Femtobeam’s Weblog

by

Robin L. Ore

In the Washington Post today, an article about the Virtual Revolution in College education appeared. The link is here.

 femtobeam wrote:

Two way interactive networks can be just as effective as face to face communications and there is no reason why the Universities will remain in control of the economics of degrees. The better professors can be paid for their audiences in large numbers much like a movie star is today bypassing the University systems altogether.

This can only happen with a secure communications system and definitive identifiers as well as an evaluation system for accreditation. Learning is learning, regardless of how the information is acquired. With a Personal Identifying Information (PII) component, it is also possible to know the originator of ideas which have profit value, making theft by any means identifiable to law enforcement.

The networks are already moving into the mind. Embedded devices that connect brains to one another are already in place and expanding very rapidly. This will become either mind control, which means a person has no choices or individuality, or it will become elective communications abilities far beyond face to face communications or any audio visual experience.

We are at a crossroads between economics, sociology, and technology. As automated systems of all kinds by necessity prevent subjective mind controllers like Rev. Moon from forcing their “ways” upon us, individual human rights are at the core of the decision making about how these systems are evolving. Robotics is eliminating menial labor and even electronics and software will disappear. Education is too expensive, and therefore for the few, because of the cost of housing and feeding students, not their professors. Laboratory equipment and buildings are what money pays for mostly. Most Universities look the other way in the academic achievements of a star football player due to his value added to University revenue, unrelated in every way to “book learning”.

The question remains, what are the markets of the future? We have lost our manufacturing base to Asia and jobs are not being created here for the fortunate few who do attend Universities, let alone those who do not. We need to transition to a new economic model that rewards learning financially, if money economies are to survive. Private/Public partnerships that share tax revenues of goods purchased in a location with individuals based on a points system might be one model to explore. This would put societies back on a basis of supporting education, writing, philosophy, art, music, science and yes… documentaries and entertainment too. Fines on poisoning, polluting, and drug industries to pay for these infrastructures would be another.

All of it is predicated on an ability to prevent a mind control takeover of our networks and a healthy society, so we can make these choices to reward the right endeavors for ourselves rather than becoming a nation of shared thoughts for the consumption of “those in need of our knowledge for economic gain”. Social engineering is going to lead us all like zombies off of a cliff.

9/13/2009 3:12:11 PM

Washington Post