I was thinking about how as a species we have gone from having too little access to information, to having a surfeit of it. Along the way, precious little has been done to teach us how to critically assess everything we consume now. This poem is about that. Enjoy!
A Brief History of Information Overload
Our story starts out long ago,
‘Ere once upon a time,
Before there was a pen or page,
To capture my poor rhyme.
We shared our wisdom through our tales,
In flick’ring firelight.
Yet when we passed, much that we knew,
Was lost back to the night.
So passed one hundred thousand years,
Without the written word,
So much of what was gained was lost,
Knew only what was heard.
Then finally, some marks were made,
That could mean something more,
Ideas now could be preserved,
Much better than before.
We climbed more quickly up the hill,
Of knowledge than before,
There still were those who’d hold us back,
Said we should not know more.
They would control all of the words,
Keep them from common reach,
The worthy meaning powerful,
The only ones they’d teach.
They did succeed and much was lost,
Yet still we persevered,
For people having knowledge was,
The only thing they feared.
And then one day, a great breakthrough,
One that would change the game,
A grand machine for making books,
Ten thousand all the same.
The time had come, our knowledge could,
Belong to anyone.
Still, some would seek to hold us back,
Frightened, but not yet done.
Clung desperately and terrified,
To power they had known,
Sought to control ideas for,
They had none of their own.
Still on we struggled up the hill,
Of knowledge ‘til at last,
We paused a moment to look back,
To understand our past.
Saw most had suffered needlessly,
So some could have it all,
For some time then our only goal,
To organize their fall.
But they don’t fall, they just change names,
Change how the game is played,
No longer try to hide the words,
Ten billion works displayed.
They would drown us in all the things,
We did for so long seek,
Then we like children gorged ourselves,
Soon found our minds too weak.
Could not contain, could not conceive,
The knowledge we now had,
Then unsupported, unprepared,
Went slowly, slightly mad.
And then they gave us more and more,
Consume, consume they’d say,
No time to think, no time to judge,
That just gets in the way.
You know you want to know some more,
Just Google and you’ll see,
More answers to more questions than,
You ever thought could be.
There is a problem here and now,
The worst that we have faced,
We need to find the gems within,
The years and tons of waste.
We need to learn to think again,
Not parrot what we hear,
Use knowledge to untie the knots,
To liberate from fear.
We must now be more critical,
Of things that people say,
Not of the person saying it,
Then we would lose our way.
No, we must understand the way,
Of thinking critically,
For only then, we’ll understand,
How to make our minds free.
Come sit beside my flick’ring fire,
Come listen to my voice,
For unlike those who would control,
I’m offering a choice.
I won’t be mad if you don’t think,
The same way that I do,
I am just offering a thought,
The rest is up to you.
Cheers,
Brain Bits To Go 