technology. Hell, you can see the result clearly today. And people are in the competition of developing the new knowledge and innovation of technology. In that circumstance, come up a prediction that there’ll be a time that our technology will outsmart us, human, the creator of that technology.

Surprisingly, tech people are enthusiastic about that prediction and want to be the one who make that prediction come true. And they’re on the track. Robotic technology is advancing. And even the study of artificial intelligence is now listed as one of my college course. So they study hard just to make ourselves outsmarted in the future?

There are a lot more if you want to observe and find out. And you know, funnily, I’m also one of the paradoxes. I rant about technology, but I instead use technology to have my rant.

But I’m not saying that we should abolish technology. We just need to use it wisely, properly.

Smile, And You’ll be Happy :)

In our daily life, we always want to have a good mood in order to have a smooth, good day. And having a good mood is believed to be the beginning of a good expression. You may smile or mourn depending on your mood. Admittedly, it’s true.

Now what happen if we’re in a not-so-nice mood that will affect our facial expression, in a time that we should show our smiling face? Looking for a mood booster will need time and you need to do your work as soon as possible, with a happy face. Otherwise your client or partner will think you’re rude. And then you have it, a ruined day.

So what should we do then?

It’s true that our brain transmit our feeling from our brain to our muscles to create the proper expression. But would you believe that the process is reversible? You can create the mood you want by creating the face first. So if you want to be happy, try to smile first, and then boost it with something that can make you happy just for a bit.

You may not believe, but there was a research to prove this one. The sample is told to watch a funny cartoon with 2 conditions. First, they watch the cartoon while holding a ping-pong ball inside their mouth, not swallowing them. After that, they watch the same cartoon, but while biting a pen horizontally, forcing them to show their teeth. The result shows that the samples are happier when they’re biting a pen. The reason is simple. It’s because they make a smiling face while watching the cartoon.

All I’m saying is, smile, and you’ll be happy.

Zombie Apocalypse Is Here Already

“Man, I’m just curious what will I do if the world is fallen to zombie apocalypse”

“You mean you want that to happen in the near time? To have zombies around?”

“This is nuts, but yes”

“Man, please. We’ve been living with zombies nowadays”

“Was that supposed to be a joke?”

“No shit. The zombies are around us already. Just look at the news channel once in a while and you’ll find one. They’re here. But at this moment, they’re more civilized, wearing suit and tie, sitting at the government office. But hey, they’re brainless.”

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This is a bit flashback when I saw a live footage of my government’s big meeting. It’s chaotic and massively disorganized due to the brainless meeting participants. Seriously, I even dare to say me and my friends can have much much better meeting that them. And hell, they’re government. What A shame.

Instanity

I’m now 21 years old and I’ve learned that learning is a process before you get the result you eagerly want to. And in fact, some people, in various ways, told me that the process itself is something that matters more that the result. Well, obviously because in the process, you learn one or two things so that you can improve in terms of quality.

But however, in recent years, result is heavily demanded. All processes and efforts won’t be appreciated if the result is not as what people have expected before. And this kind of things is easily found in our daily life.

Between Creativity And Copycat

Nowadays, something original is highly appreciated and somehow highly demanded. And in contrary, unoriginality will get a lot of criticism from most of us due to its lack of creativity and innovation. Yes, it’s called plagiarism.

Well, I cannot complain that most of us hate plagiarism. I also hate it, especially when the first time I was introduced to that word, through this.

I have nothing against both bands, so don’t bash me. But it’s quite similar isn’t it, the songs. 3 years ago, a lot of people think the second band copied MCR’s song and claimed it as a plagiarism. Truthfully, I don’t really care.

However, I’ve noticed that people are getting too critical on this plagiarism thingy, claiming everything that has a tiny bit of similarity with other and older thing as plagiarism, and misunderstood on what creativity really is.

Age Free Country

I recently saw some reports and videos about some phenomenons in my country, Indonesia.

First, about the smoking phenomenon. A lot of people smoke cigarettes in this country. Check this out (it’s 42 minutes. So brace yourself)

Second, I just saw this news about a car accident.

It’s written in Indonesian, so I’ll explain. It’s reported that a 13-14 year old kid drove his car recklessly and hit in total 15 people in different locations. Just what the hell is this? Where are his parents!!

Anyway, both reports above have one similarity. Kids are allowed to have and/or do something that they shouldn’t have and/or do at their current age. Here are some of those things.

• Smoking

If you watched the video I attached, you may see that in this country, even a 2 year old baby can smoke and even the parents don’t give a shit. And the youths think that cigar is a part of lifestyle.

Man, I’d prefer to be a healthy, not-so-popular man rather than killing myself.

• Driving a car or riding a bike

You may see from the news link I put above. A pesky kid are allowed to drive a car. Not all of them are reckless drivers though. But really, what was that for? Your parents are too busy taking care of you? You’re too noble to take a public transportation?

And it goes worse for bikes. Some parents even teach their 10 year old kid how to ride one. Don’t they have any homework?

• Have a vehicle

One the complementary of the previous point, their parents willingly buy their kids a vehicle or give what they have in the garage. Sir, Ma’am, you can pay your kid’s school with those money. Why bother giving a vehicle?

• Holding super expensive techs

With the advancement of technology, the demand to have one also grows. But surprisingly, the one who also have the high demand are kids. I’ve seen a lot of kids holding smart phones, either iPhone or Blackberry. Seriously, do they need that kind of stuff when all they do everyday is going to school and messing around?

 

There are some more I’m sure. You can mention your own version in the comment

But anyway, even though there’s a law that control those phenomenons, parents are the key. Their should know how to educate their kids, not to spoil them too much.

Tech Failures

I personally don’t hate technology. It surely makes our life much easier. But however, I heavily think that technology is misused, and eventually ruins the way we socialize. And that’s the reason why I somehow try to hate technology. And you can simply see my previous posts about technology are all somewhat negative.

And in this country, Indonesia, there are a lot of social failures (at least in my opinion) caused by technology. And in recent years it got worse thanks to BlackBerry Smart Phone. With the increasing user number, the social failures number is also increasing. It’s such a shame.

Here are some of them in my own version which have successfully irritated me.

• So-caring fools

With a lot of BlackBerry user, you will have several names in your BlackBerry Messenger contact list (a lot, perhaps). And some of them will be very caring. But somehow they do it wrongly. They just broadcast something that they received from a friend and then forward it to all of their contact. The failure is, most of them cannot be proved as true information because they rarely put the reference along with that information.

Sure you say it is useful information, but can you just mention where the hell did you get that information? And even if it’s valid, some people just don’t like to receive broadcast messages, including me.

• Self selling

The most annoying part when you bought a new phone is to retain your old contact list (unless you have email sync). And it will be a pain in the ass if you have to ask your friend one after another. But in here, with a lot of people using blackberry, you can broadcast your own phone and/or ID so that people can add and/or contact you to their contact list. For me, this is ridiculous. I can’t help but assume these kind of people as a cheap, attention whores.

I’ve made a joke post about this anyway, just to give them a slap in the face if they once read it.

• Pussies of love

Well, since the era of text messaging, some romantic dramas are gone. You shouldn’t spend your time to get your crush’ heart, while your crush somehow is stupid enough to fall for text messages. And it’s gotten worse with this BlackBerry Messenger. You can chat with your crush all day long without feeling worry about your phone credit. It’s all free once you paid the bill. And you can make up any words through text, endlessly.

Sounds easy, right? But with this, people’s social ability is falling down, not to mention the ability to confront your crush directly.

• Retards

I don’t know how to name it, but here’s what I mean. It’s often that when I hang out with some friends, or when I see other people hang out with their friend, they spend half of their time taking care of their smart phone.

Please, you have your friend in front of you, pay them some respect.

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I assume there are a lot more, but that’s all about it for me. Perhaps you can help with your own version

Like I told you earlier, technology is good. But please, learn how to use it properly. Or else you’re maybe worse than a caveman.

Lucky People Don’t Exist

A lot of us think that luck is just a good coincidence that we actually don’t actually expect. For me, luck is a chance that’s given by God for you to take, combined with the preparation and action of your own. Sure a lot of lucks are actually something we really don’t expect. Like you meet a job opportunity from a friend you meet in the café when you just want to chill in the café, or gain good score on the exam that you actually don’t really understand, or much more. But, for me, it’s you that make yourself lucky, regardless how unexpected your luck is.

Lover’s Problem

If I’ve done everything I could to my girlfriend, what should I do in Valentine’s Day?

I know,  let’s buy some condoms and use it later that day:P

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What’s the point of having a special day for love anyway?

You can get love every single day (if you do deserve it, though).

Death, The Last Way To Gain Respect

Recently I heard Eminem’s song called ‘Sing for The Moment’ after a while. And a line of that song is quite interesting. It says “…and maybe they’ll admit it when we’re gone, just let our spirits live on through our lyrics that you hear in our song…”

In my definition, the lyric means that if you’re hated for trying to do something great, or even you have don’t so, but people don’t think so, or just making fun of it, somehow death can gain you respect and all the glory you deserve. It sounds funny, right?

But some facts told you exactly the same. Remember the death of Michael Jackson? Yeah, he is the king of pop. But until his dead, less people gave a shit on him or even said bad things about him since he’s made some controversies. And once he’s gone, the news was spread and a lot of people gave him so much respect. And the respect keep flowing and increasing up until a bit annoying level. Those who didn’t even know the songs of him started to have his songs in their music player and instantly claimed that they are the biggest fans know everything about him. I mean, please, why don’t you like him when he’s still around?

I mean really, why we put up a lot of criticism towards people and try to find their mistakes when they actually try to make something big for both them and the world. Can we do the same? I don’t know about you, but I cannot. So please, respect people and their action and creation before they should be gone from this world to get it.