12.0431 millennarian dooms

Humanist Discussion Group (humanist@kcl.ac.uk)
Tue, 16 Feb 1999 20:04:24 +0000 (BST)

Humanist Discussion Group, Vol. 12, No. 431.
Centre for Computing in the Humanities, King's College London
<http://www.princeton.edu/~mccarty/humanist/>
<http://www.kcl.ac.uk/humanities/cch/humanist/>

[1] From: Ari Kambouris <aristotl@interport.net> (26)
Subject: Re: 12.0427 millennarian crises revisited

[2] From: Jan Christoph Meister <jan-c-meister@rrz.uni- (29)
hamburg.de>
Subject: Humanist 12.0427

[3] From: "Witmer, Diane" <dwitmer@Exchange.FULLERTON.EDU> (103)
Subject: FW: IU Symposium Intelligent Machines: The End of
Humanity?

--[1]------------------------------------------------------------------
Date: Tue, 16 Feb 1999 19:45:12 +0000
From: Ari Kambouris <aristotl@interport.net>
Subject: Re: 12.0427 millennarian crises revisited

OK, and one last one:

From: MIS
To: CEO, CFO, CIO

Our staff has completed the 18 months of work on time and on budget.
We have gone through every line of code in every program in every
system.

We have analyzed all databases, all data files, including backups
and historic archives, and modified all data to reflect the change.
We are proud to report that we have completed the "Y-to-K" date change
mission, and have now implemented all changes to all programs and all
data to reflect your new standards:

Januark, Februark, March, April, Mak, June, Julk, August, September,
October, November, December

As well as:
Sundak, Mondak, Tuesdak, Wednesdak, Thursdak, Fridak, Saturdak

I trust that this is satisfactory, because to be honest, none of
this Y to K problem has made any sense to me. But I understand it is
a global problem, and our team is glad to help in any way possible.
And what does the year 2000 have to do with it? Speaking of which,
what do you think we ought to do next year when the two digit year
rolls over from 99 to 00? We'll await your direction."

Ari Kambouris
Metaphor Group, Inc.
Information Architecture and Project Management Consulting
WWW | CD-ROM | Kiosk
tel. 212.740.6306
pager. 917.243.1548

--[2]------------------------------------------------------------------
Date: Tue, 16 Feb 1999 19:45:39 +0000
From: Jan Christoph Meister <jan-c-meister@rrz.uni-hamburg.de>
Subject: Humanist 12.0427

10:25
15.02.1999

Re: Cassius to Plutonius on Y0K

This must be the most entertaining thing I've read about the Y2K-phobia!

The mind boggles at the fact that in the end, all it takes to secure
survival of a cultural topos is a bunch of short sighted programmers.
Without these instruments of providence we would have nothing to match the
fear of Armageddon that haunted humanity at the first millenial
transition.

Thinking about it: Isn't it high time that someone create a Website putting
tools for virtual flagellation at our disposal? We won't be given a chance
to suffer so enjoyably for quite some time. Just imagine: a mere 300 odd
days and everything, everything will come to a halt - no e-mail, no salary
cheques, all dentist's appointments null and void (but not your tooth ake)
and all the hard drives of the world engaging in a huge collective
re-format. And then we'll kick off anew, with a clean slate and plenty of
Gigabytes at our disposal and the same old questions to be solved.

Christoph

**************************

Dr. Jan Christoph Meister
Arbeitsstelle zur Sozialgeschichte der Literatur
Literaturwissenschaftliches Seminar
Universität Hamburg
E-Mail: jan-c-meister@rrz.uni-hamburg.de

--[3]------------------------------------------------------------------
Date: Tue, 16 Feb 1999 19:46:30 +0000
From: "Witmer, Diane" <dwitmer@Exchange.FULLERTON.EDU>
Subject: FW: IU Symposium Intelligent Machines: The End of Humanity?

Hi Willard--

I thought this might be of interest to the list, despite the lateness of the
announcement.

-Diane-
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
* Diane F. Witmer, Department of Communications
* Cal State Fullerton Office Phone: 714-278-7008
* dwitmer@fullerton.edu
* http://commfaculty.fullerton.edu/dwitmer/

> ----------
>
> Date: Sat, 13 Feb 1999 13:37:20 -0500
> From: Rob Kling <kling@indiana.edu>
> >
> At IU, Saturday March 6.
>
> See: http://www.cogsci.indiana.edu/symposium99.html
>
>
> As the year 2000 starts rushing headlong towards us, we all are
> thinking about many changes. But how many of us are thinking along
> the radical lines of several recent books, all of which -- all
> written by highly reputed authorities -- argue that because of the
> relentlessly accelerating march of technology, desktop-computer power
> will, within just a few decades, far exceed that of the human brain,
> and shortly thereafter will even exceed the collective thinking power
> of all humanity. They further argue that such thinking entities
> will merge with nanotechnology and virtual reality, and the products
> that will emerge from this convergence will be intelligences of an
> inconceivably powerful sort, leaving us humans behind in the dust.
>
> All this is foreseen, at least by these experts, by the end
> of the coming century. Clearly, if there is even the tiniest grain
> of truth to what they claim, we should all be profoundly concerned
> with these prospects. We need to evaluate the likelihood that what
> they claim is true, the degree to which these forecasts are anathema
> to us, and if a true calamity seems in store, then what sorts of
> measures might be taken to forestall it before it is too late.
> On theother hand, all of this might be seen as groundless poppycock,
> as nothing more than what happens when silly science-fiction-addicted
> minds splice sloppy and wishful thinking together into an incoherent
> goulash. If this is so, however, then why do these books get
> published by top-notch publishers, get reviewed by the nation's top
> newspapers, get promoted by the editors of "Scientific American", andbr> > so forth?
>
> Are we dealing with the sublimest of hokum, or are we dealing
> with something to be taken truly seriously? Whither humanity and
> its ever more powerful, ever more flexible, ever more reflective
> technology in the coming ten decades?
>
> Welcome and Introduction
> Douglas R. Hofstadter
> College Professor of Cognitive Science and Computer Science
> Center for Research on Concepts and Cognition
>
> Panel Chair and Moderator
> J. Michael Dunn
> Oscar R. Ewing Professor of Philosophy and
> Professor of Computer Science
> Director, Office for Informatics
>
> Panelists
> Andrew Dillon
> Associate Professor of Information Science
> Thomas F. Gieryn
> Professor of Sociology
> Rob Kling
> Professor of Information Science and Information Systems
> Director, Center for Social Informatics
> Michael A. McRobbie
> Professor of Computer Science and Professor of Philosophy
> Vice President for Information Technology and
> Chief Information Officer at Indiana University
> Gregory J. E. Rawlins
> Associate Professor of Computer Science
> Richard M. Shiffrin
> Luther Dana Waterman Professor of Psychology
> Director, Cognitive Science Program
> Brian Cantwell Smith
> Professor of Cognitive Science and Computer Science
> Linda B. Smith
> Chancellors' Professor of Psychology
> John Woodcock
> Associate Professor of English
>
> ----
> Rob Kling
> http://www.slis.indiana.edu/kling
> The Information Society (journal) http://www.slis.indiana.edu/TIS
> Center for Social Informatics http://www.slis.indiana.edu/CSI
> Indiana University
> 10th & Jordan, Room 005C
> Bloomington, IN 47405-1801 812-855-9763 // Fax: 855-6166
>
> Read & contribute to the ....
> Social Informatics Home Page --> http://www.slis.indiana.edu/SI
> a resource about research, teaching, conferences & journals
>
> Read:
> "What is Social Informatics and Why Does it Matter?"
> D-Lib Magazine January 1999 Volume 5 Number 1
> at http://www.dlib.org:80/dlib/january99/kling/01kling.html
>

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