Final Blog Post

If I were to compare my relationship to technology as a real life relationship I would compare it to a toxic relationship. It is actually very interesting timing for this assignment to be given to me based on what is currently happening to me in real life. Just this week I have realized that I need to stop my addiction with my phone. Now what do I mean by addiction? Most people would hear that and think I was crazy to be addicted to my phone but I believe it is true. The amount of time that I had spent on my phone every week was well above 8 hours and this is spread out throughout the week. If you take away the time you are sleeping then you really start to see how much eight hours a week is. I found myself on my phone avoiding tasks, using it to distract myself from thinking about things that stressed me out, and overall using it and not being in the moment during my life. When I look back at my life I realize how much of it is filled with me having my face in a screen and how much of that time could have been used doing things that would better myself as a person. 

There have been many studies done by the National News and AARP that show that with the introduction of mobile phones into our everyday lives, humans attention span has gone from 12 seconds in the year 2000, to 8.25 seconds in the year 2015. This number continues to decrease due to the instant gratification we can get b just picking up our phone, and using it to conveniently fill whatever desire we have. There are studies that also have shown how children who grow up with phones aren't developing their social skills as well, along with a growing percentage of children who need glasses in elementary school due to the increased exposure to blue light. 

https://www.aarp.org/health/brain-health/info-2017/mental-focus-smartphone-use.html

https://www.thenationalnews.com/opinion/comment/mobile-phones-are-killing-our-attention-spans-and-ruining-public-discourse-1.872749

 

In the future I want to be able to leave my house without my phone and for it to not be the end of the world. If I were to go to class without it today I know for a fact I would return to my room to get it, even if it meant I was late to class, this is how I know I seriously have an issue. To begin my detox I am going to be starting slowly by deleting certain social medias. I have deleted an app called SnapChat, which is an application that you use to send pictures to and from your friends. I used to constantly be checking my phone to see if I had any new "snaps", which were pictures from my friends, even though they were meaningless. I tried once to fix the problem by turning off notifications for SnapChat but I found I would just check the app more often so it wasn't a good fix. I am going to start consciously trying to use my phone less and less so one day I can leave my house without my phone, and be able to enjoy my day without stressing over not having it on me. Not only will this be a good practice for me, but if I have children in the future I will be very mindful of how I let them be exposed to technology, now that I know the harmful effects technology truly can have. 

Age of A.I. Post

The video "In the Age of AI" by FRONTLINE, we learn about Artificial Intelligence and what it's advancements mean for our future. The video taught me many things such as how dangerous the advancements of Artificial Intelligence is for the future of human beings. The video taught me that automated systems are the way the future is going to run which means if you can afford to use the artificial intelligence you are going to be rich and if you can't you aren't going to be able to support your own family. This is a very scary thing and the reason this is true is because of how the Artificial Intelligence is an ultimate wealth growth tool. If you think about how much data FaceBook has on every single person that uses it, and how FaceBook is able to use user preferences to target advertisements to people who are more willing to buy the products, you can see how much of a wealth building tool Artificial Intelligence really is. 

Artificial Intelligence can be viewed as both a good thing as well as a bad thing. If you are wealthy and can afford to use A.I., then you are going to view it as a very good thing. You will be able to use it to advertise yourself, your business, your product, or whatever it is you need it to do. This will result in the rich getting richer in a way that we didn't know was even possible. If you are on the other end of society and you can't use A.I. then it is going to be extremely difficult to break out of the cycle and leave the lower class. You are going to end up having to work paycheck to paycheck and if you try to start your own business, you won't be able to afford to use the complicated A.I. algorithms to promote your business, which is crucial for your businesses success. 

The most concerning part of A.I. and its applications is how it's effecting our privacy. We used to think we were using social media and google to learn about outside information, when in reality these applications were using us to learn more about each of us. Our viewing habits, our screen time, what we search, what we save is all being saved and a super computer is taking this data and learning more and more about us with each click. This is great because it's learning about us to serve us in a more convenient way, but it's also extremely concerning from a security point of view because we do not know the companies objectives with all this information, and since it's being stored anyone with the resources and will can view it all at anytime. This is also concerning from a national security point of view. If our data is being stored and sold by these big tech companies, then that means so is the data of our nation. If the American government can be tracked the same way we can through these tech companies, then who's to say that they can't be bought or stolen by a different nation, such as Russia or China who would use this information, against us. 

source for all information: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5dZ_lvDgevk