"... The low hanging fruit of technology has been plucked: fire, antiseptic, the wheel, paper, vaccinations. Each new plateau of sophistication is costly: even Moore’s law slows down. Our pursuit of singularity should feel like a footrace to the death. Old diseases like tuberculosis are catching up, mutating into new promises to beat us this time. And new viruses are a mere evolutionary twitch away. Big data—our new and growing access to trillions of variables from every domain of life—is promoted by its acolytes as the salve for human error. All we have to do eliminate our folly is make the proper connections, reflect, and correct. But big data also provides a painful tide of false causality and erroneous readings, which will probably make things worse before it makes them better. So if you agree with Tainter, your anxiety should be threatening to bust gills in your neck. It’s that old adage: every time history repeats itself, the price goes up." - Ken Baumann, Of Our Chances
Posted on: Sat, 10 Aug 2013 01:30:25 +0000
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