Blind tech 090612

The Pentagon has grabbed a new buzzword, make that a couple of words, “Incestuous Amplification. (IA).”  DOD’s embrace of an academic phrase to explain an old and well-documented political and technological condition is not new. 

The military has a long history of plagiarism, believing it is above the law since it has the power behind law.  The problem however is not restricted to military arrogance; IA is pervasive in the American culture.

Public and private project managers are known to enhancing their project results for larger budgets, promotions or just political capital.  It is inevitable that they soon begin to believe their own marketing propaganda and politicians jump on board in hopes of a silver bullet that saves their agendas.  Feeding on itself IA soon becomes a run away train going down hill on the wrong track.  Manipulated data and flawed feedback stokes the locomotive’s fires ever hotter.  With its safety valves of truths tied down, sooner or later the boiler will explode.  Today’s supposed silver bullets are technologically centric.  Wars can be won by remote controlled toys; elections by social media and profits rise on techno sales based on IA of successes.

Consider the claims that remote control drones are winning wars since every round fired destroys the Taliban chief, generating a great victory.  The problem is that the military hasn’t learned that the Taliban is only a small portion of the insurgency, growing with each misfired round.  The IA comes from remote operators claiming hero status from 10,000 miles away for every body left in a crater, colonels claiming stars for every mission flown and politicians desperate for a victorious exit justification.

Decision processes are disconnected from reality. Decision-makers see what they want to see rather than what is, reacting with ever greater reliance on hope over base line truths.  In scientific methodology this is called ‘save the hypothesis’ where all data contradicting the desired outcome are discarded. 

This election year candidates perceive victory as resting on smart phones, I-something or the other and “twits.”  Campaign goals are control of the social media to obscure the absence of coherent social agendas.  Victory is seen as inciting the largest mob but mobs are ungovernable.  Social media gurus point to the Arab Spring as social media’s revolutionary victory but a year later the revolutions continue and instability reigns.  Terror is homegrown for mobs have no agenda but rather thousands of conflicting agendas.  The strong will devour the weak and victors will devour democratic reforms.

Technophiles are writing a prescription for increasing disorientation, which will increase confusion and disorder among the human drones attempting to make decisions, resulting ultimate systemic failures.

Technology is only a tool not a solution. While not the fastest computer, good solutions still rely on critical human minds supplied with honest data.