basis of Google Flu Trends, to predict where the flu spreads is incredibly helpful. But if we want to know how to control its spread, we must better understand why it spreads. And once we do so, it seems likely that our predictions might themselves become more nuanced.
In fact, authors of a recent study critiquing the predictive power of Google Flu Trends have made this very point. 4 The authors argue that more refined predictive techniques drawing on traditional methods of modeling can be at least as accurate as Googleâs method, which they demonstrate has routinely overestimated the amount of flu cases by as much as 30 percent. They ascribe this to what they call âbig data hubris,â or the assumption that sheer data size alone will always result in more predictive power. The researchersâ point is not that big data techniques arenât helpful, but that the Google algorithm is not likely to be a good stand-alone method for predicting the spread of the flu.
Given our argument above, this is not surprising. Big data techniques are going to assist our models and explanations, not supplant them.
The creativity of understanding helps to explain our intuitive sense that understanding is a cognitive act of supreme value and importance, not just for where it gets us but in itself. Creativity matters to human beings. Thatâs partly because the creative problem-solver is more apt to survive, or at least to get what she wants. But we also value it as an end. It is something we care about for its own sake; being creative is an expression of some of the deepest parts of our humanity.
Finally, understanding can also have a reflexive element. Ourdeepest moments of understanding reveal to us how we ourselves fit into the whole. Thus, an act of understanding something or someone else can also help you understand yourself. When that happens, understanding comes with what Freud called the âoceanic feelingââthe feeling of interconnectedness.
Perhaps this is why we treasure those moments of understanding in both ourselves and others. If youâve ever taught or coached or parented someone, youâve tried to help someone understand. The moment they do is what makes the effort worthwhile. If that moment never comes, you regret it because that person is missing out on an act of creative personal expression, a chance to see how the parts connect to make the whole.
So even if, contrary to what Iâve suggested here, we are someday able to outsource our understanding to some coming piece of glorious technology, it is not clear that we should want to. To do so risks losing something deep, something that makes us not just digitally human, but human, period.
Information and the Ties That Bind
What would it be like if you had the Internet connected directly to your brain? That, or something like it, is the future toward which we are barreling. The hyperconnectivity of our phones, cars, watches and glasses is just the beginning. The Internet of Things has become the Internet of Everything, the Internet of Us.
These pages have spun a cautionary tale about this progress, but there is actually a lot to be optimistic about. The massive amount of data that is making hyperconnected knowing possible has the potential to help cure diseases, contribute to constructive solutionsto climate change and tell us more about our own preferences, prejudices and inclinations than we ever thought possible. I look forward to these developments, and I hope you do too. My point in this book is that we should nonetheless approach the future with our eyes wide open, especially since our relationship with the Internet is becoming more and more intimate. Intimacy brings comfort, but it also makes us vulnerable.
Some of these vulnerabilities are extensions of those we already have. The Internet of Us will be comprised of human bodies that are themselves communicating with one another, and with the Net, through a variety of
In fact, authors of a recent study critiquing the predictive power of Google Flu Trends have made this very point. 4 The authors argue that more refined predictive techniques drawing on traditional methods of modeling can be at least as accurate as Googleâs method, which they demonstrate has routinely overestimated the amount of flu cases by as much as 30 percent. They ascribe this to what they call âbig data hubris,â or the assumption that sheer data size alone will always result in more predictive power. The researchersâ point is not that big data techniques arenât helpful, but that the Google algorithm is not likely to be a good stand-alone method for predicting the spread of the flu.
Given our argument above, this is not surprising. Big data techniques are going to assist our models and explanations, not supplant them.
The creativity of understanding helps to explain our intuitive sense that understanding is a cognitive act of supreme value and importance, not just for where it gets us but in itself. Creativity matters to human beings. Thatâs partly because the creative problem-solver is more apt to survive, or at least to get what she wants. But we also value it as an end. It is something we care about for its own sake; being creative is an expression of some of the deepest parts of our humanity.
Finally, understanding can also have a reflexive element. Ourdeepest moments of understanding reveal to us how we ourselves fit into the whole. Thus, an act of understanding something or someone else can also help you understand yourself. When that happens, understanding comes with what Freud called the âoceanic feelingââthe feeling of interconnectedness.
Perhaps this is why we treasure those moments of understanding in both ourselves and others. If youâve ever taught or coached or parented someone, youâve tried to help someone understand. The moment they do is what makes the effort worthwhile. If that moment never comes, you regret it because that person is missing out on an act of creative personal expression, a chance to see how the parts connect to make the whole.
So even if, contrary to what Iâve suggested here, we are someday able to outsource our understanding to some coming piece of glorious technology, it is not clear that we should want to. To do so risks losing something deep, something that makes us not just digitally human, but human, period.
Information and the Ties That Bind
What would it be like if you had the Internet connected directly to your brain? That, or something like it, is the future toward which we are barreling. The hyperconnectivity of our phones, cars, watches and glasses is just the beginning. The Internet of Things has become the Internet of Everything, the Internet of Us.
These pages have spun a cautionary tale about this progress, but there is actually a lot to be optimistic about. The massive amount of data that is making hyperconnected knowing possible has the potential to help cure diseases, contribute to constructive solutionsto climate change and tell us more about our own preferences, prejudices and inclinations than we ever thought possible. I look forward to these developments, and I hope you do too. My point in this book is that we should nonetheless approach the future with our eyes wide open, especially since our relationship with the Internet is becoming more and more intimate. Intimacy brings comfort, but it also makes us vulnerable.
Some of these vulnerabilities are extensions of those we already have. The Internet of Us will be comprised of human bodies that are themselves communicating with one another, and with the Net, through a variety of
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