In 1840 the top speed of a train was 50 mph. By the end of the 1890s it had reached around 85 mph. Fifty years of the glorious industrial revolution managed to increase the top speed of its precious, iconic steam train by two thirds.
The symbol of the current era's achievement and advancement must surely be the microprocessor. And what's happened here? As is nicely reported in The Telegraph, the IBM PC of 1981 has a processor speed, oh, 250 times less than a 2011 pocket mobile phone. Let's not dwell on the cost too much ($1600 vs 'free' on contract) or the size. I reckon this era has the edge in terms of speed of development and innovation. What say you?
I agree that the world of IT provides the greatest challenge to the 'No Future' thesis, not just because the speed and extent of technological change has been so great, but also because it has generated substantial social change, for example, substantially reducing the size of the typing pool and the ranks of clerks doing routine calculations. I'm not being flippant here, freeing up the labour power of routine workers in this way is a genuine advance in our productive capacity. However, although these changes are great, I would argue that they only represent a fraction of what the technology could achieve. The reduction in secretarial/clerk labour has not noticeably freed people to engage in more creative/productive activity or noticeably contributed to the leisure society in which we all work three days per week. Similarly, the availability of phenomenal processing power on virtually everyone's desk does not appear to have sparked a renaissance of scientific discovery, but is largely used for the banalities of Facebook and surfing for internet porn.
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ReplyDeleteTwo points to make about what you have said. First, I think you underestimate the impact that microprocessors have had on our lives. They can be found everywhere. I read recently, for example, that one washing machine has 13 separate microprocessors in it. It plays a role in virtually every area of our life and has had a corresponding impact on the way we behave – from the production of CNC controlled ball-bearings to finding our way along the road network.
ReplyDeleteRelated to this is my second point, that your idea of achievement seems to involve grand statements and guestures. Just as at the centre of all Russian cities you will find some large, but utterly useless monument, you want ‘big’ statements regardless of whether people want it or value it.
You view of ‘achievement’ is hopelessly caught up with Marx’s concept of species being where our ability to realise our potential as humans is measured as the gap between what we could be (our species being) and what we are under capitalist society. The only problem with this is who is to say what our potential is?
Your belief about what we could achieve with microprocessors probably involves large, risky projects. But reaching the potential of what this technology could bring need not be this at all.
For most of human history the fight has been for comfort, security and food. Only in the latter part of 20th century did a few countries achieve this. Following this enormous achievement, our desires turned to those luxuries in life: making things work reliably, more efficiently and doing so for less money. It is a sign of what we have achieved in the past that these are what we now turn our attentions to. But these desires must not be belittled as banal, petty or facile. The fact that microprocessors mean that I can now get in my car and know it will start unlike a car of the 1970s, that the computer controlled climate control will ensure that no bead of sweat will be felt rolling down my back and when a selfish person pulls out in front of me, my car will brake safely and even swerve for me to avoid an accident – this is an amazing achievement in such a short space of time.
This story of the impact of microprocessors on the everyday pains of life is everywhere around us and, as is the natural human condition, when the pains are removed we quickly forget they ever existed (just as I rarely think of how much trouble short-sightedness caused me before I had laser eye treatment).
In life it’s the minor irritations that dominate our day to day living – from stubbing a toe on a door jamb to getting a headache after a heavy drinking session – and it’s the continued eradiation of these miseries that is the incredible ongoing achievement of industrial capitalism, not rockets going to Mars.