JUNGER@CWRU.BITNET (Peter Junger) (09/30/88)
I find that I agree with many, and perhaps most, of the concerns expressed by Magrass and Upchurch in their article "Computer Literacy: The Pigeonhole Principle," without being able -- or wanting -- to accept their analytical framework. Since I suspect that many will be eager to destroy the Marxist scaffolding on which the authors have structured their article, I think it worthwhile to point out that their concerns are not logically dependent on Marxist theology. For example, Magrass and Upchurch claim that: "One approach to computer literacy is tantamount to molding the individual to ruling class needs." For most of us the argument would be more forceful if it were phrased in terms of molding the individual to the perceived needs of the market (or the State or Society) and most forceful if it were phrased in terms of molding the individual to conform to yesterday's technology. The problem is that it is hard to believe that there is anything that corresponds to the author's "orthodox Marxist definition of ruling class, i.e. the class that dominates the means of production." In note 6 the authors explain that "we imply that the ruling class is the owners or controllers of information technology." As a lawyer I am afraid that the concept of "owners of information technology" is almost incoherent; I am certain that if one could identify those "owners" they would at most constitute a congeries; they most certainly are not a class in any sociological sense. Most of you (I exclude myself) who subscribe to Computers and Society Digest can be described as "controllers of information technology" -- as can half the librarians in the country -- but I would be surprised if you delude yourself that you are members of the (of even _a_) ruling class. When I was a PFC draftee in the Army I was convinced, as I still am, that PFC's run the army; but no PFC has ever thought that he was a member of a ruling anything. If there is a ruling class its members certainly do not know enough about computers to control them and those who can control computers have very little power. What Magrass and Upchurch describe is better analyzed in terms of a "technological imperative" that disempowers everyone, not least the members of the erstwhile ruling class and those who serve the technology. Recent issues of Computers & Society Digest have shown a great concern with the definition -- and reality, or lack thereof -- of the personal computer. What Magrass and Upchurch describe is the -- I suspect inevitable -- consequences of impersonal computers. I find those consequences frightening, but I cannot believe that the "binary language of a computer system" protects the interests of the ruling class and that those interests are endangered by "intuition." The problem, I am afraid, is more intractable than that. We would have to use binary language if our machines only responded to binary language, but that is no longer the case -- if it ever was. What I fear is that when neural nets are capable of having intuitions, they will have to translate them into binary language before the products of our educational system will be able to understand them. I think we should also be concerned that the some processes that are at work in "computer education" are also present in more traditional fields. The increasing concern for "scientific" [read "technological"] education and "cultural literacy" [read "conformity"] expressed by business leaders does not differ radically from the demand for "computer literacy." One can hardly expect that the slaves of the machine -- those same business leaders -- would imagine that education -- and computers -- could actually be liberating. Now if we could somehow let people understand that computers aren't means of material production, that they are tools for thought, we might help create a more pleasant world. Peter Junger