pseudoblog

well, well, well...

I realized the other day that I've been out of school for 15 years. Things have changed since 1990...a lot.

Computers to name one. When I was in High School I believe I was using an Apple II. In collage I upgraded to an Apple Macintosh that was more reminiscent of R2D2 than anything else. Now, having made the switch to PC, back to Mac and again back to PC, I'm using an HP Laptop with an AMD 64 processor. I'm pretty sure that NASA didn't have that much computing power when they launched their first rocket and yet I can carry it around in a bag. Progress? .

I'm listening to this book called IBM & the Holocaust. It's about IBM's behind the scenes involvement in the NAZI Reich and how they and their technology made it possible for the Holocaust to occur on the massive scale that it did. The premise is that technology made it possible. IBM had the technology and without hesitation made it available to Germany and in turn, made huge profits from the atrocities it's technology made possible. IBM made the processing of information possible on such a massive scale never before known and that, in turn, allowed millions upon millions of people to be counted, sorted and eventually, exterminated. Progress...but at what cost?

It does appear that throughout human history, what little of it there is, technology has outpaced common sense...and compassion for that matter. I'm just thinking out loud, but I wonder if we were to trace the origins of my nifty little laptop back to it's origins, all the back, I wonder how much evil it has reaped on the world as we know it?

posted by Joe Mieczkowski @ 9:46 AM