UNIVAC, KEROUAC AND PROZAC
By Vince Giuliano
May 1998, Update February, 2008
A scenario:
Randy has a first dinner date
tonight with Laura, a woman whom he met on Yahoo Personals. Their Internet correspondence has been
getting more intimate recently. they
have video-chatted using Skype and exchanged semi-intimate
photos via instant messaging. They have
checked out and verified each other’s professional identities on-line too. Because of Laura’s Peace Corps background in
What is going on here? The basic story is familiar but many of the specifics did not exist ten years ago. Who and how we are in the world is being bent and shaped by three mighty though semi-invisible streams. The scenario is just one snapshot of the countless ways these streams impact on us. I use UNIVAC, KEROUAC, and PROZAC as icons for these streams. They are streams of technology, how we pass our lives and the substances we use to enhance them. They are radically changing the landscapes of our lives. They have mutated the recent past and will continue to reconfigure our future. They have profoundly altered me personally, and almost certainly you too.
First, a little background on the icons themselves.
UNIVAC® was the trade name for the first commercial
general-purpose electronic computer, marketed by Remington Rand starting in
1951. I use UNIVAC as the icon for
the incredibly rapid evolution and proliferation of computers, solid-state
electronics, and electronic communications – and for all of the other electronic
extensions of ourselves.
Comprised
in this steam of revolution are computers: big, small, personal, corporate, and
embedded in products of all kinds. I
include all things with transistors and chips in them and the software that
drives them. Also in this stream are communications
networks in the home, in the office, in the car and world-wide, cell phones, CD
ad DVD players, global worldwide satellite networks, HDTV sets, ATM machines, GPS
units, the Internet in all of its extensions, smart appliances, RFID chips and
smart medical implants. Included are all
the new generation of electronic systems, gizmos that continue to unfold on a
daily basis: pocket heart monitors, electronic bathroom scales, smart traffic
lights, smart coffee-makers, you name it.
I also include in the UNIVAC stream the software that animates all of this
hardware that would otherwise be inert junk.
And of course I include the tools, applications and new ways of using
the Internet, the fastest-developing international entity in all history.
The
roots of this stream of course go back before UNIVAC to
Jack
Kerouac is of course the key novelist of the Beat Generation. I
use KEROUAC is an icon for the changing vision of who we are as humans, our
human potential, what we care about, how we see ourselves personally, what we
allow ourselves to think, what are willing to put at risk, what we are willing
to do, and our view of others.
I
include in this icon our changing relationships to each other, to cultures,
religion and thought, the developing world consciousness, and the
human-potential movement as it applies to both individuals and businesses.
Why use the poet Kerouac as an icon? His life and writings stand in testimony to independence of thought and living life itself as an art form, to establishing personal identity in a broader context than that of locale and local relationships, to identifying with an alternative community, and to integrating Eastern philosophical ideas (Buddhism in this case) into personal philosophy. Spiritual self-realization was important for him, at least from an intellectual perspective. Also, he was concerned personally and in his writings with the transition between old family and traditional values and the new wild life he was leading as a beat poet. Like any icon, however, the man Jack Kerouac is not the same as the broad social revolutionary movement his icon name is used to represent here. KEROUAC did not “walk the walk” of leading a spiritual or contemplative life like Gary Snyder and Ginsberg did. However,he played an important role in popularizing Eastern philosophies. And Kerouac’s life ended tragically when he drunk himself to death.
Following Kerouac and his associated beat poets came
the Beatnik and then the Hippie movements, leading to the current level of legitimization
of alternative lifestyles. Fewer than
one family in five now fits the 1950’s standard template of father working,
mother and two children at home. Most
children are born out of wedlock in the
Prozac®, is of course the proprietary name for a mood-
leveling drug (Fluoxetine),
made by Eli Lilly & Co. and used by over 6 million people. I use PROZAC
as an icon for developments in biochemistry and genetics that are sweeping over
us, transforming medicine, offering possibilities for curing cancer and most
other diseases now afflicting us, altering our age demographics and relaxing
the constraints of our physical bodies.
The
substance Prozac®) is itself interesting.
By inhibiting the uptake of the brain chemical serotonin, Prozac®
affects brain chemistry in a way very different from the classical “uppers”
such as amphetamine and “downers” such as morphine, or the hallucinogenic like
LSD. Prozac® tends to level mood,
meaning fewer lows and fewer highs as well.
Zoloft® and Paxil®, “cousin” drugs manufactured by other pharmaceutical
companies, work the same way.
Prozac® is also an anti-obsession and anti-bulimic agent, and may promote weight change. The drug has generated a certain amount of controversy, mainly associated with purported side effects. For example, there may be evidence that the drug induces kleptomania. It is only one of a rapidly expanding repertory of proprietary drugs that affect behavior, representing a total market of over $20 billion. It has been called “the pride of psychiatry” and also “the world’s most murderous drug,”
Of course Prozac® is just one of very many
mood-changing drugs, and an older one at that.
There is a significant pharmacopoeia of legal mood altering drugs
prescribed by the psychiatric profession, such as Lithium
carbonate, Valproic acid (Depakene®), divalproex sodium, sodium
valproate (Depacon®), Lamotrigine
(Lamictal®),
Carbamazepine
(Tegretol,
Gabapentin
(Neurontin),
Oxcarbazepine
(Trileptal®
) andTopiramate
(Topamax®). Many of these have been proven effective in
controlling conditions like depression or bipolar disorder. And of course there are the many illegal
drugs mood-changers in widespread use like marijuana, cocaine, LSD, ecstasy, mescaline,
GHB, crystal-meth and heroin. Finally,
there are a number of legal non-prescription substances that purportedly act as
mood stabilizers like ginkgo biloba herb, piracetam, Sam-E and centrophenoxine
– not to mention chocolate, tobacco and cozy-comfort tea.
I am using the PROZAC icon to represent far more than behavior-changing chemicals, however, and to include the whole range of new biochemical and genetic possibilities emerging out of biotech research this century. Possibilities associated with this stream include genetic manipulation of unborn children, cloning of animals and humans, genetic correction of disease susceptibility, and new designer crops and animals. Also, I include the genetic and biotech developments that could allow human life-spans of hundreds of years. Finally, included in this stream are the various schools of alternative medicine and mind-body connections.
A lot has been written on each of these revolutionary streams. What I find to be most interesting is the interactions among them. The streams combine to create an intricate dance of creation. They intertwine like three snakes wrapped around one another, writhing in a way that it is impossible to discern which snake is doing what. The result of this dance is that one stream potentates another to create ever more-powerful and unexpected results.
It’s hard to know where best to start, since the streams are so intertwined, so I will start out somewhere in the middle.
UNIVAC and KEROUAC
The new world of computers and
communications is enabling profound shifts in who we are and who we think we
are. And, it is the nature of such
shifts that they are not always noticed as they happen.
Here is a simple example I
observed back in 1996 in a restaurant in the countryside in
When I wrote the previous
paragraph ten years ago cell phones were rarely seen in the
Internet, via its essentially no-cost world-wide communications, facilitates communities which are not geographically based. And, with the communities comes the identities that go with those communities. How many of us bat off e-mail to colleagues and friends around the world on a daily basis now without even thinking about it? In the culture of e-mail within cyber communities there is often a certain good will and generosity that does not exist in normal discourse. Strangers become friends who put you in touch with other strangers to help get things done and they also can become friends. On a personal level – and the essence of the KEROUAC stream is that it involves the intensely personal - I find myself as a cyber-being willing to extend a certain magnanimity to strangers that I normally would not extend in physical public places. And I get magnanimity back too. Also, Internet empowers me to have a work-play lifestyle that I love. I can work when I feel like it wherever I feel like working, using my notebook computer, my cell phone, my current PDA, my digital camera and my little HDTV camcorder.
I first wrote this paragraph
(1998) sitting at a kitchen table in my family cottage on an island in
Since my first draft of this
article ten years ago, a number of new technology applications have emerged to
empower human interactions. Social network
web sites is one such example. These
networks facilitate people connecting for such things as finding jobs, new
partners, places to live and people to play with. Sites like KinkedIn.com, Facebook.com and
Facebook.com do this. There are cybercommunities augmenting real ones of every kind
imaginable. Blogs
allow sharing of personal experiences and the formation of impromptu
communities of all kinds. There are
hundreds of thousands of them. Web-empowered
cell phones, instant messaging and mobile e-mail allow extension of cyberspace
community to everyplace and every time. SKYPE
and other videoconferencing sites allow friends, colleagues and lovers to stay
in close hourly contact without cost although they are continents apart. Many sites facilitate meeting new people and
dating them for purposes of every taste. And for some who want to live seriously
in pure cyberspace community there are sites like Second Life.
All these developments not only
expand social possibilities but, KEROUAC-like, also pose questions about the
acceptable limits of our behavior. Is it
acceptable for a happily-married man in a committed relationship to have a
torrid affair with another player in a virtual world? From an
Internet as a research tool
empowers me to find out almost anything about anything using the Web and search
engines. It empowers me in my
knowing. My information tools enable me
to function outside of a corporate structure as an independent professional. I am joined by human and cyber links with an
international “empowerment network” of colleagues I work with.
See my article on empowerment networks. This is a lot different than the
absinth-drinking artists in
Anything Everywhere, and Any
Place in My Place
Now in 2008 my island home has HDTV if I want to pay for it. I have regular cable TV and a broadband Internet connection there. I can videoconference from there now. My cell phone, pocket digital camera and PDA have collapsed into a single device. Using this device I can snap photos and take short movies and promptly share them with my friends anywhere. There are six active general-purpose computers in my home on a high speed wired and wireless network with nearly terabytes of combined memory.
My new 47” 0180p HDTV is worth comment. It brings me immersive audiovisual experience beyond what is available in theatres – not only of broadcast commercial materials but of my own video and DVD productions. The TV is a portal linking two worlds. One world is my family room, with one two, or up to ten of us family and friends sometimes talking, eating popcorn, drinking tea or beer, or interacting in our particular ways. The other world is a changeable one largely under my control. A few clicks and I can portal to terribly realistic-looking and awesome-sounding places. Other clicks take us to boring or barely-tolerable places. I can zoom around picking place and circumstances. Click, a Patriots football game; click, a creepy cop movie; click, the inside of a rocket ship in space; click, I am witnessing a cold blooded murder; click, pudgy political experts are before me expounding endlessly on which candidate is up and which is down; click, I am exploring an underground cavern in Chile; click, an aged but trim blond is telling me to act now to buy an exercise machine; click, I am in a frigate in the midst of a sea battle; click, click, click, click : a visit to the Easter Islands, Victorian England, Ancient Rome, China in the twelfth century. Click, I am in a research submarine a mile deep under the ocean; click, I am in the midst of Aleutian Eskimos. Click, I am in the Baths of Caracalla in Rome watching a grand version of Aida that is going on right now; click, I am in the Paradiso or the Melkweg experiencing nightlife in Amsterdam; click, I am eavesdropping on one of Tony Soprano’s painful therapy sessions, click; I am dangerously close to an active volcanic crater on Mount Aetna. There are hundreds of channels to pick among and again that number of on-demand shows and movies. And we have a collection of DVDs and shows we have recorded not to mention ones from the library and Blockbuster Video and NetFlix. What would Marshal McLuhan write or say if he could experience this sensory feast?
I submit that HDTV seen on a large LCD screen with a good sound system connected to cable or satellite with a DVR and DVD recorder is a fundamentally different medium than the TV known to Marshal McLuhan when he was writing Understanding Media in the 1960s. The differences are:
· Where there used to be four to six TV channels available, now there are at any time hundreds if you have a good cable or satellite subscription. A TIVO or other DVR enables time shifting and greatly expands availability of good programming. In addition, on-demand video programming offered by the same companies swell the available offerings by the hundreds. Then there is the video materials available on DVD in your private home collection, in the video store, in your library or available from Netflix. If you have both a DVR and a DVD recorder, you can build up your own collection of movies and other programming on DVDs. The availability of on-demand video materials is rapidly increasing. The cable and satellite providers will soon be offering thousands of movies and other programs. More interesting, at the time of this writing a number of companies are gearing up to provide movies and video programming over the Internet. It won't be too long before essentially all movies and recorded works are available on-demand. Back in the 60s, most of the things on TV most of the time were not worth watching. Now all of the time there is a choice of many things worth watching. Before long, all the time you will be able to watch anything out there in your home.
· The old TV video was in black-and-white or washed-out color with images made up out of horizontal lines with snowy noise on a 9” or 15” tube. The sound came from a 3” speaker mounted in the cabinet as an afterthought. The new HDTV image shows on a 40,” 50” or 60 inch LCD or plasma screen with in-depth Dolby surround sound from multiple speakers. The impression of realism is incomparable. The old TV image looked and sounded like a rough facsimile of reality. The new TV looks and sounds like a window opening up to another real place. And it is.
Scenery in the old TV had the details washed out of it and was not very interesting. Videography therefore used to emphasize the use of close-ups, such as of faces. The new HDTV shows panoramic views magnificently: mountains, villages, natural scenes in which you can make out the individual branches and leaves on the trees. And, in viewing the crowds attending the academy awards ceremony or attacking a castle in a movie or watching a basketball game, you can see the expressions on individual faces, hundreds of them. And you can experience the sounds and energy of the crowd as if you were there.
We are approaching the point of having a window we can open up to practically anywhere and anything we want to experience in realistic sight and sound. We are not there yet, but are well on the way. And if I really want to explore anything in intellectual depth, I can just step into the next room and start using the search engines on Internet. My main computer monitor has a 32” LCD screen. The world is my place, I can see, hear and learn about essentially everything that is not kept secret.
Marshal McLuhan point was :”The Medium is the Message.” I think this should be amended to read :”The Medium is the Message and the Medium is the Portal.”
Anybody Anywhere Anytime (if
they want to)
Do I want to see and talk to Luciano, an
old colleague in Sao Paulo Brazil or to Diego in Pamplona Spain, or Hal in
Munich Bavaria, or my cousin Nicola in San Pietro a
Maida in
So, from the KEROUAC viewpoint, who am I when I have portals to everything and anybody everywhere? Who I am becomes more and more a matter of my choice rather than of necessity. I am empowered to have interests and make identity choices and join communities as I wish. I could spend my retirement years crusading for control of global warming, retrofitting an old sail boat or buy a cottage on a wonderful island in Second Life and retire there with a sexy 25 year-old second-life wife (even if the real woman behind the 25 year-old is 60). As it is, I am too restless and too grounded for any of these. I choose to pursue creative writing, research and video making and enjoy my real family and friends, keeping a healthy blend between my real and cyber experiences and identities.
KEROUAC stream technology
Just like there is a series of technologies, behind the UNIVAC and KEROUAC streams, there are powerful "humanwear" technologies furthering the KEROUAC stream. Among these are the traditional ones of contemplation, meditation, and drugs, and disciplines like Kung Fu and Zen. There is also a host of newer approaches for human and organizational transformation that borrow from the traditional ones, such as the work of Landmark Education in human transformation, and the application of Knowledge Management to organizational transformation. Thousands of semi-formal organizations espouse aspects of "New Age" philosophy , whether they are derived from Asian traditions or based on science or ecology.
And personal transformation demands
and facilitates organizational transformation.
Much on my professional work, for example, involved introducing concepts
and practices for knowledge-sharing into traditional companies. Like thousands of others today, my colleagues
and I are comfortable with seamless transition between talking about human
empowerment one minute, and the role of extranets and social networking sites for
this purpose the next minute.
From the 2008 viewpoint new
technology applications are having a profound impact on the political process –
again KEROUAC transformations facilitated by UNIVAC technology. In February 2008 the leading Democratic
candidate for president, Barach Obama,
has found ways to use the web to mobilize self-organizing political communities
that seem to more effective for grass-root political organization than the established
political machines backing his rivals. Obama has been able to recruit a million campaign
contributors, raising more money than the other candidates which rely more on a
much smaller number of deep-pocket contributors
These deep-pocket contributors are more often than not groups or
organizations seeking political favor. So,
in principle at least, Obama is going into the
election with fewer secret commitments than the other candidates, a KEROUAC
development. Young people with open
minds about what is possible understandably seem to be in the forefront of the Obama movement.
UNIVAC – KEROUAC – UNIVAC -KEROUAC
– round and round we are going.
UNIVAC and PROZAC
Modern genetic research and new-drug development is only possible through use of computers, electronic microscopes, mass spectroscopes, computerized gene splicers, chemical and genetic computer data bases, e-mail communications among scientists and the like. It would never have been possible to identify the human genome without powerful computers. And without them today new drug discovery, genetic research and the biotech industry would grind to a halt. As our information tools improve, so will our understandings of ourselves as physical beings. Patient data bases are becoming more universal, improving the quality of our lives from birth through death. The latest medical technology is possible only because of the UNIVAC stream including MRI machines, Cat Scans, Lithotripters, and all the machines that beep in the operating room and ICU. Today, at least a half-dozen machines in a typical hospital operating room are microprocessor controlled and sport LCD-screens, up from none twenty years ago. When a microprocessor-controlled device monitors and constantly adjusts the flow of a new anesthetic bend to allow a patient to go home with a clearer mind and enjoy his family, this is UNIVAC meeting up with PROZAK to serve KEROUAC.
World-wide data bases allow the
monitoring of epidemics and the emergence of new dangerous bacteria. Important information is flashed to all via
Internet. There are perhaps 15000 health
and medical sites on Internet. If I have
a set of X-rays taken today near my home in
New medical and life-science developments
are published informally on Internet by their creators as soon as the results
are in. This replaces the old system
where important medical papers were delayed a year or more in the journal
publication process. The linkage system
of Internet allows a doctor, researcher or layperson to move rapidly from one
to another resource throughout the world very rapidly and efficiently. In three minutes on the Internet, it is
possible to travel between resource sites that would take 100,000 miles of travel
if it had to be done physically.
Folding over to the KEROUAC stream, Internet allows us ordinary people to learn more about diseases, cures and alternative medical approaches, empowering ourselves to learn more about our health conditions and take ever-increasing responsibility for our personal health. Thousands of sites on Internet offer ordinary people as well as health professionals great depth of information on all aspects of health and medical conditions.
PROZAC AND KEROUAC
The link from Prozac to KEROUAC
is pretty obvious. We use drugs – legal
and illegal – in multiple ways to provide us experience, assert or express our
identities, express our views of life, and allow ourselves to behave in ways we would not otherwise
behave. And here it is possible to
identify four general families: 1. Legal prescription medications blessed by the
medical establishment like Prozac, but often used by millions as
lifestyle-modification drugs, 2. Alcohol
and tobacco, which are legal, widely used, but addictive and dangerous in their
own ways, 3. Illegal addictive drugs
ranging from marijuana to crack, and 4.
Health and identity substances which are non-addictive, legal, but not
part of the medical establishment’s pharmacopoeia. This last group is the one of most personal
interest to me, and includes vitamins, Chinese medicines, herbal concoctions,
“smart drugs” and hormone supplements. For example, it is claimed that
Prozac®
is a lifestyle prescription drug, and is only one of many. The impact of oral
contraceptives on women’s lifestyles needs no comment. And there are drugs for weight loss, weight
gain, sleep, remaining wakeful, improvement of memory, restoration of hair,
control of pain, and – the application that opens up more markets than anything
else – sex. Drafting this (1998), the
media was full of comments on Viagra® (sildenafil
citrate) by Pfizer, which allows men to have strong and lasting penis
erections. While marketed in theory to
help the 30 million Americans who suffer from erectile dysfunction, its
popularity and appeal – at $10 a pill – extended to a lot of other men as well
for reasons that do not need explaining.
The annual market for Viagra® was estimated to be $5 billion back then, and the
total market for lifestyle prescription drugs perhaps $100 million. From the 2008 view the options are broader,
including Levitra® and Cialis®
which works for 3 days instead of just 4 hours.
Does the availability of these substances affect social behavior
(KEROUAC)? You bet. For example, now there is an important issue
of how to assure safe sex among nursing home residents.
The
influence relationships between personal identity (KEROUAC) and use of
substances (PROZAC) go in both directions.
Older folks take vitamins and minerals to express their commitment to
youth, and much use of illegal drugs is in expression of being “alternative” -
being a part of an alternative community of such users.
Many of those allowing themselves to be carried forward by the currents of the KEROUAC
stream are active in the adoption of new technologies and approaches to health.
Not only
are people living longer but more older people are healthier and open to pursuing new
and creative activities later in life. Take
me for example, Vince the writer. Now in
2008 I am 78, highly involved in studying the biotechnology literature related
to longevity (PROZAK), enjoying great family friends and community (KEROUAC)
and writing articles like this one, screenplays and short stories. I am doing art
and creating video KEROUAC) with the help of the computers and networks in my home and
inspired by what I see on HDTV (UNIVAC). I am having lots of fun. Check my websites www.vincegiuliano.name for writings, www.giulianoart.com for art, www.artkoukou for the art movement I started.
Finally the Electronic Publishing Group
web site tells a bit about
my professional career as a consultant.
UNIVAC, PROZAC and KEROUAC
>And
how about the three-way relationships among the the PROZAC, KEROUAC and UNIVAC streams?
Again, there are multiple cross
linkages. Consider, for example, the
proliferation of web sites devoted to all the ramifications of drugs and
associated personal identification. A search on
the word Marijuana using Google retrieves 32.4 million
references to different web sites. Hundreds
of websites promote and sell “smart drugs” and lifestyle-related hormone and
herbal products.
Offshore sellers sell products that are not sold in the
Another
way that UNIVAC folds in with both PROZAC and KEROUAC is in terms of health
support groups. The web features
hundreds of support groups for people with medical conditions – ranging from
AIDS to little-known diseases such as Alpha-one anti-trypsine
deficiency. These groups allow sharing
of information and feelings on multiple levels. Picking an arcane example,
there is an association of people who happen to have the as Alpha-one anti-trypsine deficiency disease, and they maintain a website to
enable people with the disease to connect with each other to exchange
information, and even socialize on-line. What we find on this Internet web, and on
hundreds of similar disease-specific ones webs, is a mixture of professional
information, personal information and communication among people who have the
disease and who want to connect to other people who have the same disease. The Alpha-one anti-trypsine
deficiency web site even offers a photo album of people who have got this
disease, and who are open to sharing information about their experience with
each other. They share information about
their conditions, about the therapies they’ve had and what they’re doing. They share stories, pictures, life stories,
and even poems. For people with the
disease, such communications can be highly useful, breaking through what
otherwise would be personal isolation.
Another rare disease for which
there are powerful Internet support sites is Angleman’s
Syndrome, an incurable disease that affects children. “Angel Down Under”
is an Australian site for families with children who have the disease. The site refers to children who have this
syndrome as “angels.”
This site contains
many pictures of families and their “angel” children, and family history
narratives. It is full of highly
personal information. I cannot but help
feel emotionally moved when looking at the pictures of the “angels” and hearing
their stories.
And here we see another
characteristic of Internet health communications: Sometimes the content of an Internet health
site is not just rational information, but also content with highly emotional
impact. Many of the hundreds of
disease-specific webs are created and maintained by people who have the
condition and know its implications well.
Internet offers families who have a seriously diseased member a way of
sharing with other families who have a member with the same diseases. This is just one of thousands of crossovers
from UNIVAC to PROZAC to KEROUAC streams.
UNIVAC and PROZAC, KEROUAC AND OTHER TRENDS
How the interactions of UNIVAC and PROZAC and KEROUAC play out in a specific situation is highly dependent on cultural factors and there are other major trends out there that are shaping where and how things are going. I comment only briefly on these.
· Environmental changes and critical resource scarcity – these include climate change, death of species, pollution of all kinds, depletion and consequent rising costs of resources like oil and fish stocks, soil erosion, food scarcity, loss of rain forests, monoculture agriculture – all those things resulting from human’s patterns of not exercising stewardship for continuation of quality life on the planet
Information technology (UNIVAC) offers some medium and long-term hopes here such as via hybrid vehicles, photovoltaic, wind and other alternative energy sources. Biotechnology researchers (PROZAC) have developed genetically-engineered food crops that grow under adverse conditions, microbes that can neutralize certain forms of pollution, and are working on means to sequester carbon dioxide from the atmosphere. Consciousness of these matters and willingness to address the issues (KEROUAC) is rapidly developing and expressing itself in environmental movements, international treaties and encouragement of steps to address many of the long-term human survival issues concerned. Whether these countervailing trends may be mobilized in time to ward off major human disasters remains an open question.
Religious and economic philosophies, trends and activities that tend to block or negate the forces of UNIVAC, PROZAC and KEROUAC. Fundamentalist religions and their conservative political counterparts, for example, often reject the new ideas and ways of being of KEROUAC and regard them as evil. They also reject some branches of PROZAC activity such as stem cell research and cloning. They often see the developments of the life sciences as in conflict with their established religious truths. As to UNIVAC, Some major communications corporations would like to establish the same corporate control over Internet that they now enjoy over communication of TV content. But it interesting that the major tools of UNIVAC – broadcast and cable TV, the web and e-mail – have been adapted and are being used across the political and economic spectrum.
· Wars, violence, terrorism, genocide and natural and man-made disasters threaten existence and therefore tend to dominate what is going on and the immediate agenda for dealing with it. So in the US we have seen many laws passed as an aftermath of the World Trade Center attack that limit our constitutional freedoms; torture is now condoned – setbacks for the KEROUAC stream of development. In a war between major powers one of the first thing that would happen is communications satellites being shot down – a major setback for the UNIVAC stream. The high cost of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan have resulted in limiting social and educational programs in the US (blows to KEROUAC) and limiting of biomedical as well as other research (limiting PROZAC).
The UNIVAC, PROZAC, and KEROUAC
streams have their own ways of fighting back against environmental deterioriation,
wars and retrograde philosophies. For example Move On, a technology empowered
mass action group (UNIVAC and KEROUAC) has mobilized much public sentiment in
the US against the Iraq war by providing Internet based information and
connections not available through the mass media. And the humanistic philosophies of the KEROUAC
trend move people to take action against genocide, global warming and the
destruction of the environment. These ways of fighting back are
profound but they are slow. They may
ultimately prevail but it may take decades to undo the havoc and damage created
by the
WHERE IS IT ALL GOING?
The three steams appear to be
swelling if anything. In the UNIVAC
stream,
In the KEROUAC stream, grandmothers
and children are using computers and e-mail, and Internet usage in the
ON A PERSONAL NOTE
Strong doses of KEROUAC-stream
technology were important for opening me up to the possibilities of the UNIVAC
stream (where my profession and business has been) and the PROZAC stream (which
I depend on for vitality and longevity).
But for the thousands of hours in my life of group therapy, T-group
training, encounter groups, human relationships, EST and Landmark Education
training, and other workshops of all kinds, I would not have the internal
freedom to lead the life I lead or to enjoy it as I do. I probably never would have been involved
with Internet to the depth I have been, would not have the international group
of colleagues I have, and certainly would not be writing this article.
A final note: I feel I have only scratched the surface of
the inter-weavings of the UNIVAC, PROZAC and KEROUAC streams. I invite readers to share their own stories
and ideas. You can reach me by e-mail at
vegiulian@comcast.net
I have
written a number of other works which touch on themes in this paper from
various viewpoints, both serious treatises and fiction stories. I encourage you to look over the items I have
online by going to my Writings Index Web Page.