Twitter and Forgiveness, Jetpacks and Change

In: Our Technological World

Commitment:
  • Words: 271
  • Sentences: 14
  • Grade level: 8.4-11.6
  • Read time: ~1.4 min @ 200WPM

11 Feb 2010

In case you missed them, I’d like to point you to a few articles I wrote for Collide Magazine over the past few months.

I Will Remember Your Tweets No More

In this article, I looked at what it means to forgive in a world where our computers remember everything we do. Should we just blow people off who annoy us? Probably not. But should we remove all record of wrong from our hard drives either?

For Christians, this means that the Internet’s ability to help us remember rightly is a chance to practice a theologically-informed, true kind of forgiveness. Rather than downplay an incident or cut people off every time they annoy us, we have the chance to look at the past with Google-like accuracy and choose to stop holding those wrongs against those who harmed us. Instead of constantly blocking, de-following, and un-friending, we can choose to see people and their wrong through the blood of Christ.

It’s 2010, Where’s My Jetpack?

In an article that’s quite a bit lighter than the previous one, I attempt to look into the future and imagine what it would really be like when and if we ever get our jetpacks by applying Neil Postman’s Five Things We Need To Know About Technological Change.

What new technology are you considering adding to your life, your family, or your church? It might not be as cool as the mythical jetpack, but it will likely bring some change to your life and the life of those around you. It might be helpful to run your new stuff through these five questions.

Hope you enjoy them!

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About this blog

John DyerI'm John Dyer a web developer working on sites like Best Commentaries, Bible Web App, Dallas Seminary. I'm also a seminary graduate and teacher at Irving Bible Church.

This blog is about the the role of technology in the redemptive movement from the Garden to the City. I believe technology is an amazing testament to the creativity embedded in the imago dei, but instead of assuming technology is always a neutral tool, I believe it - like culture in general - profoundly influences us.

Upcoming Posts

  • 3D TV Means Color TV is New Black (and White)
  • What Are They Advertising?
  • Jesus, James, and McLuhan On the Heart, the Tongue, and the Internet
  • A Definition of Technology
  • The Cornwall Alliance: Technological Theory at Work
  • Reading and Publishing and Publishing and Reading
  • Learning from Buber: I-Thou and I-It
  • Prepackaged Communion and Albert Borgmann’s Device Paradigm
  • Technology is Kinda Like Money

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  • Tristan Mason: John, I'm looking forward to that post. It seems to me that Jesus' coming was, in one way, the tran [...]
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Asides

Our brains are designed to more easily be stimulated than satisfied
Fascinating look at the science of the brain’s response to seeking and rewards: http://www.slate.com/id/2224932/ (1)

Roman Catholic Church Expresses Concern Regarding Social Technologies
The head of the British Roman Catholic church says,

“I think there’s a worry that an excessive use, or an almost exclusive use of text and emails means that as a society we’re losing some of the ability to build interpersonal communication that’s necessary for living together and building a community.”
(0)

Internet Fatigue
CNN has a report on the phenomenon of internet fatigue. I wish they would have spent more time on giving suggestions for how to understand why this happens and how to avoid it. (0)

Articles and Tools on Texting
The NYTimes has a new article on the effects of texting on youth which include anxiety, sleep deprivation, and hand injuries. Interestingly, as Andy Crouch points out, the article also mentions that teens send many texts to their parents, meaning that teens are now connected to their parents more often during the day – a time when teenagers of the past were developing independence. LG has also created a new site to help parents decode text messages. (0)

Course Syllabus: Writing for Nonreaders in the Postprint Era
A humorous, but enlightening syllabus for a class on writing in the “postprint” era. Writing for nonreaders in the postprint era: “Students will examine why former generations carried around heavy clumps of bound paper and why they chose to read instead of watching TV or playing Guitar Hero.” (0)

Language Shapes Our Worldview
A psychology professor at Stanford University found that in languages with gender, the gender assigned to an objects tends to shape the way a speaker views that’s object. For example, in Spanish, “bridge” is masculine so Spanish speakers describe bridges as “strong” and “dangerous,” while German speakers for whom bridge is feminine tend to describe bridges as “fragile” and “beautiful.” Perhaps our own understanding of words like redemption, wrath, and adoption are also shaped by unseen factors. (0)

Survey Says Facebook Users Get Lower Grades
A study from educational researches at the Ohio State University found that students who regularly used facebook only study 1-5 hours per week and had GPAs in the 3.0-3.5 range, while non-facebook users study around 11-15 hours per week with GPAs in the 3.5-4.0 range. I wonder how church education compares? (0)

Risk-Reducing Technologies Increase Risk-Taking
The Pope and a Harvard scientist make an interesting argument that AIDS is increasing in Africa precisely because of condom distribution. More... (0)

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