A world of sci-fi killer gadgets, and a gadget killer － キラキラSF機器の世界と機器殺し －

How often do the predictions of science-fiction writers come true?

Not very often.  For example, do you remember the film “2001: A space odyssey” by Stanley Kubrick?  Weren’t we by now supposed to have astronauts comfortably flying around to far off planets, and computers so intelligent that they suffered nervous breakdowns?

Well, this week I found one science-fiction story which has proved remarkably accurate in its depiction of the future.  “The murderer” was written by Ray Bradbury in 1953.  That was sixty-three years ago.  I’d like to post a few extracts of the story.  See if anything about his imaginary world rings (and beeps, and flashes, and rings again) true about the world today. 

In the first extract, a prisoner meets the prison psychiatrist for the first time.  He has been arrested for destroying gadgets such as tvs, telephones, radios, a robot vacuum cleaner and so on.

 “The murderer”, by Ray Bradbury (1953), extract 1:

“I’m here to help you,” said the psychiatrist, frowning.  Something was wrong with the room.  He had hesitated the moment he entered.  He glanced around.

The prisoner laughed.  “If you’re wondering why it’s so quiet in here, I just kicked the radio to death.”

*

The psychiatrist is uncomfortable in a room without gadgets and confused as to why anyone would want to destroy technology.  And why does the prisoner talk so passionately about “killing” gadgets?  He explains how difficult it has become to avoid the constant noise and interruption of technology and electronic communication...

Extract 2:

When it wasn’t the television or the radio or the phonograph it was motion pictures at the corner theatre; motion pictures projected, with commercials projected onto [clouds]... When it wasn’t [advertisements on clouds], it was music... in every restaurant; music and commercials on the buses I rode to work.  When it wasn’t music, it was inter-office communications...
*
The prisoner goes on to explain how, with his wrist radio always attached, his boss could contact him all of the time...

Extract 3:

You can’t leave your car without checking in: “Have stopped to visit gas-station men’s room.”

...”What took you so long?”

“Sorry, Sir.”
*
The prisoner remembers the scene on a public bus.  Nobody is paying attention to the people around them, but are focussed instead on using their personal communication devices.  Most of their conversation is just pointless descriptions of what street they are now on...

Extract 4:

[On the bus] sat all the tired commuters with their wrist radios, talking to their wives, saying, “Now I am at Forty-third, now I am at Forty-fourth, here I am at Forty-ninth, turning at Sixty-first.  One husband cursing, “Well get out of that bar, damn it, and get home and get dinner started.  I’m at Seventieth.”  [And the bus radio playing music and commercials.]
*

The psychiatrist decides that the man must be mad, and goes back to his world of constantly bleeping and flashing devices.  The prisoner is equally sure that the world must be mad and looks forward to enjoying the quiet of his prison cell. 

That’s quite an impressive prediction of how the world was set to go from a man writing in 1953!  I don’t want to destroy all technology, of course.  I’m happy to have x-ray machines and aeroplanes and computers.  But when I am sitting on a train and everyone is totally engrossed in their smartphones, or when people playing Pokemon Go start ignoring the rules and dangers of the real world because they are so engrossed in their virtual game (as I wrote about in last week’s blog), then I feel sympathetic to “The Murderer”.  Perhaps some gadgets deserve to be killed after all.

I’ll leave you with a final thought from Ray Bradbury’s short story.

Extract 5:

They went too far.  If a little music and keeping in touch was charming, they figured a lot would be ten times as charming.

*

Vocabulary:

a killer gadget – slang: an amazing, or amazingly cool piece of technology

an astronaut – a human who travels to space

a nervous breakdown – a collapse of mental stability

to ring true – to sound accurate; to have the sound or feel of truth

a psychiatrist – a doctor who treats mental problems

to frown – a facial expression involving the wrinkling of the skin of one’s forehead, usually showing displeasure

men’s room – male toilet

to be engrossed – to be absorbed; to be so focussed on something that you don’t notice anything else

I’m bored with reality - Give me monsters －現実に飽きた。モンスターちょうだい－

“As the internet of things advances, the very notion of a clear dividing line between reality and virtual reality becomes blurred, sometimes in creative ways.”
Geoff Mulgan

 “Gotta catch ‘em all!”
From the Pokemon franchise 

In a maternity ward, a new father ignores the birth of his first child because he is busy catching a monster.  In Singapore, a man is deported for a bitter harangue against the country where he can’t find any monsters to catch.  On the banks of a river, a teenager searching for monsters instead finds a dead body.  In a museum commemorating the victims of Nazi murders, people repeatedly disturb the solemn quiet to battle monsters.  In Phoenix, monster hunters break into private property to get at a monster.

These are some of the strange incidents caused by the release of the new Pokemon Go game.  The game is marketed as “augmented reality”.  That is, it adds to reality, rather than creating a virtual world wholly and clearly separate from reality.  Players have to go to places in the real world to find monsters to catch.  If they use their device’s camera, they can see the monsters, which seem to exist in the real world.

The game has become wildly popular.  I wonder if this is a craze, which will be successful for a while before the novelty wears off.  Or is this the future?  Will we see more and more role playing games blending their virtual worlds with the real world?

As some of the stories above show, people are already getting into trouble in the real world because they have become so absorbed in the world of monsters.  My favourite of the strange stories was the Australian who was transferred to Singapore.  He had become so addicted to playing Pokemon Go in Australia that, when he found out that it wasn’t available in Singapore, he became furious.  He recorded a nasty rant about the country and posted it on Youtube.  He claimed that any country that didn’t have Pokemon Go was “stupid” and that Singaporeans must be stupid.  Some Singaporeans saw the video and contacted the man’s company to complain.  He was fired, and the Singaporean government even stepped in to take away his visa and deport him back to Australia.  Perhaps he found a monster in Singapore after all.

What will happen when other video games copy the idea of augmenting reality?  For a war game, will you have to travel to real bridges and strategic points in order to virtually shoot opposing players?  I can see the blending and confusing of reality and virtual reality causing problems in America, where there are so many real guns around.

I think on the whole I like my monsters to stay in the land of fantasy, or at least locked away in the cupboard.  If we let the monsters loose into reality, who knows when they will turn on us?

 

Vocabulary:

a notion – an idea

blurred – clouded; fuzzy; hard to see clearly

to be deported – to be forced to leave a country by that country’s government

a harangue – a lengthy and aggressive speech

to commemorate – to respectfully remember, especially after someone’s death

solemn – serious and respectful

augmented – having been added to or made greater

a craze – widespread but short-lived popularity

novelty – the interest which comes with something being new

furious – extremely angry

a rant - an angry, out of control speech

 

I want my 14 minutes and 55 seconds of fame! －14分55秒の名声がほしい！－

“In the future, everyone will be world famous for 15 minutes.”

Andy Warhol

“On the Web, everyone will be famous to 15 people.”
Attributed to Scottish artist, Momus
 

Andy Warhol’s comment in the 1960s that everyone would, in the future, have 15 minutes of fame has become something of a cliché.  With the democratisation of sources of news and information, such as social media, Youtube, and even humble blogs, the idea has seemed prescient.

The more recent quote that on the Web, everyone will be famous to 15 people is a humorous, but also telling observation.  If more people are providing information, then fewer people must be accessing each source of information.  Bloggers and Youtube posters can have fame of a sort...  if the 15 people who read or watch really love their posts.  By the way, it would be rude to ask how many people read this blog!

Anyway, I had brief contact with a more traditional source of news recently.  Just before the British referendum on leaving the EU, I got a call from a Japanese tv station, asking if I would appear on a national morning news show to give my opinion on the vote.

Naturally, I immediately thought of the advertising possibilities and agreed.  If I could just get them to mention my Tokyo English school - Nerima English - or the fact that I teach Skype lessons and telephone lessons to students who could be anywhere in Japan.  The students would come flooding in.  Wouldn’t they?

So a cameraman and an interviewer came round to my school and talked to me in Japanese for about 15 minutes.

We immediately ran into difficulties.  The interviewer asked if I agreed with the proposal in the referendum, or disagreed (賛成しますか？ または賛成しませんか？)  This confused me.  The referendum question was worded without a Yes or No answer in English.  It asked, “Should the UK leave the European Union, or remain in the European Union?”

Interviewer:  Do you agree with the referendum proposal or disagree?

Me:  Um...  What?

Interviewer:  Umm...

Me:  I want to stay in the EU.  Do you understand?

Interviewer:  Ah, okay.  Let’s move on. 

The interviewer then asked me why I wanted to remain in the EU.  I took a deep breath and then started a long, rambling speech.  I tried to explain that I was worried about the direction a leave vote would send British politics in.  I explained about the workers’ rights that the EU protects, and my fears that a UK outside of the EU would try to gain an economic advantage by ending these protections, and perhaps ending our wonderful free health-care system.

I spoke about other points and fears – about Scotland’s future being unclear, damage to the economy and Britain’s influence in the world, and so on.

And after the exhausting 15 minute interview, what did they show on tv?  I appeared for about 5 seconds.  On the tv screen, I said, “Britain has a free health-care system.”  And then they moved on to another British person.  Viewers wouldn’t even be sure if I supported leaving the EU, or supported remaining.  There was no mention of an English school in Tokyo.  No flood of new students...

I want the rest of my 14 minutes and 55 seconds!  Somebody call Andy Warhol!  I was promised 15 minutes!

 

Vocabulary:

the Web – the worldwide web; the internet

to attribute  a quote to (someone) – to say that (someone) made the quote

a cliché – an overused phrase

prescient – displaying a knowledge of the future, or an ability to accurately predict the future

telling – revealing; significant

to come flooding in – of offers, letters, emails etc., to suddenly appear in huge volumes, like a flood of water

rambling – of a journey or speech, to move randomly and widely from place to place, or from topic to topic