In Moths to the Flame, Gregory Rawlins takes us on a humorous yet thought-provoking tour of the world wrought by modern technology.
The book’s first four chapters explore the worlds of privacy, virtual reality, publishing, and computer networks, while the last four focus on social issues such as warfare, jobs, computer catastrophes, and the future itself. Throughout, eye-opening historical comparisons give a context for the computer age, showing how new technologies have always bred hope and resistance. Provocative yet balanced and sophisticated, Moths to the Flame is an indispensable guidebook to the future.
Customer Reviews
An unengaging read.:
In the preface, the author poses many naturally interesting questions like “Who will become the information aristocracy and who will becomes the infoserfs of the next generation?”. The book proper, however, doesn’t do much to answer them.
Primarily, the author rambles on vaguely about the possible synergy between humans and computers/robots in the near future. He also highlights the challenges that the complexity of recent and future technologies pose. There do appear some interspersed interesting tidbits, as well. But, in the end, this book is not really thought-provoking. If you are even moderately aware of modern technologies that pervade human societies in developed economies, you will not gather any novel impressions from this book.
What’s wrong:
Hey, I’m only half way through it but I’m loving this book. What’s wrong with me? I found his chapter on e-books and publishing to be right on the mark and couldn’t help but think of Napster when he talks about “dinosaur killers” in chapter 3, and Stephen Kings recent e-Book offering. I even double checked the publishing date as the book seems so current.
Sure he is not as deep here as Postman or Roszak, but if you want an entertaining book you will buzz through in a couple of hours, get it.
Painfully Trite:
“For two decades now I’ve been awaiting a book explaining computers and their social consequences to literate readers,” claims the author. Readers with similar hopes will not find satisfaction in this book. Rather, Rawlins casually addresses important issues concerning the role of computers concerning privacy, war, and poverty with no apparent insights or solutions. His descriptions of technologies are insultingly simplistic; one wonders if an average high-school student might have more interesting views on computers. This book’s lack of footnotes and bibliography adds support to this reader’s suspicion that the author just wrote down whatever came to mind. If Rawlins still wonders about computers and “their social consequences,” he might try reading Niel Postman’s “Technopoly” or any of the brilliant works of Theodore Roszak.
A poor treatment of a serious topic:
There are a lot of reasons for thoughtful concern about the proliferation of computer technology in our society. Invasions of privacy, loss of contact with our fellow beings, etc., are all very valid concerns! To his credit, the author (obviously a well-accomplished professional in the computer science area) raises these perhaps unpopular themes. However, having once raised the issues he does not follow through with sound analyses of the problems and recommendations for their amelioration. Frankly, some of what he has to say comes across as barely thought out and silly. At one point he discusses a particular negative ramification of computer technology (I don’t have the book in front of me so I cannot be certain which one it is. He describes the problem, indicates that it may have an adverse effect on us, and concludes that the presence of the problem has many implications, and then drops it. I, personally, would have liked to have known what some of those implications are! The whole book looks like it was written too fast and edited poorly. Save your money.
