10.90 My Conclusions

My conclusions?

(Considering that man is sometimes called the tool-making animal, it is not surprising that machines that calculate have been with us since very nearly the beginning.)

Even within the last half-century, and even within the narrower class of things we have called a personal computer in the last thirty years, there is a huge range of functionality. The differences between an abacus and a MacBook are daunting, but so are the differences between a Micro Chroma 68 (or a Commodore 64) and a MacBook.

If we focus too narrowly on one class of computers, we miss a whole lot of other things going on.

That's usually no big deal, we have to focus to get any work done.

But when lawyers or legislators or judges or CEOs or patent examiners (etc.) forget that the word "computer" covers a huge range of devices, they tend to make some serious errors in judgment. This is true in patents which are somehow granted based on the magic words, "does this unoriginal thing, but with a computer". It is also true in networking, when we try to use computers to control the uses of our "intellectual property" at a distance.

It is especially damaging when the "miraculous" power of the computer is called upon to do such inherently impossible things as establish or enforce identity, or find out who the bad guys are.

The power of the computer is that it can do lots of calculations very quickly. That is all.

That doesn't allow us to be in two places at once, even if it can give us a virtual presence where our bodies are not.

It does not allow us to prescribe laws which circumvent nature, even though we can make it hard for people to do things which come natural.

It does not allow us to escape the consequences of immoral or unethical activities, even if it allows us to research thousands of cases of people who have been as stupid as we are.

I think the foregoing is enough to establish a little context for the theoretical stuff that follows. Let's move on.