Disconnection from the Collective

Okay–I’ll admit it. I’m addicted.

Those of you who are Star Trek fans will recall the Borg–the species without individuals, who could not survive when severed from the Collective. I think I may be going in that direction. We lost internet two days ago (the whole village experienced an outage), and I felt utterly helpless.

Without internet, how could I look up information? How could I blog? What emails were going unanswered? To say the experience was anxiety-producing would be an understatement.

There are lessons to ponder, and not just that we may be becoming Borg-like. What would happen if a terrorist–or accident–took down the internet, or some substantial portion of it? We have created systems–banking, policing, communicating, etc. etc.-that simply would shut down if computerized systems no longer worked. Not to mention the psychic shock to our increasingly interconnected social systems.

I am one of those people who welcome change. Generally, I think technological innovation aids human progress. But I have to admit that our increasingly wired world has made it more difficult to disconnect, to be alone with our own thoughts and selves for extended periods of time. There is much research–and concern–that suggests these new technologies may be changing brain patterns in unanticipated ways.

In any event, I will have to cope with the experience for over a week, since it is unlikely that the small boat we will take from Dubrovnik will have wifi.

Blogging will be VERY spotty until we return to the US in early August. I know all of you will be fine–there’s plenty of other reading available to the connected.

If the last two days are any indication, I’m not so sure that I’ll make it.