Chateau Lloyd

For the past couple of days I've been unable to get into the site.  This may or may not have been related to the catastrophic computer failures that devastated the travel sector, but it's a reminder that the technology that now seems so vital to us is actually both fragile and still quote new.

I'm in the middle of middle age, yet I can remember burning through paper checks to pay bills not that long ago.  I now keep my ledger on a spreadsheet rather than on paper, but I can go back to it fairly easily.

An entire generation of people have no idea what I am talking about.

For a long time, modern technology increased both society's convenience and resilience.  Telephone and radio allowed for instantaneous long-distance communication, greatly enhancing responses to disasters or public safety emergencies.  Our medical system engaged and destroyed diseases like smallpox and brought polio to the brink of extinction.  

Yet at some point, it all turned sour.  Our communications are now extremely vulnerable to the extent that a backhoe digging near St. Louis a few years back crippled American computer networks.  This latest incident is a reminder that the profit motive can result in tremendous advances but also dangerous weaknesses.

The same is true of medicine.  Where bright minds once battled disease, our doctors now seek to unmake humanity itself, telling troubled children that they can and should be mutilated and chemically castrated in order to make them feel better.  The Covid pandemic demonstrated that modern medicine  is more about asserting authority than healing.

The key takeaway is to look at other networks for support.  Friends, family, community, parish - these are far more resilient and much less prone to corruption and exploitation.