We're Going Numb

Technology is a crazy thing isn't it? Every day there is some newfangled invention created to make our lives easier, more relaxed. The world I grew up in filled with analog receivers, rabbit ear televisions and Sony Walkmans has evolved into digital waves, plasma screen HDTV’s and iPad 3's. 



For full effect, download "Comfortably Numb" by Pink Floyd, and play at maximum volume throughout the duration of this post.

Things are getting digitally out of control. Take for instance the new iPhone 5. Wow, is that thing amazing. I don't think there is anything that phone cannot do: pictures, music, video, e-mail, heck the thing could probably change a dirty diaper while composing a Tony-award winning musical it is so advanced. 



The unique thing about the iPhone 5 is that it can perform just about any task in the entire world. The brains behind the phone back at Apple have made it one of the most premiere creations ever manufactured. It seems like year after year they are coming out with a new phone that can do more than the previous models. I bet one year they will make a phone that is so state-of-the-art, so distinguished, so upgraded, that it can do just about every single task imaginable, yet it won't be able to make a regular phone call.



But then again who cares about making a phone call anymore? Nobody has a conversation these days except through text messaging. Acronyms like JK, LOL or IDK my BFF Rose, have replaced the normal everyday conversation fodder that was once commonplace among everyone. It's getting out of control I tell you, I mean, WTF?! 



The “digital age” has gotten so bad that recently I had a conversation with my little sister, and when I asked her what was her favorite book. Her jokingly semi-serious response was, “Books? Wait, what are those? Are those the paper things with words on them? Come on, Brock, get with the program. We don't use those things anymore.”

Oh, excuse me for being a little bit old school. 



“We use e-books now, Brock,” she continued. “That’s a lot easier than actually reading a real, live, hard-cover, page-infested book.” E-this and e-that, the e-world gets bigger and bigger every day. Pretty soon we will have e-libraries and e-relationships. All the guys are going to have e-girlfriends. Which pretty much is just a digital inflatable doll.

The great mind Albert Einstein once predicted that World War III would be fought with slingshots because of the constant advancement in battlefield technology. If that be the case then all of us will be raising our families in caves, communicating with smoke signals, and protecting ourselves with homemade bows and arrows. A realistic version of the Hunger Games I tell you. That's all right; I think I would be a decent hunter/gatherer due to the fact that I was ridiculously good at the game “Oregon Trail” as a little kid. 



I can't sit and bash the super wave of technology that is taking over the world, though. I'd be a hypocrite if I did, for I'm writing, editing and submitting this blogpost directly from my own iPhone 4 (Siri not included). Forget typewriters or WordPerfect; they don't hold a candle to this thing. 



Growing up I never thought we would make it to the age of “The Jetsons” with flying cars and talking robot maids, but the future is here. We may not be that advanced… yet, but we're getting there. All we can do is sit back and enjoy the digitally enhanced, high definition, virtual plasma screen e-ride.