Downloaded Mavericks, Apple's latest operating system for MacBooks, last night. Took > 6 hours, but given there were well over 5 gigs and we're in the far north of India and running off one of the hospital's wifi hot spots, I'm impressed. Downloaded a whole bunch of apps taking another 4 or so gigs this morning. Last time I did something like this was in Dili, the capital of Timor Leste. I downloaded Al Gore's Climate Change slide show of nearly 400 megs and presented it the next day in a continuing education seminar for Leprosy Mission staff. Any break in the phone line internet connection or power supply during that time would have wrecked it, but everything worked beautifully! The other fun techo thing I did was 2 years ago, when I took my iPad and my mini data projector with LED display in my backpack and rode a motorbike up to the leprosy hospital I had worked in 30 years previously. They asked me to do devotions the next morning, so I produced a Keynote presentation on the iPad overnight. The question becomes, at what point does the medium overwhelm the message? Still, laptops and even data projectors are quite common here. That mini data projector has had a good workout at the local school this week. I've taken what we'd call scripture assemblies 3 mornings for years 8 & 9. Being greeted in the street by several teenagers today was a terrific reward!
Sunday 27 October 2013
Neophobia
"Novelty is deeply disturbing, especially when people have built their lives around the old way." Tom Wright, Luke for Everyone.
Is this the fundamental reason for the current bad behaviour in public life? The world is being drawn, willy nilly, into a new energy regime, and therefore a new way of living. The threat of Climate Change is forcing humanity to reconsider not simply how we live but who we are in relation to nature/creation, and the ones who have been advantaged most by the old regime are the ones who are fighting with whatever means they have at their disposal against the change to the new. Some of their means are deeply unethical. Lying, recasting history shamelessly to suit their own version of reality, besmirching the reputations of opponents and bringing them before the courts, and corrupting scientific method to cast doubt on scientific findings that they don't like are some of the tactics they use. But the change is inevitable. Resisting it will only make the process more painful. In one way or another we are already paying and will continue to lay a price on carbon.
Is this the fundamental reason for the current bad behaviour in public life? The world is being drawn, willy nilly, into a new energy regime, and therefore a new way of living. The threat of Climate Change is forcing humanity to reconsider not simply how we live but who we are in relation to nature/creation, and the ones who have been advantaged most by the old regime are the ones who are fighting with whatever means they have at their disposal against the change to the new. Some of their means are deeply unethical. Lying, recasting history shamelessly to suit their own version of reality, besmirching the reputations of opponents and bringing them before the courts, and corrupting scientific method to cast doubt on scientific findings that they don't like are some of the tactics they use. But the change is inevitable. Resisting it will only make the process more painful. In one way or another we are already paying and will continue to lay a price on carbon.
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