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From: ravi@hcr.UUCP (Ravi Pandya)
Newsgroups: net.works
Subject: Re: ICONS: Passing Fad or New Found Wisdom?
Message-ID: <440@hcr.UUCP>
Date: Sun, 26-Jun-83 15:51:55 EDT
Article-I.D.: hcr.440
Posted: Sun Jun 26 15:51:55 1983
Date-Received: Sun, 26-Jun-83 15:57:03 EDT
References: <2434@sri-arpa.UUCP>, <715@utcsstat.UUCP>
Organization: Human Computing Resources, Toronto
Lines: 44

Whew! You certainly were feeling cynical -- but your article had a lot of
unpleasant (but true) points that set my thoughts on a path they haven't
been along in a while.  It is quite chilling to see how few people use their
intelligence at all (let alone to its full capacity).  Following the rise of
anti-science movements like the Creationists, the more rabid of the ecology
groups (although some of them have many valid and intelligent points), the
mystic and pseudo-scientific cults (like the Scientologists that our windows
look down upon), over the last few years gives the impression of an almost
palpable fear of rational and scientific thought, a kind of "look where
thinking has brought us -- let's stop thinking" attitude.  If anything is
going to destroy us, I think this is the prime candidate, for people who
don't think can be swayed with ease by any skilful demagogue with a bit of
media coverage.  Look at Ronald Reagan, the president of the United States,
a "world superpower", in command of enough power to destroy the earth many
times over -- a B-grade movie actor.  (Pierre Trudeau, despite his faults,
is a well-read, well-educated, well-travelled, intelligent man -- he toured
through the Third World on a motorcycle in his thirties to get first-hand
experience with the conditions there).  

So what is there to be done?  It would be impossible to give 180 million
Americans (I'm still amazed by that figure!) an idea of what that sense of
wonder, of discovery, of enlightenment is really like, and (cynically) if
you try something of that massive a scope, you're simply going to be
disappointed.  I content myself with designing tools that make those who do
want to think and create more effective at the task, and perhaps to make the
activity seem less foreign to those unaccustomed to it.  Despite their
"cuteness", the iconic referents and similar graphical user-interface
techniques are the best way that I can see to do that.  If you don't have to
spend your time fighting your way through the Sargasso Seas of the abysmal
user interface facilities of Unix (which is one of the better traditional
systems), then you can spend more time solving the problem you're working
on.

CPU power requirement isn't the issue -- mind power requirement is.
Computer science suffers greatly from the archaic idea that the computer is
still the expensive part of the system, and many people waste much time
adapting themselves to computer systems that are well-designed, but with the
wrong set of design parameters; the designers tried to minimize demand on
the computer rather than demand on the user.

	"You can lead a whore to culture, but you can't make her think"
		[I think either George Bernard Shaw or Oscar Wilde]

	--ravi