An apostate computer nerd
A computer is a time-saving machine. Such is the mantra of the times. But all around us in businesses and homes many hours are spent saving time in front of the screen - the alter ego of modern working life. There is a Hebrew word for this, “futz”.
By Susanne Nielsen, the danish daily Politiken
Futzing means working hard without accomplishing anything. We futz when we use months and weeks to learn new systems and products. It's futz when a doctor is no longer able to make appointments because the “computer is down.''
It's a futz when we use several minutes to get into a computer to look at our schedule or when we loose orientation surfing the Internet. It can also course futz when a power outage forces a business to go on hold. In a modern office, a piece of paper stuck in a printer can force many persons to sit for hours without working, writes Carsten Graff in his new book which is meant as an antidote to our semi-blind obsession with the machinery of the information society. The book's title is "Conversation with an Oak Tree".
It is an outrageously ironic essay on our fascination with complicated systems that can do much more than we have a need for. It exposes our uncritical hankering after TV telephones, computer games, e-mail, telephone muzak, ticket machines and mobile telephones. Not to speak of our obsession with surfing the Internet where most of the information, seen rightly is “wrong, unwieldy, irrelevant, unusable, boring, incomprehensible or obsolete.''
Graff got his inspiration for his book under an old tree in a cemetery in Copenhagen. The atmosphere in a cemetery is a contrast to the atmosphere in front of a computerscreen. In a cemetery myths and superstitions still live. There is no television, no computer networks, and no electric lights. The book is shaped as a dialogue between an old tree that represents wisdom and acumen in contrast to the technological society's glorification of knowledge and information.
“The information society is the creation of a dream of a perfect and straightforward world,” he says. “But the hunger for knowledge and control has no soul. It has taken possession of our imagination, our habits, and our lives.”
Carsten Graff is a repentant computer nerd. He never learned to read and write in school. He was a member of a rocker club, an unadapted tough with greased-down hair on the other side of the law. His teachers thought he would never amount to anything. Then he pulled himself together. He got a masters degree in business administration, in data processing and organization. He became a consultant at the Danish Technological Institute and traveled around the world installing new systems in businesses and teaching staffs to use them.
“More and more of my time was spent reassuring people,” he says. “Document control, e-mail systems, automated buying systems, remote control work, and multimedia instruction. Such things often make people afraid. I saw that this also had a negative influence on collaboration, as well as on the language, for the world of technology uses a terminology that is cumbersome, impersonal, and alien. In the end I began to view myself as a kind of therapist.”
When Graff got his first computer in the midst 80’s he too succumbed to its power to fascinate. At home, he retreated behind a locked door with his computer. He developed computer programs, played adventure games, and almost forgot to eat. All his money was used for buying new technology.
He lived in a state of intoxication and was obsessed with the desire to become one with his computer. His vocabulary multiplied and made him insufferable company for others. "I probably had what they today call a cyber-psychosis. It ended with a computer divorce. Naturally my wife couldn't stand it. She became a computer widow."
Years later a good friend of his died of AIDS and Carsten Graff plunged into a depression. This was the start of a journey of discovery that got him to see the world in a quite different perspective. He asked himself what joy he actually had from all of those relatively banal computer programs on which he used up all his time.
A few years ago the government published a report describing information technology as an unequivocal good. “The first-string teams of the future will consist of people who understand how to use computers. The others will be the losers,” the report concluded. Carsten Graff was shocked and threw himself into the debate wholeheartedly.
"I was called a Luddite and for a time I was the victim of violent attacks in the media. I soiled my own nest as they say and was given the same treatment as doctors who criticize doctors. Evidently there is always a fuss when one criticizes his own profession,'' he says.
When on the national TV-program “The Profile” he ironized on the many side effects of the information society - on the school system, on journalism, on literature, on legislation, and also on relations between the sexes - shockwaves were felt throughout the entire world of technology in his country. But at the same time he became one of the Denmark's most popular lecturers.
He called the schools' demand for more and more computers a call for an “electronic comforter.'' Later he criticized kindergartens that put small children in front of the screen in an effort to create future kids.
"I have met many educationists who have become computer processing consultants. Computers often destroy their perspective, which should be on the pupils. Machines are not bad things. But they tempt one to believe that one can legitimately show an interest in a machine instead of for a pupil. That is much easier. This applies to many contexts. Technology can be used as a shield for doing something that is otherwise irritating or annoying. Many teachers are totally taken in by technology. The same is true for psychologists, librarians, journalists, office workers, and so forth. They can't do anything without that screen. The screen has become a place where people seek comfort and relief. I can't send the screen back from whence it came. It is here to stay. But I can point out that it perhaps cuts us off from some important things that can't be concretized in words, numbers, and formulas. One might call this wisdom, in contrast to knowledge, which is something totally impersonal."
"Wisdom is everything that can't be chopped up and controlled. The computer is a temptation. It allows us to believe that we need the absolutely latest. It is part of human nature to constantly feel that one lacks something without knowing fully what it is. It is indefinable itch. The computer offers control. It is exciting per se to control a machine - even more exciting than being able to do something with it. Science often is about being able to control a few abstract systems. And hence one is perhaps relatively indifferent over what these systems can do. We can send space ships to the moon, but we can't bring water to a desert. That for me is an illustration that research is often driven by prestige and fascination instead of love of one's fellow men.”
Carsten Graff does not like the social debate, which in his eyes too often ends in abstractions. Therefore he has packed his television in a box in the attic. He doesn't read newspapers, and keeps a zealous eye on attempts to throw advertising through his mail slot.
"My family is afraid that I am becoming more and more stupid. OK, I don't know the lotto numbers. On the other hand, I have gained time and peace to reflect on intimate things. My writing is changing. Today I’m writing less about technology and more about the close relationships among people. In the information society, we can withdraw from almost all situations. But one can't run away in a couple relationship. Then there is no hiding behind the screen or escaping behind titles and theories. I believe that the rational way of thinking is the swaddling clothes of the information society. And this way of thinking - that one should save money and time - is gaining ground everywhere. “The new technology will increase productivity,'' so they say. But the fact is we know perfectly well that that is often not so. Once I was hired as a consultant by a major Danish company. “We would like to give our employees better access to the Internet,'' I was told. “But we don't dare - if we do, the business would close in three months.”
The manager knew that all his employees would spend to much time surfing the Net. I have had contact with firms who thought they could use the Internet to procure scientific information. A few calculations were made and it was found that 80 per cent of the time on the Net was used surfing pornographic pages. Maybe the world would look different if we would let the woman handle computers. A man becomes mad with delight when he discovers that a computer can show videos in a word-processing system. A woman asks: “What can it be used for?''. You could say that I have a female approach to the technology debate. Responsibility is being shifted increasingly to technology, which is acquiring almost the same role as legislation. Laws are passed when people cannot find their own ethic. For me the varsity team is those people who can resist the temptation to shift responsibility to machines, legislation, or rules.
The computer is advanced, and therefore we call it serious. It is a machine that makes it acceptable for grownups to play. We are fascinated because: “Isn't it incredible that such things are possible!'', “Think, here I am sitting in Denmark and I have contact through the Internet with somebody in Australia!'' But what comes out of that contact is often lost somewhere in the fog. That's too bad. The quantity of information is growing and it's getting too much for us. It costs almost nothing to store information technologically. When we used paper we were often allot better at keeping things in order. Now - storing information electronically - we can't decide what to throw away. So we discover that progress and complication are close relatives. So we discover that having a piece of paper in one's pocket is still better than having a diskette in one's pocket. As long as we don’t look facts in the face the paperless society will never be a reality. The global village is linked together electronically. Carsten Graff calls the mobile telephone an illustration of our anxiety of being alone.
“We do not feel right if we do not have the whole population of the entire world in our pocket. We shudder at the thought that people can't get hold of us. So we take our mobile telephone with us when we take a walk on the beach. We are afraid of missing something. But the person who takes a walk along the beach and hopes that his telephone will ring is precisely the one who is missing something. What he is missing is what his walk was about. Many have a mobile telephone stuck to their ear throughout most of their waking hours. One day it will perhaps be possible to install a mobile telephone in one's ear surgically. That is not a totally crazy idea. We have for a long time already been able to install artificial parts in the human body. It will be tempting to have a mobile telephone in one's ear so that anyone can call you any time. But it will probably also be irritating. Think at the piles of messages that will be dumped upon you at any time at all. Think of all the ads you will receive ... Not a nice thought is it?"
"Of course this is only an experiment in thought. But it has to do with our capacity to set limits and shield us against technology's power of fascination. Do we want electronic telepathy? Do we want to be able to reach one another solely through the power of thought? I think we will have to go the whole way before we discover the power information technology can have over our souls and our lives,” says Carsten Graff.
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