Re: Theological discussion....

[Joseph Osako <scholr@xxxxxxxx>]

NOTE: The attributions were hand-patched, as Eudora does track the name of
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At 03:35 PM 4/5/99 -0700, Aaron Toney <joeboy@xxxxxxxx> wrote:
>Brenden Tuck <friar@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
>> Due to the increased stability of memory that a wearable system
>> bestows upon the wearer, the situation becomes possible for a
>> person's memories to exist after their death, and in a format
>> dissectable by other people.  Emails, important news articles,
>> papers, thoughts, etc. are all perserved even after death.
>> And unlike a desktop, due to the systems integral nature, most
>> of these things will be MUCH more personal in nature, much more
>> private.
>> Due to the increased stability of memory that a wearable system
>> bestows upon the wearer, the situation becomes possible for a
>> person's memories to exist after their death, and in a format
>> dissectable by other people.  Emails, important news articles,
>> papers, thoughts, etc. are all perserved even after death.
>> And unlike a desktop, due to the systems integral nature, most
>> of these things will be MUCH more personal in nature, much more
>> private.

<<clipped section restored for sake of XANADU list readers - further proof
of the need for transclusions>>>

>> My conversation partner vehemenantly expressed his wish that
>> the system would short itself out, or otherwise permanently
>> destroy those memories upon his death, so that no one could
>> "rob his grave."  Yet, I myself see this as a plausible, minor
>> form of immortality.
>
>Back in July of 1945 Bush coined the term "memex" in an article entitled
>As We May Think originally published in the The Atlantic Monthly. This was
>his name for "a future device for individual use, which is a sort of
>mechanized private file and library."  The way he described it people
>would pass on their store of memories to their children in a form of
>evolution of data from father to son. Very cool.

One of the people most influenced by Vannavar Bush's paper is Ted Nelson,
of Project Xanadu fame. He found that reading 'How we May Think' helped
crystallize his own ideas on organizing knowledge (or that is how I
understand it - Ted, any comments?), and he included the entire peice in
his own book, _Literary Machines_.

I have always felt that there this 'legacy' aspect was an important part of
Project Xanadu, although I had the sense that the goal was more to create a
'community memory' (to use Felsenstein and Milhon's term), or even a sort
of group intelligence (in the sense that the whole effect exceeds the sum
of the individual member's input). I like to compare it to the idea of the
Bene Gesserit 'heritage' from Dune: an unbroken line going back decades or
even centuries, creating the potential for work going on from generation to
generation, and perspectives that a single human lifetime is too short to
achieve. While there wouldn't be the continuation of conciousness itself
(unless Mark Miller is right and we'll upload our minds someday RSN) the
continuation of thought and perpose would be remarkable, especially as our
lives adapt to it.

Or perhaps the 'Ancient Ancestors' from Pohl's Heechee stories (stored
conciousnesses which the Heechee carried at all times that could be
consulted for advice) is closer to the mark. 

How does this relate to wearable computing? Well, as Brenden Tuck points
out, wearables are a good deal more personal; you tend to commit to disk a
lot of small things, notes and such. Three things occur to me about this.
First in a system like Xanadu, where all data recorded is absolutely
permanent (an important design goal, necessary for continuity even on a
desktop system), it would indeed be very intimate - but it would also be
overwhelming. Imagine if you had to pick through every laundry list and
post-it someone ever wrote, and you get the idea. The second is that it
would be much harder to choose the 'important' and permanent things out
from the trivial than with other computer systems; who's to say that the
Brilliant Idea didn't come out of one of those laundry lists? The record
left behind can clarify not only who you were and what you thought, it
could cast light on the very process of thought itself. 

Doubly so if processes like Mind Switch can be made to work effectively; if
its used enough that it becomes habitual, it may be that a user would have
to intentional *stop* recording their impressions with such a device. In
such a case, you'd quite literally be able to go through the user's
ungaurded moments, and ponder their literal states of mind over time. In
some ways its frightening, but it's also somewhat exciting. 

Lastly, on a personal note, I think that on the one hand, I would prefer to
leave my records for the future - I'm not one to worry overmuch about
privacy - but, on the other, I can't help but wonder if it isn't a little
arrogant of me to expect such a record to have a lasting value. Am *I*
worth all of this effort to preserve, just because I happened to be using a
wearable computer (assuming I ever get mine built)? If I am, then isn't
everyone else, too?

-- 
J Osako
Programmer Analyst, Operating Systems Designer, Notational Engineer
http://www.slip.net/~scholr/resume.html