On Fri, 30 Mar 2001, Ben Damm wrote:
|This is a rather interesting article. There has been quite some press
|about the possible connection between computer-skilled people (although
|most press make the mistake of using the term "hacker") having some kind
|of medical "problem" that results in their computer interest.
I've been pushing for some unbiased reasearch on this since about DefCon 5,
but I have limited experience dealing with sociologists and anthropologists.
Then again, I was not shooting for obtaining the interest of psychologists
and psychiatrists -- or folks that might actually have experience with the
people in this 'scene.'
|Of course, the connections that researchers are trying to make seem to be
|flawed, because when I apply the "typicals" of the disease in question to
|myself or to others they invariably break down because I know why I became
|interested in computers. A possibility would be that a "disease" causes
|interaction problems at a young age, resulting in a ripple effect leading
|to computers.
Unfortunately the motiviation behind the intrest now is biased and aimed
at trying to figure out what is "wrong" with us. The same approach is
applied at other types of people who suddenly appear in the limelight due
to their unconventional actions. I doubt the research produced today would
equal the quality or the accuracy of something initiated a few years ago.
|I also don't buy the "disease" theory because I've been able to modify my
|behaviour in places where I saw that it didn't work. Unless, of course,
|there is some kind of social interaction blueprint gene being mislabelled
|as a "disease".
I was initially put off by the idea of "computer addiction" until I realized
there really isn't anything else as specific. We see every day how decades-
old institutions are being changed by the implementation of technology
(and the Internet in general) so I figured it was an 'okay' step in the right
direction. (Generalize first, and hope someone gets around to specifically
analyzing down the right paths.)
|Further, labelling it as a "disease" is misleading because the effects
|that these researchers claim are hardly bad. An ability to work with
|numbers? The ability to focus on one thing for long periods of time?
|Honest and law-abiding? Intelligent? These are hardly problems that we
|need to fix. If only everybody had these abilities.
ADD/ADHD/Asperger was not associated with our "abilities" until recently,
because how we did things was ignored and what we did them with was the
surprise factor. We live in a unique world where "e"-terms have taken over
for 'real-life' terms when applied in a digital environment. E-commerce is
still shopping, for heaven's sake, but non-technical folks have to turn it
into a revolution. I believe the reasoning why "computer addicts" were not
identified as having ADD or ADHD early on was because it seemed their problem
was only associated with computers. (And then it became apparent there was
nothing else to associate it with, because some of us spend 95% of our waking
hourr in front of a keyboard and CRT.)
|The idea that an engineer knows other engineers in their immediate family
|is not surprising, and it doesn't support the idea that being an engineer
|is a genetic trait. In my case, I knew an engineer who was a close family
|friend, but not genetically related. At the age of eight, I asked for a
|robot for Christmas. I did not get a robot, instead the engineer gave me
|a box of computer parts. He helped me set it up, and I was hooked. This
|kind of mentoring can result in an engineer. As for the abilities,
|childhood patterning can account for most, if not all, traits.
Eventually, someone will take the technology factor out of the equation and
realize there hasn't really been a significant change in human behavior. It
is not anyone's fault how it is applied, it's just a heck of a lot easier to
"utilize" the disorder at the keyboard of a computer. What will come out of
a successful evaluation is that a heck of a lot more people -- now and
throughout the ages -- have had "disorders" like these, it's just not been
apparent because there hasn't been a medium where they were used and exposed
like technology allows us to.
|-Ben
I'm reminded of a concert shirt I have from a old Nitzer Ebb show:
"What is normal?"
.nhoJ
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Received on Mon Apr 2 06:58 CDT 2001