New Pope Confuses Technology Reality And Fiction
from the fixed-that-for-you dept
Slashdot drew our attention to an article about the Pope warning of the dangers of new technologies, that came with the title: New technologies confuse reality and fiction: Pope. However, I'd argue that flipping the words around a bit, as I did in the title to this post, seems a bit more accurate. For years, with pretty much every new media/technology invention there's been some sort of moral panic about how it's somehow harming people's ability to tell truth from fiction. And there never seems to be any sort of evidence to support this. In fact, it seems that the only people still confusing reality and fiction are those who insist that technology has this magical property of ruining people's ability to tell reality from fiction.
Thank you for reading this Techdirt post. With so many things competing for everyone’s attention these days, we really appreciate you giving us your time. We work hard every day to put quality content out there for our community.
Techdirt is one of the few remaining truly independent media outlets. We do not have a giant corporation behind us, and we rely heavily on our community to support us, in an age when advertisers are increasingly uninterested in sponsoring small, independent sites — especially a site like ours that is unwilling to pull punches in its reporting and analysis.
While other websites have resorted to paywalls, registration requirements, and increasingly annoying/intrusive advertising, we have always kept Techdirt open and available to anyone. But in order to continue doing so, we need your support. We offer a variety of ways for our readers to support us, from direct donations to special subscriptions and cool merchandise — and every little bit helps. Thank you.
–The Techdirt Team
Filed Under: fiction, pop, reality, technology
Reader Comments
Subscribe: RSS
View by: Time | Thread
Or...
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Or...
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Re: Or...
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Re: Re: Or...
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Well...
Perhaps he is worried new technology will expose the church as the charlatan it is?
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Well...
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
I see what happened...
Seriously the head of an organisiation that is all about confusing fiction and reality is not the person to be giving advice on this issue.. or is he?
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
I see what happened...
Seriously the head of an organisiation that is all about confusing fiction and reality is not the person to be giving advice on this issue.. or is he?
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Or....Also...
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
ya the popes reality
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
"never seems to be any sort of evidence to support this"
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: "never seems to be any sort of evidence to support this"
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re:
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Although there is no definitive proof that God exists, there is also no definitive proof that he doesn't.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re:
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re:
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re:
regardless of whether God exists or not, the Bible is still a work of fiction.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re:
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Re:
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Good luck with that!
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Better ?
or would I owe someone a nickel for that ?
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Too bad (for them, but too good for us) that the church is so technophobic.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re:
The church is informationophobic.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
You Mean ...
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: You Mean ...
But what type is he? Pinot Noir, or sauvignon blanc?!!!
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Ahh the irony...
Pope Palpatine has zero credibility. See:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fcXBuDuEZTs
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=91EQ76MOwqE
http:/ /www.youtube.com/watch?v=em-9PvxbGng
I never get more tempted to scream "STFU" at my monitor than when I read about this horrible man's most recent moralizing pronouncements.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Come on, Mike
From how I read it, he is talking to the Catholic media, and is encouraging them to report the facts and avoid things like big headlines, playing up stories for appearances, etc. My take is: Hey media, technology is good, but don't let it detract from the real story. Don't be indifferent to the truth.
Mike, it seems like you did exactly what he warned against. At least you got in a good headline and some witty commentary!
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Come on, Mike
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Re: Come on, Mike
AC
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Pope Hopes Ropes Dopes
At least that's what I heard from an alter boy.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Insight Community
Yes, we all love technology, but we must remember how it benefits our lives; technology is a means to an end, not an end in and of itself. It cannot replace human interaction, regardless if its conducted over Second Life or coffee at Strabucks. Our current level of technology makes it difficult for tech-mediated communication to equal the real-world experience, but Skype is better than a phone call and cheaper than driving to visit.
As I understand the church's position, it is not against technologies like the iPad & facetime, but it is against Apple calling them 'Magical,' because this implies we can't and shouldn't understand how they work.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: “Cannot Replace Human Interaction”
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Re: �Cannot Replace Human Interaction�
If I guess at your intent, you're fearful that the church is a brainwashing agent, filling people's heads with false or limiting views on the world that prevent them from being rational, responsible citizens. We can certainly cherry-pick examples of this from the histories of most major religions, especially when viewed in a contemporary lens. But why jump all over examples to the contrary, the pope's address being the most recent? You and he are saying the exact same thing: people should take care to not get caught up in the constructs of man to the point that the occupation prevents them from engaging in society.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
In Internet years that asshole has been around for, like, centuries, but wev.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
as leftist Patrick Bloche said "Nicolas Sarkozy did not understand anything of what the internet is."
http://tempsreel.nouvelobs.com/actualite/vu-sur-le-web/20101011.OBS1135/nicolas-sarkozy-bon- catholique-en-lutte-contre-l-immoralite-d-internet.html
If I may tell you this, he called the internet a lawless area, where outlaws are allowed to pillage as they want or even commercialiaze what they pillage on the back of artists.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Remember just because a lot of people do a thing doesn't make the thing right, correct or even true. Fairy tales and myths abound from the distant past.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
To get back to the point
Cast your minds back to the printing press which was such a threat that monarchs all over Europe sought to control it. In the end they couldn't. That certainly didn't stop the attempt.
Fast forward to things like the telephone and telegraph both of which alarmed some in authority. People could plan things like stealing someone else's azaleas on the phone!
Movies could take pictures of naked people doing things naked adult humans often do, say sex, and that wouldn't be good for anyone so we got censorship. Not official censorship mind you but some MPAA version to avoid legal prescriptions. Que steam train flying into tunnel.
Go back far enough and the post was, no doubt, considered dangerous. People in remote areas could drift off into some sort of virtual reality and become anti-social while exchanging letters!
Radio, television! It doesn't even take a change in technology just how it's used. For example comic books! Oh the horror! Rock'n'Roll! Terrible! Rap and hip hop worse!
Now comes the Internet and the Web. Oh my!
We're social creatures. We'll use any excuse to talk with one another, write to one another, make pictures for each other and on and on and on. So if a new technology comes along that makes talking to each other easier humans will jump on it.
Another group of humans will jump right back on it to declare how terrible it all is and how it needs to be controlled or how careful we need to be in how we use it.
It can be a religious leader, psychologist, philosopher, cabinet minister, talk radio host, or just someone looking to fill 10 minutes of a newscast on the latest danger to us all.
Then again, because I'm here, I'm obviously an anti-social guy stuck in a virtual world because I can't handle the real one and fantasy is so much more comforting (boring as all hell after a while, mind you).
Yeah, Benedict is an easy target. Too easy, in fact. That doesn't make Mike's point any the less valid. As I pointed out there are many, many others doing and saying exactly the same things.
So carry on arguing about religion and the current holder of the Papacy, if it makes you happy.
Mike's point is still the same so why are you engaging in a mere sidebar rather than the story itself which is not Benedict but that he's only saying what so many others are who have as much, if not more, influence on our lives?
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
on the other hand...
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
marriage
[ link to this | view in chronology ]