Bob’s Blog

Jesus Christ sent His apostles to all the world to preach the gospel. The apostles traveled far and wide preaching and baptizing. We’re most familiar with Paul’s travels from Acts and the Epistles. Paul’s epistles are laced heavily with doctrinal corrections cautions about apostasy. Despite their best efforts, the apostles just couldn’t keep up with the Church as it spread across the nations. The only way to communicate was in person, by emissary, or by letter, and these methods were simply not effective enough. Soon the Church as the apostles defined it was gone. When The Church of Jesus Christ was restored in 1830, technology had not improved much since the time of Christ; life for the average person was still much the same. There was, however, one major improvement: printing. The Bible was widely owned and The Book of Mormon could be widely distributed cheaply because of the printing press. Since that time the technology of communication has improved manyfold. Now, the gospel can be spread electronically, through the internet and other media. Were it not for this dramatic increase in technology, a global Church would be impossible. Technology, especially computers, has enabled The church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints to spread throughout the world and still retain centralized leadership. Surely technological advance is inspired by God, at least partially, for this purpose. 

We all write every day. Reading and writing are part of every job, every school assignment, every game, and even our interactions with each other. We value literacy so highly that it’s one of the first things we teach our children. With the advent of computers and the internet, writing has become easier than ever. With a little training and practice, the average person can produce more than 30 words per minute. That same person can then publish his or her work for the whole world to see on the internet. Many people find great satisfaction in publishing in this way (myself included). And yet, most people (school-aged people especially) hate writing.  Perhaps the reason is the effort required, or the rules to follow Perhaps it’s because for most people writing is a chore, an assignment, or a punishment. Whatever the reason, too many people are unused to writing seriously. The result is a large number of people who are unable to form complete sentences without resorting to slang, or worse, vulgarity. I attended a production of on of Shakespeare’s works last week. The program stated that Shakespeare used over 20,000 words–1,500 of which had never been seen in print before. It also claimed that in his day the average person used more than 1000 different words in every day speech. In comparison, it claimed the average college graduate uses about 600 different words every day. The truth of this claim is perhaps suspect, but the trend is true. We don’t use our language enough. The art of eloquent speech and writing is dying. That’s why inventions like blogs that let the average American publish his own words are so important. More and more people are writing, about anything and everything. They are reviving writing as an art form and introducing it as a form of recreation.

A current court case involving a man suspected of participating in child pornography has drawn media attention due to some possibly incriminating evidence stored on a password-protected computer drive. There have been more recent posts, but this post on news.com is the most detailed. Essentially, a judge tossed out a subpoena attempting to force the defendant to reveal his PGP (Pretty Good Privacy, a common encryption scheme) password. The decision was based on 5th amendment rights. It has been appealed. This case raises an important question: Can a suspect be legally forced to divulge passwords? With a search warrant police can require entry to a house and even to a safe, so why not a computer? A password is in some ways like the key to a house or safe. However, a computer password is not “hardware” (like a key) nor is it likely that a law enforcer could gain access without the password (a house or safe can be broken into if the key is not given). Good encryption schemes are very hard to break. It all comes down to the age old debate: which is more important, the right to privacy or the need to enforce the law? I don’t know what I would answer. I want criminals caught, but I would be outraged if forced to divulge my own password(s). Then again, I would probably be just as annoyed if my house or car were searched. Do I have the right to conceal evidence from the law? Do they have the right to demand a privileged search (assuming probable cause)? These issues didn’t even exist 20 years ago. The decision of the appellant court on this case will be critical in years to come as more and more of our lives become digitized.

The internet is at the same time a treasure trove of valuable information and a junk heap of useless data.  This dual nature is unique to the internet; nowhere else do we find such indiscriminate conglomeration of information.  Before Google (and other modern search engines), finding the diamonds of valuable information in the rough of the junk heap was a tedious process.  Google has revolutionized the way we use the internet, making information increasingly more accessible.  The power available at our fingertips raises the important question of how to use that power.  Certainly seeking to gratify our base urges is not the best way to use the internet.  We must be responsible with our time and our resources.  Rather than pointlessly gather data, we should use our data-gathering capabilities to enhance our lives and those of others.  The internet can be a great force for good if we use it responsibly.