I don't care what people want beyond what they need and deserve to get. Harry
> >From: Jed Rothwell <[email protected]> >To: [email protected] >Sent: Thu, November 4, 2010 4:29:33 PM >Subject: Re: [Vo]:OFF TOPIC Progress in One Laptop Per Child (OLPC) project > > >Steven V Johnson <[email protected]> wrote: > >> Many years ago Bill Gates said that Third World people do not need >>> computers, they need food and medical care. Gates is a great humanitarian >>> philanthropist, and he knew a lot about Third World conditions, but he was >>> wrong about that. >> >>My sediments as well. One has to ask: after the third world is >>healthy, what will they do with the rest of their healthy lives. >> On that subject, I love this quote from Samuel Florman: > > >. . . Our contemporary problem is distressingly obvious. We have too many >people >wanting too many things. This is not caused by technology; it is a consequence >of the type of creature that man is . . . > >It is common knowledge that millions of underprivileged families want adequate >food and housing. What is less commonly remarked is that after they have >adequate food and housing they will want to be served at a fine restaurant and >to have a weekend cottage by the sea. People want tickets to the Philharmonic >and vacation trips abroad . . . The illiterate want to learn how to read. Then >they want education, and then more education, and then they want their sons >and >daughters to become doctors and lawyers. It is frightening to see so many >millions of people wanting so much. It is almost like being present at the >Oklahoma land rush, except that millions are involved instead of hundreds, and >instead of land, the prize is everything that life has to offer. > >- S. Florman, The Existential Pleasures of Engineering (St. Martin’s Griffin, >1996), p. 76 > >I quoted this in chapter 21 of my book. Florman is great! > >I love the idea that some kid in India or Africa right now is using a laptop >computer to download lesson plans from MIT and will go on to invent some >wonderful thing and become a multimillionaire. Like William Kamkwamba, author >of >"The Boy Who Harnessed the Wind" who learned basic physics and electrical >engineering from a U.S.-government supported local library. This will be more >competition for our children, but it is the kind of competition we want. > > >In the 1950s and 60s, Japanese families caught up with U.S. families in living >standards, education, health and most other metrics. I never got the sense >that >we are poorer because they got richer. Naturally there is some competition for >scarce resources such as oil, but most resources nowadays are things like >silicon (sand) or bandwidth, which are available in unlimited quantities. >There >seems to be quite a lot of space in Japan to grow more food, if they ever >decide >to grow their own food again instead of buying it from us. If they build food >factories I am pretty sure their entire agricultural production system would >fit >in less space than Osaka. It would look a lot nicer than Osaka. > > >- Jed > >
