Orson Scott Card in the Wall Street Journal

One of the reasons I chose to blog under the pseudonym, Ender, is how appropriately the analogy of Ender's Game was  for the situation at hand. Recently, the sci-fi author of Ender's Game, Orson Scott Card, wrote a piece for the Wall Street Journal explaining how the Internet is changing our lives. Fittingly, his tag line reads,


In my 1985 sci-fi novel 'Ender's Game,' a couple kids used something like the Internet to pass for experts and influence public opinion.  It didn't take long for reality to catch up.


http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748703727804576017891806186856.html?mod=googlenews_wsj

His opinion is embedded in this somewhat generically written overview, leaving much for the reader to decide. More interesting than the article itself, then, was the discussion generated by the readers. Many of their comments are exactly the points "Valentine" and "Ender" were trying to make on my blog this fall.

This comment to Card's article generated much discussion.  His words, I hope, resonate through my blog:

"The scary turn of events I see coming is that so few people in the US have the ability to sustain cogent discourse that ridiculous and wild statements are taken as foundational truths. Everyone is entitled to their opinion, but when we can no longer distinguish fact from farce we are truly lost. At that point the loudest voice will win and might will never make right. That being said Might has and will continue to make policy for all time and an educated populace is the only defense."

A different author concluded with...

"Without the conviction that there exists an "objective good" (moral absolutes), public debate disintegrates into a cacophony of warring voices." 

Absolutely one of the finer points I never quite succinctly made.  Does the GLS blog site have the intention of an "objective good" based on moral absolutes?  Or does the debate often disintegrate (even before it starts)?

Another commenter brought up this fine point:

The internet has become an n-dimension space whose coordinates are measured in a blend of fact, fantasy, opinion, hypothesis and propaganda. From one post to the next you may find yourself transported from fact-Hypothesis into a propaganda-fantasy with nary a bump....  Knowledge is power. But Information isn't necessarily Knowledge. 

Camouflage, misdirection ,and subterfuge all can influence the future. 

Which dovetails right into another comment made, which, explains why I am choosing to blog less and less.

I expect that many of us, including myself, should spend less time on the computer, often simply acquiring knowledge to feed our pride in how much we think we know, and more time talking and actually doing things with the people with whom we share space in our offices, homes, and neighborhoods.

I've taken the advice of the last commenter, and find myself much more at peace for having done so.

Wishes for well-being this new year to you and yours.