I saw this on mind hacks about Susan Greenfield, Baroness Greenfield talking about Facebook et al risk 'infantilising' the human mind. The blog post sort of laughs at her for making these statements without evidence. I'm skeptical of the safe until proven otherwise model that has driven the use of chemicals in food and products that humans come in touch with. I'm skeptical of medicines that are not tested in real world situations, but only in controlled studies, before being released to interact.
When it comes to online technologies, to say that they're safe because no one has proven otherwise with valid data, is ludicrous. Facebook use will change how people think. TV did. The invention of the Novel did. Don't forget that the novel was a new technology too.
There's no question, in my experience, that people who don't read novels have a less nuanced and diverse understanding of human nature. That gives people who read novels an advantage in some respects. I think that social networking technologies such as FB reduce the complexity of social interactions to the most minimal level, reducing the need to engage cognitively with one's self and others. But I'm not putting a value judgement on that. It will no doubt either engender new types of relationships that will have their own values, though there's no data for that either.
There's no question, however, FB type interactions help lots of people keep in touch with lots of people, in a very shallow, banal, trite and superficial manner... but is that anything new?
The Disappearing Male - Doc Zone | CBC-TV
"We are conducting a vast toxicological experiment in which our children and our children's children are the experimental subjects." Dr. Herbert Needleman
The Disappearing Male is about one of the most important, and least publicized, issues facing the human species: the toxic threat to the male reproductive system.
The last few decades have seen steady and dramatic increases in the incidence of boys and young men suffering from genital deformities, low sperm count, sperm abnormalities and testicular cancer.
Some researchers say that declining male fertility rates could be the first sign of extinction.
At the same time, boys are now far more at risk of suffering from ADHD, autism, Tourette's syndrome, cerebral palsy, and dyslexia.The Disappearing Male takes a close and disturbing look at what many doctors and researchers now suspect are responsible for many of these problems: a class of common chemicals that are ubiquitous in our world.
Found in everything from shampoo, sunglasses, meat and dairy products, carpet, cosmetics and baby bottles, they are called "hormone mimicking" or "endocrine disrupting" chemicals and they may be starting to damage the most basic building blocks of human development.
Thanks to AlexB for sending me this. I can't but laugh. You mean people just noticed? This has been going on as a discussion for over a decade that I'm aware of it. And of course I try to avoid most of these products, and succeed. But parents... they just surround their world and children with plastics... and then pop them in the mircowave. :)
The Teenager Audio Test - Can you hear this sound?
Clicking the play button below will produce a tone that is generally only heard by people under the age of 25. It has been used as a deterrent device to keep teenagers from loitering in malls and shops, and sounds similar to a buzzing mosquito. Typically the longer you listen to it, the more annoying it gets.
Try it and let me know. I can hear it, at 46 yrs old with a combined hardware and software hearing loss of 40%.
"The Fertility Institutes recently stunned the fertility community by being the first company to boldly offer couples the opportunity to screen their embryos not only for diseases and gender, but also for completely benign characteristics such as eye color, hair color, and complexion. The Fertility Institutes proudly claims this is just the tip of the iceberg, and plans to offer almost any conceivable customization as science makes them available. Even as couples from across the globe are flocking in droves to pay the company their life's savings for a custom baby, opponents are vilifying the company for shattering moral and ethical boundaries. Like it or not, the era of designer babies is officially here and there is no going back."
This brings whole new meaning to the notion of adaptive design. Now how about designer parents please? Here's the full article and a link to their evil web site.
Ok, even if we do put aside the whole issue of the evils of gender selection and inconvenient disabilities, eugenics is just plain evil and stupid. It is a cultural form of short sighted hubris. It is a form of mono-cropping that will surely be detrimental. Challenges lead to innovative thinking, and innovative thinking is good. Although, here's a thought. Set up a company like this, and whenever parents come, put them on a list for removal from the gene pool. I'm not talking about people who have very specific healthcare risks that they don't want to pass down to their children unnecessarily... that's a different issue. People who want designer babies have perhaps lost an understanding of the value of bio-diversity, and perhaps represent a danger to the survival of our species as much as any other eugenics enthusiast.
FT.com / UK - My new sense of guilt as a selfish working mother
On Monday The Children's Society published a report based on interviews with 35,000 people in Britain that concluded children such as mine may not be as happy as they should be.
The main risk for British children, it said, was that their selfish parents were too busy chasing their own success. The culture of individual fulfilment for adults was making the lot of children much less happy than a generation or two ago.
The report caused a storm in the British media last week - just as one would have expected. Social conservatives crowed in agreement: we should roll the clocks back to the 1950s, they said, when everyone lived in nuclear families and women baked cakes and everyone was happy. The social liberals, meanwhile, flew into a rage - female columnists protested that our children are happy (my old argument), and tried to rip the report apart, closing their ears to what they claimed was preachy nonsense.
I have no opinion in this matter, to any great degree for a variety of reasons. Oh, I do have opinions! I don't have children, and I'd prefer to focus on my own life and that of my long suffering partner (who sent me this). I'm professionally dedicated to children, but not on my spare time. And most important to me, my colleagues are predominately female and I shudder at the thought of having to work in a male dominated workforce. I also think that women who are active professionals are making major impacts in the lives of their children because of their careers. I could go on and on. What I DO think is the problem is the intersection of the nuclear family and two parents working. If two parents are working, who stays with the children? Well, if we got rid of the problem of nuclear families, then the issue becomes a lot more diverse and complex. It is not natural to force families into this nuclear mode. It is unnatural for people to have to work 9-5 all at the same time. What IS natural is for people to work at something they love and find meaningful to the best of their ability. I can tell you that if I'd had kids I'd have fought to be the homemaker, and I'd be there with the other moms and dads... but ideally, our family would also be situated in a larger extended family structure where children were collectively nurtured and supported, and no child would have to depend on a single parent as caregiver. It takes a community to raise a child... no one or two people should feel guilty for having to do it alone. IMHO of course.
Deathwatch: The End of Second Life talks about how SL is dead and useless and only good for education and the like. Great! Now that people move on to create something 'better' it can fall below the hype-radar and we can get back on to learnification. Blogs, after the hype, could grow and mature as a learning too. Same for wikis. The best things, imho, often happen after the wave, not on the bleeding edge. Thanks to jeremy for this, as he pointed me to it, and it always saying SL's dead.
