Global knowledgy-porridge

There is this wise and beautiful observation from New York Times writer David Brooks, writing about his outsourced mind:

I have relinquished control over my decisions to the universal mind. I have fused with the knowledge of the cybersphere, and entered the bliss of a higher metaphysic. As John Steinbeck nearly wrote, a fella ain’t got a mind of his own, just a little piece of the big mind — one mind that belongs to everybody. Then it don’t matter, Ma. I’ll be everywhere, around in the dark. Wherever there is a network, I’ll be there. Wherever there’s a TiVo machine making a sitcom recommendation based on past preferences, I’ll be there. Wherever there’s a Times reader selecting articles based on the most e-mailed list, I’ll be there. I’ll be in the way Amazon links purchasing Dostoyevsky to purchasing garden furniture. And when memes are spreading, and humiliation videos are shared on Facebook — I’ll be there, too.

His big point here is that all our actions, blog posts, emails, clicks for goodness sake, become a part of something bigger. All this browsing and commenting and writing and photographs becomes part of something bigger, some store of global actions, events and knowledge. If I get all misty-eyed about the future I’d say something rash like we are making a global consciousness but for now let us just say we’re making a world-sized bowl of knowledgy-porridge.

So what? Well if you want to be a part of something bigger, an optimistic feeling that I am familiar with, then you have the opportunity. Go and click on stuff, recommend stuff, rate stuff, comment, write, make videos, sing songs, podcast, act. Add your stuff to the global soup.

Your stuff persits, or at least some of it does. It may well live longer than you. This is a tiny piece of your immortality, happening today.

You impact is non-linear. The butterfly effect can apply. That comment you make on that unknown blog post might change the whole world or help an important movie to get a major release, or stop something bad happening, or change a law.

Let this sit for a while. I’m going to. Then I’m going to write something about the who, how and why of gatekeepers controlling access to all our stuff in the global knowledgy-porridge.