etc.

All is not well in the real world of technology. This book is the published version of the Massey Lectures Ursula Franklin gave at the University of Toronto in 1989, and sadly, even in 2003 the majority of Franklin’s observations and ruminations are not dated. I say sadly because what Franklin does in these lectures is try to come to some understanding of the way in which technological advances impact our “real world”, and the impact is by and large, not positive. In a richly humanistic way, Franklin examines the smallest and most insignificant of technologies, like the modern computer keyboard. Today’s keyboard is based on a layout designed by E. Remington and Sons, the typewriter manufacturer. Early typewriters were riddled with jamming hammers and keys, so Remington commissioned a study to come to an understanding of letter associations – or which letters are struck in closest and most frequent proximity to which letters. Based on the results of the study, Remington designed a keyboard that physically separated associated letters as widely as possible. Even though more conveniently designed keyboards have been produced since then, it is the Remington layout that has survived and remains in use for modern computers, even though the original constraints that led to the development of the current layout (keys and hammers jamming), have long since disappeared.

But Franklin doesn’t stop there. At the heart of these lectures, she is most concerned about the impact of technology on the environment and the role that government plays (or lack thereof) in that impact. She begins by suggesting that the lifespan and proliferation of technological devices (from cars to computers) is something that should be taken seriously, and that it is the role of government to take such things seriously. But corporations develop new technologies with little concern for their impact on the environment and history has proven that governments have led the charge in building support infrastructures for these emerging technologies, and have failed to safeguard the environment while doing so: “I made a plea that we get away from the egocentric and technocentric mindset that regards nature as an infrastructure to be adjusted and used like all other infrastructures” (118).

Ultimately, Franklin suggests that the only way to illicit change is to do it at the grassroots level, by starting small and eventually bringing the discourse into the public sphere, much in the same way that the abolition of slavery or the liberation of women began small and eventually worked their way into resounding, policy changing public discourses. Sadly, once again, 14 years later and there is little evidence that any such discourse is gaining momentum in the public sphere. I agree with and ardently salute most of what Franklin says in this book, and while I have some reservations about a few of her ideas (for example, in her utopian vision, government is trusted and granted far more control than it would in mine), it is truly one of those books that opens your eyes and makes you think about the things you take for granted in a completely changed way. This book should be required reading for every warm-blooded human being.