Cal Thomas recently called attention to the obvious legislative problem in the United States, indicating that the source of present ills lies more in the people than in their political representatives in Congress. Though blame certainly can be placed in both camps and we are pressed on all sides by unresolved issues, there is another huge factor that few dare to call out, even if they are aware of its reach: computers.
Why are issues unresolved? There are conceivably many political, economic, and social reasons, but a very big "elephant" is standing in the way, seldom called to account but constantly nourished. The identity of the culprit? Technology, or, more to the point, technologists. It is not really them, it is their attitudes. I will bring it up later; it is a paradigm thing. As in most issues of this kind, most computer and networking people cannot be called to account, as they are simply "doing their jobs". On the whole, however the technological beast exists for the purpose of extracting maintaining a strong hegemony (unbridled control) over computer functionality. Among other things, this allows them to extract outsized amounts of money from the rest of us.
In other cases, it allows certain of them to "play Kissinger" and find other ways to wield unearned power, as the young Mr. Snowden has recently done. An individual with no political credentials other than that he inexplicably had access to many sensitive documents and had no scruples in stealing them, he created a stir, citing a high-profile problem with no light to shed on the issue other than to personify it. I know, I know, privacy concerns were at stake, which is in large part the problem I referenced earlier. You probably know the story: They hadn't even "vetted" him properly, interviewing only his mother and girlfriend before offering him access to the biggest, most sensitive trove of sensitive information in the world. Obviously, the people responsible to do the task had the option of not doing so. Does that make sense to anyone?
Systems are both ineffectual and sloppy. Take the problems with the PPACA/Obamacare's now-famous website. Despite a reported budget of $400 million, by many accounts, the site "does not work". There are those that say that at times one cannot even log into the system.
Why is there any kind of problem with the Obamacare health exchange web site in the first place? There is no new technology to be deployed, no need to test any machine or operating system or database or web tools. This is all "off-the-rack" stuff. All that is being presented is a new application of an old idea and not really the most complicated one at that. There is no real attempt to "fix" the healthcare system", just to change who pays for it. There are systems aplenty that have been carrying out that task for decades. Why should there be even a shadow of a fault?
One effect of such failures is that interest in filling in the gaps by knowledgeable people diminishes with time. People with something to offer in terms of needed functionality will, with each abortive stage in the process, think twice about helping. Eventually they will walk away if they were even asked to help in the first place.
Think of how the politicians must feel, particularly the ones that want the health payment reform plan to succeed. They would have to be more than a little despondent with the news of the system's shortfalls, feeling powerless. Of course, their political rivals on this point would be feeling more than a little happy about the very public struggle to "make the site work". Amid the chaos, some forms of sabotage cannot be ruled out. If the opposing parties are involved in such a plan, they must also worry about their own programs being similarly blocked, technically-speaking. Such a condition speaks to concerns about the "bums" Mr. Thomas makes reference to, the current legislators. Upstanding, competent professionals would be little interested in such political "kabuki dances" even if sabotage were not a part of the equation. The "big elephant" and the inability to effectively deploy coherent plans would be discouraging to such "non-bum-like" potential representatives, but help to lure individuals with fewer scruples to the Congressional arena.
Another take-home message from the lumbering pachyderm in the room is this: If even such a simple task cannot be implemented, how could meaningful reforms be carried out with necessary relevance and nuance? The "government is inexorably doomed to be pathetic" message may play out politically back at home, but our needs lie far beyond the concept of distant, ineffectual government. The problem of government legitimacy must be resolved. In spite of Mr. Thomas' statements to the contrary, a frequent political refrain from some, the people certainly do need government. We all depend on good government.
Mr. Thomas says that people need to essentially forget government as the source of help and assistance and depend on themselves. This is true, to a point; We do need to contribute, to lend our native abilities and energies toward the general good, if not just for our own benefit. Family support is of critical importance in this process, but such is not available to everyone. We need better ways of learning just what our native abilities are, something that should be happening in the educational system, widely regarded as a government function. Unless a person is blessed with certain kinds of analytical and cognitive abilities, the educational system is likely to inform them mostly about what they are not very good at.
The greatest waste we face on that front is that we do not collectively benefit from the native abilities of every single person, not just people with natural abilities in mathematical and analytical areas. The self-made model holds that it would be better to have a person make french fries and be miserable when he or she could be a great artist or craftsman with appropriate identification, guidance, and assistance. Many of the "self-made" advocates benefit from family and socioeconomic benefits that they do not recognize or refuse to acknowledge.
One problem is that we discourage better ways of "making french fries" and the rest in order to "employ" a person. If we more rigorously pursued competitiveness and efficiency there would be more available resources to promote beneficial pursuits. The fact is, inefficiency is a kind of "Chinese handcuff" with regard to the general good. It does not provide value, particularly when it forces people to live in a "Joe vs the Volcano" lifestyle. Boring. Not fulfilling. Not productive.
The traditional self-made-man doctrine was never really true. Without the perquisites of government and the protection and guidance governments can provide, commerce would be virtually impossible. Who would regulate disputes? Who would protect intellectual property? Who would organize and provide for public goods? Who would educate the people? Who would provide for and maintain infrastructure? Who would fund and guide research for the general good? Who would keep the peace? Finally, who would protect the realm in times of crisis?
There are those that might say that such things ought to be turned over to Amazon and its kind, efficient organizations. Functions of the executive branch arguably already are being supported by such enterprises, the UPS's and FedEx's of this world and others. The question is, how can such kinds of services be carried out when the problem involves more than selling a discrete product and delivering packages? History has taught ugly lessons about governments that "make the trains run on time" but do not consider the broader needs of society and its many cultural requirements.
Many factors mitigate against success where critical technologies are not brought under tow, responding to the minute, specific needs of people and institutions, government agencies included. As to legislators, the experienced ones have faced political victory after victory that have turned into mush before the ink dried because of this problem. Government's inability to govern as a result has reached legendary proportions, and not in a good way. Part of what is called the conservative view is the presumption that we can all ignore an ineffectual national government, go home, and prosper locally. Since government is ineffective and ineffectual, they say we should punish it by shrinking its size.
This is a troublesome condition. Encouraged by the inability to get the machines to do what we want them to do, efforts to govern, collaborate, and optimizing activities are largely doomed. Who would compose a song that could never be sung, write book that could never be read, or cobble a shoe that could never be worn? Well, maybe one of these might be carried out for the sake of artistry, but not day-to-day, following the daily grind. So legislators are left to shadow box inside the constraints that the technologists allow. There probably would be less to argue about if plans could actually be carried out and government brought to high levels of functionality once fine-tuned plans were negotiated and clarified.
Are they really the bad guys, the technologists, or are they simply benefiting from the inevitable. Although magnificent instruments for computation and communications, are computers by their nature incapable of helping with the larger questions of complexity and scale that vex us? Must we forever doomed to "get our hopes up", only to have such hopes dashed by hemorrhaging flows of money, by unexplained lack of functionality, and by the machinations of smug technologists who have the audacity to smile about it all with little accountability?
If this is true, perhaps there are few policy options other than to muddle along, continuing to invest in forests of Post-it[tm] notes to fill in the gaps where we know what needs to be done but can't get the computers to do it.
Its not true.
The notion that it is IS the "ghost in the machine". How do I know? I've lived for the last twenty years knowing the answer. For awhile, I would knock on the doors of erstwhile technologists and technology companies with the message. Each time, I found myself figuratively "out in the parking lot picking gravel out of my teeth". This is to say that in no case did they want to hear what I had to say. One outgrowth of this is that they have no idea what the details of my message are, only rejecting out of hand the implications of my notion.
I even hired a New York boutique investment bank to represent me in presenting the message to the top thirty or so companies in the information technology business. We sent demonstration disks and all kinds of support materials to them. They didn't even want to meet. I did fly across the country for one meeting, but it turns out they were doing it as a favor to my banker.
My message was simple: People could make better systems if they could define them in their own way using simple tools. The tools in question needed to be valid, what you would call logically complete, not adding anything that was unnecessary. Such an environment should be whole and permanent, not being subject to system upgrades and new implementations.
This is pretty scary stuff, to be sure. I have learned over the years that making this case is a really good way to quiet down a crowd of computer people. In my case, I never have gotten further with these people. I have often wished that they would dare me to prove myself right or challenged me by proving me wrong. I did receive one question from a presentation that I made about ten years ago in a DARPA-sponsored conference (DARPA being the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency of the U.S. Government) on making systems more relevant. I felt like kissing the guy. Just the one question, though, and it was on a secondary point.
As you can see, even they do not want to talk about the elephant. It is largely assumed, having been present in the computing world at least from the 1960s, when people started thinking about how to make computers more responsive. I have documented some cases when people have bumped into the issue.
We should do something about the apparent ghost in the machine. Victory on that score would prepare us and give us the confidence to clear up many other misunderstandings, as well.
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