Has the Internet Made the World a Better Place?

[peter]

When I was young we had no internet yet we had power to our houses, we had water flowing from our taps and we could use the television to entertain ourselves. When we wanted to go out and about, we could book a train or plane ticket [over the phone], or similarly a restaurant table or cinema ticket. If I wanted to know something obscure that my own selection of books at home could tell me - then I might have to go to a library to research the subject, or indeed a number of libraries or different research venues, but I always got there in the end. The accessing of information was indeed slower - but this had the upside of actually making our lives proceed more slowly and often more carefully thereby and it is beyond doubt that in it's slower way we tended to absorb more of what we encountered in our work than we do by the speed-scanning of huge amounts of information available at the drop of a hat.

So is this indeed the only thing the internet has done for us; allowed for a huge increase in the speed at which information may be accessed and communicated? is there in truth no other concrete advantage that we have gained?

[I ask this question having just read on Google News that Russia intends to 'close down the internet' in it's country for a short period in order to 'test it's defences'. I hadn't realised a country could even do this what with 4G and mobile access etc. but there you have it; it got me to thinking as to whether it might not be such a bad idea for the rest of us now and again!]

[Avatar]

Of course it's made the world a better place.

It's also made it a worse place.

Not sure you can have one without the other really.

--A

[peter]

Yes - I get it, but what has it actually done, that couldn't be done without it in a simply slower and more measured way? Sure, it has given us 'reach' - but a chain-letter gave you reach in much the same way, and when you received one of those you threw it in the bin!

I can access beauty and ugliness and great speed and in the most casual and flippant of ways; now I am insouciant to the one and desensitised to the other. What in life gone by I would have searched for with vigour and found with joy, I now haul in within minutes from eBay. It took me ten years of searching second hand bookshops and markets to complete the finding of a series of old books I collected; everywhere I traveled I sought out the shops, I made a million other serendipitous discoveries en route and each time I found one of my desired books my spirits soared - and it got harder and harder and better and better. This was life; now we have the internet. What I wanted to learn I had to search out, and again in the finding I was more atuned to absorb: now I click and skim, click and skim and it passes me by like the idle wind I regardeth not.

It has been said in another thread that happiness lies not in the destination but in the journey; has this not been the internet's greatest contribution - it has killed the journey?

[Skyweir]

I agree that the internet has made the world both better and worse ... and I think it is an illusion to imagine any other future than the path to it we are on now.

The genie isnt going to fit back in it's more archaic bottle.

Is that the tragedy of the modern world? Yes I believe it might well be.

But I believe also, that it doesnt have to be IF humankind seek a balance in their lives.

In many ways I llove this age .. but for the internet I wouldnt have found the Watch after finishing TCTC .. and what a salve to the grief stricken soul that was.

But for the internet and associated technology law enforcement and global security collaboration is made more effective. Perfect no. But one hundred percent improved. I remember doing criminal background checks by card indices .. we had faxes in the 80s but not computers.

I remember typing reports on typewriters in triplicate with messy carbon paper and .. you did not want a typo. Just one would be the cause of utter frustration and ire. No one needs that kind of clumsy shit.

On a word processor however, corrections were easy .. no need for carbon paper .. simply print multiple copies.

I remember going to Uni in the 2000s and accessing soft copy materials, saving me hundreds of dollars in books. Till I got to law .. the discipline is woefully archaic. Annoying and impractical really given how precedent changes the law. Sure for some areas little changes but in tort law particularly the law is constantly nuancing.

But .. its not just the internet per se .. no offence to gamers here .. but there are a lot of diversions these days that inhibit the value of engaging with others, with nature and enjoying greater physical activity.

I didnt like my kids to come home from school and jump on the Xbox. It wasnt the internet they cared about .. it was their games. So we would encourage them to be ALSO involved in community and school sports and activities.

So to my mind the internet is great so long as you arent constantly plugged in to the matrix and forget there is an amazing world out there to explore and engage in

Its all about balance my friend .. those that have one get the pleasure and the joys of enjoying the benefits of both.

[sgt.null]

Yes. Loads.
Communication.

[Lazy Luke]

Amazon Lockers

[Ur Dead]

Of course it's made the world a better place.

It's also made it a worse place.

Not sure you can have one without the other really.

--A

Agree but the real bad side..

It's like heroin, once your hooked, withdraw is dangerous and painful.

[Vraith]

I can access beauty and ugliness and great speed and in the most casual and flippant of ways

If you want to get deep in the weeds on aesthetics, speed and it's harms, try you some Virilio...[[fair warning: it ain't easy, [though not as hard/dense as some from the realm] probably not much fun for you or anyone. Look at his wikipedia page, though, and you'll get a sense of the linkage I made here, and why]]

ANYWAY: I think like the many above: better and worse. BUT--a lot of the worse, while a predictable outcome isn't/wasn't a necessary one. A lot of choosing goes into creating the worse things.

One part/example [[which Sky is also talking about in part, and a parallel or connection to your happy thread, peter]]
Your book hunt---
SOME things are made better by the pursuit, the journey, the effort, the work. The process enhances the culmination/endpoint experience [as well as being experience itself]

SOME things are even more extreme than that---the journey doesn't just enhance/supplement/expand the final...it causes a cleavage.
You get to the end of the trail, and before you isn't just a heightened view/perspective of sea--bluer, brighter, larger...but a different WORLD.

But SOME things, the getting from A to B is just a tedium and waste, a chore, a bore, a pain-in-the-ass.

The first two kinds, the internet has made---well, if not always worse, at least often lesser. I'd say your old-timey bookhunt was the first type.

BUT, a person can still choose to engage in things in the first two ways.
You don't HAVE to look at MoMA's 80 fucking thousand collection pieces in their online gallery, you can go down the damn street, or take a train and spend a day or a week at the damn Tate!.

And the 'net can make things easily better---you can spend a few hours gathering a ton of info on the poetry, history, environment of freaking Iceland that would have taken a person weeks, months, more 20 years ago... BEFORE you go there on vacation. Your vacation just became ten times better experience in one-tenth the time/effort.

Also, if one were so inclined, there are journeys/goals/endeavors hard, deep, long, that are only achievable----and a fair number that didn't even EXIST before---because of the 'net.

[Zarathustra]

Yes - I get it, but what has it actually done, that couldn't be done without it in a simply slower and more measured way?

I think in this case a difference in scale/speed is a difference in kind. Because it goes faster/farther, it is something truly different. Emergent properties have developed that otherwise wouldn't have developed, no matter how long you waited for them by trying to do the same thing slower and on a more limited scale. Primarily, those properties take the form of interactivity. For instance, imagine trying to discuss current events with people around the world in the same way you would with people at the pub. By the time our snail mail delivered the conversation, it would have moved on to some other topic.

And for those who play video games (or have kids who do), you will know that there is a quantum leap in interactivity for gaming. Being able to inhabit the same virtual environment with all your friends, to play the same game with them, while talking/chatting at the same time, there is simply no way to replicate this without an Internet. It is only possible in real time, with a digital network.

I did freelance writing for a while. I was working with customers and collaborators around the world. My project leader was a lady in Pakistan. My customers were in Europe. People in Africa were my cheaper competition. To be able to collaborate on a project with people around the world would simply be impossible without an Internet. We had a single interface where we all "met" virtually. Sure, you could do the same thing locally, but that's not the same thing.

And this doesn't even scratch the surface. Military, science, medicine, education . . . we do so much now that would be impossible without an Internet.

It's like comparing the printing press to hand written books. One could describe it as "doing the same thing, faster," but that entirely misses the point of how the printing press transformed society. Humans live through time. Faster really does make a difference. It alters the power balance of civilizations for knowledge to be transferred from the few to the multitudes.

[Fist and Faith]

The accessing of information was indeed slower - but this had the upside of actually making our lives proceed more slowly and often more carefully thereby and it is beyond doubt that in it's slower way we tended to absorb more of what we encountered in our work than we do by the speed-scanning of huge amounts of information available at the drop of a hat.

I disagree. Those who were once willing to go to great effort to get their hands on the info they wanted, and thoroughly absorb it, can now get it more easily, and thoroughly absorb it. The ease with which the info can be gotten does not make it less absorbable. Those who now flit from one topic to another, never absorbing anything, probably did the same then. And, since it doesn't take as long go acquire the material you want, there's plenty of time to flit AND absorb.

[wayfriend]

The internet has certainly made the world a different place. Nothing has so profoundly changed society, culture, economies, labor, science, art, philosophy, morality, and even religion.

It's tempting to say it's all to the good, but we all know by now that every upside has a downside. Probably it's a net positive. But it's not, after careful evaluation, a slam-dunk positive.

And the jury is still deliberating on this one. There's a lot of chaos which hasn't settled yet. Mankind is rather on the hook right now to tame it. It is still possible that the internet will precipitate Earth becoming a smoking cinder orbiting the Sun. Or a planet of slaves who labor for Elysium. Your faith in a positive outcome will vary. The fable of Prometheus still pertains.

peter, you are certainly right that the internet has made us a race of instant gratification seeking, short term attention having, shallow desire wanting, led by the nose following, anonymous vitriol spewing idiots. Mostly. I except myself, and thou, of course. But is that a phase? Or an evolution? As I said, that jury is still reviewing the evidence.

[peter]

Thank you for that diplomatic inclusion above Wayfriend and I agree that the jury is still out on the balance sheet regarding the pluses and minuses of the internet.

But yes - you guys make a strong case for the beneficial effects and I agree that this is one genie that ain't going back in the bottle any time soon. Absolutely one of the chief effects of the phenomenon (because really, it is no less) is that of the exponential growth of connectivity it has facilitated. As Z points out , this in itself results in emergent effects that would/could never be seen, no matter what, in the old ways of communicating. I'm thinking here in terms of the creative powers of huge numbers of minds all focused on one end - the generative powers that are unleashed thereby.

But what of Russia's proposed experiment? Interesting to know the details of how they intend to carry out their test; will it be for an hour, a day? And what would the effect be of a sudden and rapid cesation of internet capabilities on the world today? Could we survive it and still retain our level of civilization as we know it or would we be plunged into a world of chaos and primitive dystopian survival tactics? I saw some science boffin say on TV that a solar pulse of the magnitude of that that hit the Earth in the nineteenth century would take out the internet in a blink - and such solar events are not rare, one being in fact overdue as we speak. If we are indeed as internet dependant as I suspect we are, would it not be wise to perhaps be making some preparations for dealing with such an event?

[DukkhaWaynhim]

Yes.

But it also creates other problems, the biggest of which to me is the faux-anonymity that makes it way too easy for strangers, acquaintances, friends, and family to spew garbage at each other under the pretense of social media.

[Skyweir]

Totally agree Dukkha that is indeed one of the things we have seen and experienced arising from and through social media.

It is a faux anonymity .. a shield that we think protects us from the consequences of being harsh, abusive and abrasive with fellow humans. Its arguably one of the more unpleasant trends arising from social media and crossing over into the real world.

Its probably not just social media though .. its maybe also a direction that humans are evolving towards. Theres a lack of sensitivity to violence and aggressive behaviour, rudeness, abrasiveness in todays world. The knock on effects can be readily seen in the way we treat each other as humans. The humans dont care for one another .. aged care institutions is a good example of this. We are becoming less connected to community, family and other humans, the natural world.

All though can be turned around and addressed. We can be more connected to nature, to community, family, society etc.

We can resist being a bully on social media and engaging in aggressive commentary. All things are within our power to change.

[Fist and Faith]

peter, you are certainly right that the internet has made us a race of instant gratification seeking, short term attention having, shallow desire wanting, led by the nose following, anonymous vitriol spewing idiots.

No, all of that is just a part of us, and it's always been there. Something comes along now and then that shines a spotlight on it, and the Internet is the biggest example. When Native Americans were given alcohol, everybody said they were lazy drunks. But they aren't moreso than any other group, some of which are celebrated for their drinking. (What will you be doing March 17?) McDonald's didn't cause obesity and the health problems associated with it; it simply took advantage of tendencies within the species. Radio, then television, and now the Internet and video games, didn't create the negative aspects in us; they just take advantage of those aspects.

[wayfriend]

No, all of that is just a part of us, and it's always been there.

Fair point. I agree. But is it not wise to judge something by whether or not it brings out our worse inclinations, or our better selves?

[Fist and Faith]

That's also a fair point. And when it comes to alcohol or fast food, I'll just them negatively. But the internet has done some incredibly good things for us, as has already been pointed out. I'm not going to judge it harshly.

[Skyweir]

Mmm.. so do you think the instant form of communication has no bearing on bullying and aggressiveness we see in social media?

Thats its solely a reflection of our less disciplined, less civilised selves?

I agree with your point Fist ... its bang on right but I think there is a tendency to feel that we are immune from social mores and decorum when communicating from behind a computer screen or phone screen.

Kinda like the invisible man ... he was a stand up guy ... till he discovered an amazing anonymity in his invisibility. I think a similar brazenness can be experienced on the internet.

But youre right not all people will respond like the invisible man .. some of course wont. Which actually highlights your point that its us humans that are the problem. Which of course we absolutely are.

I may have just done a 180 on this lol

[wayfriend]

The problem with technological advances is that the benefits are rather immediate and contained, while the drawbacks tend to emerge only after time goes by, and are rather systemic.

[Cagliostro]

Yes!