The business end of an electric car EVTV Motor Verks
We may be at the edge of a period when consumer technology blends more easily into our lives. Silicon-based devices like iPhones may finally yield back to the quirks of our carbon-based and biological selves.
We tend to think in terms of the greater complexities of living in our age. Phones, passwords, online accounts and the like all add to the burden of keeping our lives on track. But there is an interesting reverse trend happening in the auto industry. And it may offer a lesson for the rest of us.
Basically, cars are going to become mechanically much simpler. Newer electric cars are likely to be loaded with sensors and smart computers, but the mechanical side of an electric car is a study in simplicity. Their key advantage is that an electric motor has high torque even at slow speeds. So Teslas and the scores of new models planned by other manufacturers do not need the kinds of transmissions used now to capture a gas engine’s variable power output. This is so significant because a complex part of any conventional car is its elaborate transmission and drivetrain. By contrast, an electric motor just goes, not particularly bothered by demands for low or high-speeds. In some ways, this means a Tesla has more in common with a clothes dryer than a car driven by an internal combustion engine. If you are in the transmission business in Detroit or Osaka, that’s a problem. But it’s all good for buyers of the more inexpensive electric cars on the horizon.
In a related trend, recent reports from the annual Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas signal a flattening of the innovation curve for digital media and devices. This year techies weren’t much impressed by what they saw in the way of new products. Apparently, a “virtual reality” headset can be about as much fun as wearing a football helmet backwards.
It would be a fool’s errand to bet against change in this field. But we may be at the edge of a period when newer devices blend more seamlessly into our lives. Innovations tend to be followed by periods of consolidation, where new inventions must meld into existing patterns of human behavior. Never completely, of course. But significantly. For example, many people who own “personal assistants,” such as Amazon’s Alexa or Google’s Home, use them essentially as radios. As it turns out, these devices use streaming, to the benefit of the older medium that was once given up for dead.
If the pattern of consolidation continues, silicon-based devices like iPhones may finally yield back to the quirks of our carbon-based and biological selves. Call me an optimist, but this could mean that while we appreciate the easy of connecting to family and friends over long distances, we will also cherish the HD experience of being in the same space with them. Similarly, perhaps phone connectivity may go the way of e-mail: OK, but nothing worth spending hours on. Texts may become another form of contemporary signage: pointing us to where we want to go and who we want to meet. And tweets may finally be given the status they merit: interruptions in conversations that barely merit a second glance. At least for adults on the far side of adolescence, the durable world of unadulterated and unmediated contact may again look enticing.
The idea of forbidden language is offensive in an open society. Fortunately, the resources of language can usually outflank any administration’s clumsy attempts at thought control.
Policy analysts at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta were told of the list of forbidden words at a meeting Thursday with senior CDC officials who oversee the budget, according to an analyst who took part in the 90-minute briefing. The forbidden words are “vulnerable,” “entitlement,” “diversity,” “transgender,” “fetus,” “evidence-based” and “science-based.” --Washington Post, December 15, 2017.
“A Fool’s Errand” is a phrase perfectly suited to the attempts of any bureaucracy to censor the words of their employees. But it’s doubly hard to get one’s head around a diktat coming from this enfeebled executive branch that would try to control language used by one of the nation’s premier federal agencies.
We are lucky to have the Centers for Disease Control and the 15,000 dedicated science and public health professionals it employs. Wikipedia notes that about half of these folks have advanced degrees. Many are the world’s leading authorities on illness and the control of infectious diseases. Whose bright idea was it to try to make certain public health terms forbidden? Perhaps the same kind of neanderthal who might ask a singer to only produce notes on the major scale.
The organizational impulse to ban certain unwelcome ideas is hardly novel. Employees “fronting” for industrial or institutional interests will frequently learn what to say, as well as the lexicon of terms to avoid. But it’s especially insidious when lists of unacceptable terms show up in our civil life, where there should be unfettered public discussion. This is why there is an emerging sense of satisfaction in the release of the new film, The Post. It celebrates the 1971 decision by Katherine Graham and others at the Washington Post to publish a secret government history of the ill-fated Vietnam War. A gag order has already been issued to the New York Times.
Widespread revulsion to the CDC gag order has apparently led to some backtracking on what the policy analysts can say. But these kinds of missives keep coming from all over, including state and federal leaders averting their eyes from subjects like “climate change” or “reproductive rights.” Every instance is a reminder of how hostile the dead hand of censorship can be.
To be sure, in everyday life it makes perfect sense to consider terms appropriate or inappropriate for the settings in which they are used. Editors are still scratching their heads over whether to print or broadcast some of the vulgarities uttered in the 2016 Presidential campaign. But monitoring language for appropriateness is very different than forbidding it in all contexts.
Effective synonyms can save the day. One can only hope cowed agency employees will have the will to use them.
Luckily, the resources of language are far greater than a pathetic list of banned terms proposed by management at the CDC. If “vulnerable” doesn’t work for the administration, how about “exposed,” “insecure,” “defenseless,” or “at risk”? If “entitlement” seems dangerous, how about “privileged,” “given special prerogatives,” “deserving,” “one’s birthright” or “owed to a citizen”? If “evidence-based” or “science-based” seem inexplicably risky to inflict on the public, how about “reasonable,” “rational,” “empirical,” “based on observation and study” or “what has been proven through systematic observation”? Like a star broken field runner, the resources of rhetoric can easily outrun clumsy attempts at thought control. Effective synonyms can save the day. One can only hope cowed agency employees will have the will to use them.
