Pervasive Technology Overload

Here is a timely article that ran on 200 NBC TV news affiliates on the growing phenomena of something we all face, technology overload.

The news story is accompanied by a short video: once you're on the NBC site, click on the little red camera to the right of the screen.

No Limits to our Social Pace

A paper titled "No Apparent Limits: Addressing Common Arguments Against Continuous Computational Acceleration states, "The closer we look, the more we discover the astonishing, surprising, and (for some at least) alarming irrelevancy of all currently proposed limits to
the ongoing acceleration of local computation....Ours is the generation that will no longer be able to ignore the phenomenon of continuing technological acceleration."

"We, and more particularly, our technological creations, are on a wild ride to an interesting destination-the technological singularity-a local rate of computational change so fast and powerful that it must have a profound and as-yet-unclarified universal effect."

"As a side effect of this hypergrowth, biological human beings will not be able to meaningfully understand the computer-driven world of the near future unless they are able to make some kind of transition to 'transhumanity,' an environment with greater-than-human computational capacity, and a new, as yet undetermined human-machine symbiosis. How this transition will and should occur, and how it is presently occurring, is a subject of spirited and insightful debate."

The upshot for each of us? Don't expect the pace of society to slow down in your lifetime, and employing Breathing Space techniques is more important than ever.

Draining Your Brain

David Brook, writing in the New York Times, offers a brilliant article called "The Outsourced Brain," wherein he describes how today's technology is aiding some people in abdicating from everyday decisions, and worse, even from basic thinking.

"The gurus seek bliss amidst mountaintop solitude and serenity in the meditative trance," he writes, "but I, grasshopper, have achieved the oneness with the universe that is known as pure externalization.

"I have melded my mind with the heavens, communed with the universal consciousness, and experienced the inner calm that externalization brings, and it all started because I bought a car with a G.P.S."

"Like many men, I quickly established a romantic attachment to my G.P.S. I found comfort in her tranquil and slightly Anglophilic voice. I felt warm and safe following her thin blue line. More than once I experienced her mercy, for each of my transgressions would be greeted by nothing worse than a gentle, Make a U-turn if possible.”

"After a few weeks, it occurred to me that I could no longer get anywhere without her. Any trip slightly out of the ordinary had me typing the address into her system and then blissfully following her satellite-fed commands. I found that I was quickly shedding all vestiges of geographic knowledge."

Underfunding Healthy Foods

In a Baltimore Sun feature by Scott Kahan it appears that "A long-running contradiction in U.S. farm policy is fattening the waistlines of Americans and the profits of agribusiness at the same time. For the 30 years that the U.S. Department of Agriculture has been issuing dietary guidelines, there has been a stark inconsistency between the federal government's advice and its food funding."

"True, the USDA has been doing more, over time, to promote health through dietary guidelines, food pyramids and other nutrition programs. And yet more than $20 billion yearly -- more than one-fifth its budget -- is sunk into a farm bill that supports many of the foods its recommendations warn against. At the same time, the department virtually ignores incentives to produce, promote and consume some of the healthiest foods: fruits and vegetables."

"This contradiction may play a role in today's obesity epidemic and is in part driven by a counterintuitive farm policy, highlighted by the farm bill, which is up for renewal this year in Congress. This legislation began during the Depression to protect farmers against environmental disasters and plummeting crop prices but has evolved into a massive program of handouts, largely benefiting agribusinesses. Worse, it promotes vast overproduction of crops that are the building blocks of calorie-dense, nutrient-poor, processed junk foods. It has become a 'food bill.'"

Jeff's take: overweight and obesity are the antithesis of Breathing Space. Learn to shop for yourself and eat what is healthy, or endure the consequences.

No Smoking: Real Breathing Space

USA TODAY reporter Wend Koch writes that "Lawmakers in two California cities are casting votes this month on unprecedented legislation that would widen a growing voluntary movement by landlords and resident associations to ban smoking inside apartments and condos."

"Tens of thousands of apartments and condos have gone smoke-free in the past five years, management companies and health activists say."

Percentage of the U.S. adult population who smoke based on data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention :
• 1965: 42.4%
• 1970: 37.4%
• 1974: 37.1%
• 1980: 33.2%
• 1985: 30.1%
• 1990: 25.5%
• 1995: 24.7%
• 2001: 22.8%
• 2004: 20.9%

Now Sit up Straight!

Trainer Luke Richesson quoted in Mens Health magazine says: "Your body adapts to the posture you most often assume. If you sit at a desk all day with your shoulders slumped and your neck protruding forward, then you'll inevitably have a posture that looks more like Neanderthal man than Superman. Want to be the best you can be...? Think about posture every waking minute.

Your mother was right, don't slouch.

Wanted: Fewer People in the U.K.

"Overpopulation is the main cause of environmental degradation," says Madeleine Bunting, writing in the London Guardian. Common sense tells us that, "if the planet's resources are being grossly depleted, there are just too many of us about." Yet none of the main environmental lobbying groups will mention that obvious fact "because of the unpleasant associations it brings
with it."

If we admitted that there were too many of us on this "crowded island" of Great Britain, we'd have to either limit immigration, which would seem racist, or limit family size, which would seem authoritarian. So the Green lobby tries to insist that if we all just recycle more and drive less, we can live together in ever-greater numbers. If only that were true. At the current rate of increase, by 2074 Britain will be the most densely populated country in the world after Bangladesh.

"How many more people can you squeeze into cities that already seem to be choking under the weight of their population density-the buses and trains packed, the streets clogged, and the parks on a Sunday afternoon teeming with people?" The challenge of the next few decades will be to have that debate "while steering well clear of racism."

Jeff's take: such a shame that honest debate about over-population and its enormous negative effects is stifled by the PC police.

Confronting the Noise

The city of Mount Dora, Florida, "may put a leash on frequent dog-barking," according to a feature written by Brad Buck of the Daily Commercial. "Under a proposed change in Mount Dora's noise ordinance, dogs won't be able to just keep barking and barking, creating a disturbance in a neighborhood."

"Mount Dora already prohibits dogs from barking for five minutes at a time. But under the revised ordinance, even if dogs bark for less than five minutes, their owners can be cited by the city if the dog barks for three periods in 24 hours. Such barking is considered a noise disturbance."

"If passed, residents can add barking dogs to noisy radios, TVs, musical instruments, loudspeakers, tape players, record players, power equipment and similar devices. Loudspeakers, public address systems or similar devices can be used at activities authorized by the city including parades and art festivals.

"Currently, the ordinance says dogs can bark for at most five minutes at a time or intermittently for at least 30 minutes. City staff starting changing the noise law after resident Monique Richardson told the council in August she was concerned about a new renter in her neighborhood that has a dog or dogs that bark at all hours."

My view: seems a bit draconian but what else can you do in a nation with well over 70,000, 000 dogs distributed among 110,000,000 households?

Wasting the Most Precious Gift

Laura Cohen, a Wall Street Journal reader, in a letter to the editor writes, "How pitiful that people choose to spend the precious gift of time on virtual-reality games (Ref: "Is This Man Cheating on His Wife?" WSJ, Weekend Journal). I was troubled by this story all weekend. There are so many genuine needs of the community for people with so much spare time. Imagine what benefits could come from taking all that energy and using it to improve the world instead of indulging in behavior that is destructive to the family."

It would be hard to find a statement with which I agree more than Laura's.

I Can't Get no Satisfaction?

Chris Michaud writing in the New York Post says "A surprising 94 percent of Americans say they are satisfied with their lives -- although far fewer in New York and other Eastern states think they're better off than they were five years ago, according to a new survey."

"The Harris Poll of more than 1,000 people reported the overall 'satisfaction' level, defined as people who said they were either very or somewhat satisfied with their lot, was up 4 percentage points, from 90 percent two years ago. But only 42 percent of people in the Eastern U.S. said things had improved since 2002. By contrast, 60 percent of Southerners and 62 percent of Westerners said their lives had improved."

Hmmmm, so ignore the New York Times and the other eastern media elite, and you have a better chance of grasping current reality

Stand for Health

A recent feature in Men's Health caught my eye, as I have been using a stand-up desk for the last 18 months:

Stand In The Place Where You Work: "Quit sitting down on the job. Australian scientists found that workers who log more than 6 hours of chair time a day are up to 68 percent more likely to be overweight than those who sit less. One solution: Ask HR for a stand-up desk. You burn one more calorie each minute when standing than when sitting. (Do the math.) Request denied? Create your own stand-up workstation: Place your monitor on a box, with the top of the screen at arm's length and at eye level, and elevate your keyboard so your elbows are bent 90 degrees. A bonus: Your posture will improve from standing instead of slumping."

TV Isolates Us from Each Other

Robert Putnam, Ph.D. Harvard professor of public policy and author of "Bowling Alone," says, "For most of the 20th century, Americans were becoming more connected with family and friends, and there was more giving of blood and money, and all of those trend lines turn sharply in the middle '60s and have gone in the other direction ever since,"

Quoted in the Washington Post, he says, "Americans go on 60 percent fewer picnics today and families eat dinner together 40 percent less often compared with 1965, he said. They are less likely to meet at clubs or go bowling in groups. Putnam has estimated that every 10-minute increase in commutes makes it 10 percent less likely that people will establish and maintain close social ties."

"Television is a big part of the problem, he contends. Whereas 5 percent of U.S. households in 1950 owned television sets, 95 percent did a decade later."

Social Isolation Growing in U.S.

"The number of people who say they have no one to confide in has risen." Washington Post staff journalist Shankar Vedantam recently wrote that "Americans are far more socially isolated today than they were two decades ago, and a sharply growing number of people say they have no one in whom they can confide, according to a comprehensive new evaluation of the decline of social ties in the United States."

"A quarter of Americans say they have no one with whom they can discuss personal troubles, more than double the number who were similarly isolated in 1985. Overall, the number of people Americans have in their closest circle of confidants has dropped from around three to about two."

"The comprehensive new study paints a sobering picture of an increasingly fragmented America, where intimate social ties -- once seen as an integral part of daily life and associated with a host of psychological and civic benefits -- are shrinking or nonexistent. In bad times, far more people appear to suffer alone."

Having Breathing Space is wonderful, but history has shown that social isolation is seldom beneficial

Obesity Can Spread!

According to a recent New York Times article, "Obesity can spread from person to person, much like a virus, researchers are reporting today. When one person gains weight, close friends tend to gain weight, too."

Hmmm, does that mean staying thin requires only befriending thin people?

Ways to Hide Your Valuables

From Bottom Line/Personal, January 15, 2007

Kevin Coffey with Corporate Travel Safety says “Most burglars like to get in and out of homes quickly. They will focus on closets and drawers and under mattresses. Their favorite targets include cash, jewelry, checkbooks, credit cards, handguns, cameras and laptop computers.

The safest place to keep valuables is in a safe-deposit box or a safe built into the wall or the floor of your home. If you decide to use another location, let a trusted relative know about your hiding spot or put a note in your safe-deposit box describing the location. Otherwise, your valuables could be lost if you pass away or forget where they’re hidden.”

DO-IT-YOURSELF “SAFES”

These hiding spots will take a bit more time and effort to construct. They might be worth the trouble if you have basic carpentry skills and you keep a significant amount of valuables in your home. Some are best for small items, such as jewelry. Others can hide larger items, such as a laptop computer.

Posts of a poster bed. The tops of the bedposts usually unscrew. Take the tops off, drill down into the wood posts to create hiding spaces for valuables (be careful not to drill into the grooves where the top screws in).

Fake pipe, vent or electrical outlet. Add an unnecessary pipe or duct among the real pipes and ducts in your attic, basement, laundry room or kitchen, and store valuables inside. This pipe or duct should look as if it is part of the home’s plumbing or heating, ventilation and air-conditioning (HVAC) system.

Or use a phony electrical outlet or vent to provide access to valuables hidden in the wall. The fake outlet or vent should match the color and style of the real outlets or vents in your home.

Below a bookcase. The lowest shelf of a wooden bookcase often is a few inches above the floor. Turn the space below into a hiding area large enough for even a laptop computer by cutting a secret door into the wood facing.

Junk Mail Beyond the Pale

This story in Newsweek, “Dear Junk Mailers: Leave My Son Alone,” speaks volumes about the junk mail industry in our society. Thirteen years after the death of a seven year old boy, advertisers still target him with offers of tuxedos and snack cakes. Repulsive and sad.

Parent Gary Wiener, writing in Newsweek: “When his 18th birthday arrived, my son, Jacob, became awfully popular. The U.S. Navy wanted him. "Before you find your place in the world, maybe you should see it first," it urged. A local menswear shop offered him 50 percent off a tuxedo package for high-school graduation. And a razor company sent him a free razor, hoping, I suppose, to make a lifelong customer out of him. Their only miscalculation was that Jacob didn't shave. Nor was it likely that any of the armed forces would gain Jacob's services. And he certainly wouldn't graduate from high school. Jacob, you see, died in 1993. He was only 7 years old when a cancerous brain tumor stole him from us.”

“As much as we loved Jacob, that period of our lives is still incredibly painful to remember. Yet, years after his death, letters addressed to Jacob find their way into our mailbox. Early on, I was driven almost to tears by these inducements for our son to attend a ritzy local private school or to sample a particular snack cake. I knew my wife would be devastated by such mail, and I tried to get to the mailbox first so that she would never be affronted by envelopes addressed to her dead first child. Much later, I realized she had been doing the same thing, hastily throwing out mail addressed to Jake so I wouldn't have to endure the epistolary abuse.”