Too Much Information

Prehistory. Prehistoric.

Before recorded time there was unrecorded time. I'm not talking about the Universe and its origin and age. From time-to-time I suspect that we'll use our limited resources, not too wisely I think, to answer the questions of curious scientists, without improving the lot of those who are paying the bill. But that's neither here nor there, and it certainly isn't the point of this essay.

I'm more interested in the unrecorded time on earth – the time we call “prehistoric.” Even after the appearance of our species – and there are many others as well – we lacked an understandable written language, and the way to record and transmit it. What happened then?

Santayana, and many others have written that the knowledge of the past is invaluable to us in planning our futures and in avoiding past mistakes. We learn. We “stand on the shoulders” of those who preceded us. But we can only do that if we know what they said and what they did. Hence there are archaeologists, who try to reconstruct the past from evidence left by our antecedents even those who didn't know how to record them, or made no attempt to do so.

They left information though. They left evidence of their existence, their interests, and their skills. They may not have left written histories, but there are paintings and tools, cooking fires and burial mounds, and many other artifacts. With detective skills the archaeologists can determine a little of what preceded us and tell us about it.

But if they can do so without information being created intentionally, what will happen when, a few thousand years from now, they try to piece together the twenty-first century, and beyond? Recordings, movies, television tapes, social media – the mass of information provided by entrepreneurs and the self-absorbed will be massive. It already is.

Consider Facebook and YouTube, for example. There's so much on them to sort through. It may be embarrassing, as almost all of it is, but it tells a lot about our society. As do all of the other sites that allow people to express their views – usually on subjects of no interest to anyone but themselves – and to display the photographs and videos that they've taken on the numerous devices they have. It's money down the drain, and they subject all their “friends” to it. Surely they'll be fascinated as we are.

And, of course, there are the blogs, like this one. I'm not immune to polluting the present and the future with my personal views. I know they'll be of no consequence to others, but that's not my problem.

But what about the future. Ultimately others will look back at our time and try to learn from us as we have learned from our past. What will they find? Fortunately we'll never know. If we did, we'd blush or hide. There's far more than we might want to reveal, and there's no taking it back. Once it's on the computer it, like a diamond, is forever. Or is it?

Do you remember eight-track tapes? And Betamax? The formats are no longer produced. And the devices that played them have no value. Do you remember tape cassettes with computer programs, and floppy discs?

Times change. Perhaps in the future the nonsense we produce today will cease to be of value because the information will be incompatible with the devices they have, and they won't have access to it. We can only hope.

They'll still have our paintings and our tools. And our cemeteries. And by then the space explorers will be returning – perhaps not much older if they've really been speeding – so perhaps they can help out. Or, at least, they'll give everyone other things to think about.