A Tangled Web

摘要

The Internet certainly seemed a good idea at the time. What's wrong with linking top academics through their computers so they can share big thoughts? And in these democratic times, extending those messaging facilities to the hoi polloi so they can share their tedious little thoughts, too? Yet one thing has led to another, and another, and the Internet of 2016 is a vast and ever-vaster entity. We don't need to be techno-skeptics such as Andrew Keen and Sherry Turkle to wonder if one day we may question our wisdom. Because we didn't just sit back and watch the Internet infiltrate every aspect of our lives; we cheered it on like Blackhawks fans at the Stanley Cup Final. The highly mixed results of which lead grumpy academics to organize another seminar on Collingridge's famous dilemma (we can't accurately predict the impact of a new technology until it is fully developed, and by then it is too late to do anything about it); heady Silicon Valley optimists to conjure Ned Ludd and tell us to sit down and shut up while technology solves its own problems; and those who are thinking hardest about cybersecurity to pour another Scotch.