James Burke : Connections, Episode 10, "Yesterday, Tomorrow and You", 5 of 5 (CC)

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Episode 10, conclusion of James Burke's most well-known series "Connections".

With his powerful closing remarks, Mr. Burke discusses the imminent information explosion that [was] about to occur and the growing awareness by the average person that they know so little about so much. And that this lack of knowledge amounts to an ever-increasingly crippling factor towards their power to change and mould their own futures.

Mr. Burke does not offer a solution to the problem other than for people to start to realize this, and then to seek out answers by asking those in posession of such knowledge to try to help them understand more about the world in which they live.

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[♪ futuristic, synthesized ♪]

And when you get to where we are now,
in the last quarter of the 20th century

how do you begin to get involved with this,
the computer?

There's nothing to see!

Well I suppose in one sense there is -

Here:

But so I tell you that these disks
contain one hundred million characters.

Where does that get you?

Oh sure, at one level we all understand computers
don't we? they send us bills and statements.

And even this awe-inspiring lot here;

the British Airways computer,

one of the biggest and fastest in the world,

will do some very endearing things for you.

I mean, you can book your old granny onto any flight,
from anywhere to anywhere, with all the trimmings,

like this:

That's her and her flights and hotels,

and this is her, and her personal details:

Look she speaks only Italian she's flying for the 1st time
she doesn't like carrots she wants help when she gets there

she wants to sit near the toilet, not see the film,
she's got excess baggage, and a lot more.

And this friendly monster will do that for you for a flight
anytime up to a year in the future and prepare your bill

within 50th of a second.

Great.

That's the kind of assistance computers give us
that help the world go 'round.

And you get involved:

☺You pay☺

But that's not the side of the computer I'm talking about.

If part one of the specialization of knowledge

happened in the 15th century when Johannes Gutenberg
came up with the printing press,

and helped scientists to talk their own kind of gibberish
to each other on the printed page

easier than they'd ever done it before,

then this is part two.

Only this is no book you can leaf through
and get a rough idea what it's talking about.

This is *the future*

because if you tell a computer
everything you know about something,

it will juggle the mix and come up with a prediction.

• Do this and you'll get that

And if you have information, and a computer,

you too can look into the future.

And that is power.

• Commercial power

• Political power

• Power to change things

You want some of that power?

Easy, go get yourself a PhD.

Otherwise?

The way things have become: Forget it.

And there's no point in coming in here and say:
"show me, show me", look:

So what?

☺Me too!☺

But never mind the machinery.

What about the stuff this lot uses?

The *raw material* that will change our futures
like you will never believe:

Information.

Not the facts, it's too late for that:

What you do with the facts.

Because there, you're into probability theory;

choosing one of the alternate futures
and actually making it happen.

And how does the man on the street
get involved in that game?

He doesn't.

So when the next major change comes out of the computers,

double-checked and pre-packaged,

it looks increasingly like you've only got
two options open to you:

1. Do nothing, stick your thumb in your mouth and
switch your mind in neutral.

2. Do what people have done for centuries
when machines did things they didn't want:

Overreact.

Strike out.

Sabotage the machine for good.

You want that?

[♫ ♫ ↑↑↑]

[♫ ♫ ↑↑↑]

[♫ ♫ ↑↑↑]

But once you start can you stop?
[♫ ♫ ↑↑↑]

Is our technology so interconnected
[♫ ♫ ↑↑↑]

that when you destroy one machine
[♫ ♫ ↑↑↑]

you automatically trigger total destruction
[♫ ♫ ↑↑↑]

of the entire life support system!
[♫ ♫ ↑↑↑]

[♫ ♫ ♫ ↑↑↑↑]

[♫ ♫ ♫ ↑↑↑↑]

[♫ ♫ ♫ ↑↑↑↑]

[♫ ♫ ♫ (climaxes)]

[♫ ♫ ♫ ↑↑↑↑]

[♫ ♫ ...]

Well, that's no better a solution
than any of the others is it?

So, in the end, have we learned anything

from this look at

why the world turned out the way it did

that's of any use to us in our future?

Something, I think.

That... *the key* to why things change,
is the key to everything

• How easy is it *for knowledge* to spread?

And that, in the past

the people who made change happen were
the people who had that knowledge,

whether they were craftsmen or kings.

Today, the people who make things change,
the people who have that knowledge,

are the scientists and the technologists

who are the true driving force of humanity.

And before you say:
"What about the Beethovens and the Michaelangelos?"

Let me suggest something with which
you may disagree violently:

That *at best* the products of human emotion;

Art - philosophy - politics - music - literature,

are interpretations of the world.

They tell you more about the guy who's talking

than about the world he's talking about.

Second-hand views of the world

made third-hand by your interpretation of them.

Things like that:

As opposed to

this:

Know what it is?

It's a bunch of amino acids.

The stuff that goes to build a up a ...

a worm,

or a geranium,

or you.

This stuff's easier to take isn't it?

Understandable; got people in it.

This: scientific knowledge,

is hard to take

because it removes the reassuring crutches of
opinion - ideology

and leaves only what is demonstrably true
about the world.

And the reason why so many people may be
thinking about throwing away those crutches

is because, thanks to science and technology,

they have begun to know

that they don't know *so much*

and that if they're to have

more say in what happens to their lives;

more freedom to develop their abilities to the full,

they have to be helped towards that knowledge
that they know exists

and that they don't possess.

And by "helped towards that knowledge", I don't mean

uh... give everybody a computer and say "help yourself".

Where would you even start?

No, I mean...

trying to find ways to translate the knowledge;

to *teach us* to ask the right questions.

See, we're on the edge [►1978◄]

of a revolution in communications technology that is
going to make that more possible than ever before.

Or, if that's not done,

to cause an explosion of knowledge

that will leave those of us who don't have access to it
as powerless as if we were *deaf, dumb and blind*.

And I don't think most people want that.

So what do we do about it?

I don't know.

But maybe a good start

would be to recognize. within yourself, the ability to
understand anything

because that ability's there,

as long as it's explained clearly enough.

And then go and ask for explanations.

And if you're thinking right now "what do I ask for"?

ask yourself

if there's anything in your life that you want changed.

That's where to start.

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