Wired Life

Most people doubt the computer's capacity for satisfying all human needs. Even Bill Gates, who finds no evidence to suppose that human intelligence is unique and cannot be replicated, watches his young daughter's growing mind with 'amazement and wonder'.

Charles Jonscher clings to that sense of wonder. He eschews the notion that we are entering what some pundits chillingly call the 'post-human society'. The book is not a strikingly original work - at a skim read you might be forgiven for thinking 'got the T-shirt' because all the familiar clichés about technology are here. It's fashionable these days for technology gurus to be Luddite about IT.




Not that the author is anti-digital; he simply believes in the value of analogue thinking too. Digital logic shouldn't be regarded as the gold standard of human reasoning. Jonscher has read just about everything on the subject and quotes extensively and pertinently. He also has a firm and informative grasp of the science, economics and technical achievement behind the current information revolution. This makes the book balanced and clear-sighted, if a little plodding at times. I've never read a more lucid exploration of the difference between information, knowledge and wisdom, and the relationship of all three to data handled by computers.

The book pivots on a central essay which the other chapters expand and support, 'Who are we in the digital age?' Well, we're the same human being as we always were. Computers haven't changed our ways of thinking, nor - said with the authority of extensive research - have they improved the quality of entertainment or produced an uplift in economic productivity. There are limits, he says, to the ability of images on screens or facts in databases to cater to our needs. We know that, of course, but it needs saying with the full academic backing this book exhibits.

The book appears to have different titles, covers, and publishers for its UK and US editions. At Amazon.com it is listed as 'The Evolution of Wired Life: From the Alphabet to the Soul-Catcher Chip - How Information Technologies Change Our World'. Jonscher's overall message is, don't let's swap our exploration of the richness of the human spirit for expertise in computer technology. Educators and politicians would do well to take note: the National Grid for Learning is in danger of doing just that.