In the second session, "Technology's Embrace," Kevin Kelly compared technology's growth and march towards the future with that of the human race, declaring that in the end, technology will prevail.
As evidence of this, he noted computer storage around the world was roughly equivalent to human capacities, and that unlike Moore's Law's principle that processing capacity roughly doubles every 18 months, human capacities do not.
"The question is, does technology have its own agenda?" said Kelly, a tech industry impresario who was the founding executive editor of Wired and editor and publisher of the Whole Earth Catalog. "I think we have to ask the question, "What does technology want?"
Thus far, Kelly suggests technology wants similar, and thus benign, outcomes.
"Technology wants clean water," he said, as one of several examples. Kelly rejects the notion of good or evil technology, or that of good or evil children, saying that technology, like children, simply needs good parenting.
Another speaker, multimedia artist and Rutgers professor Hasan Elahi discussed a website project he said was inspired by an airport run-in at a flight check in which resulted in a lengthy background investigation, presumably because he was considered a terror threat.
"There was never any hostility," he said, but added he was aware the consequences he felt could have landed him at Guantanamo if he had not known the American culture fluently and used his knowledge with investigators to increase their comfort that he had no malicous intentions.
Despite having since been cleared, Elahi said he tired of reporting his where-abouts to authorities, so he decided to publish everything - whereabouts, financial records, etc., etc. etc., on the web.
"I've been timestamping my life," said Elahi, who posts his whereabouts at this website, volantarily using an ankle bracelet and GPS to track his location. He's also located every flight he's taken since birth, including many of his onflight meals.
He doesn't stop there. He's also recorded every meal he's eaten, over the past several years.
Perhaps in the 'too much information' category, he has also recorded every toilet he's ever used...at least of late.
"I sincerely consider the FBI a form of protection and I am pleased they are there to protect me," he said, with a certain degree of credulity.
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