Siri can disempower

technology can diminish us

there’s a deep irony

in how disempowering technology can be,

Google can answer most any question

but I fear we have fewer questions

than we did when we had to work for the answer,

the trivial online can seduce us away from thinking and work

as we surf the net with no more redeeming value

than surfing channels on television,

we can know where we are,

we can know what’s happening anywhere,

we can now just click for a quick answer,

and we then forget 

to use our own minds, guesses, decisions,

our autonomy diminishes, atrophies,

we follow Siri and not our own reckoning,

we send out our evaluations from our school

in electronic rather than paper form, we save paper!

and I fear each document has less value

because anything we get online

is tarnished by its ease

and by being kissing cousin to spam,

I fear we are diminished by our servants,

lessened when we forget to venture forth

in the audacious courage to believe that yes, we can.

by Henry H. Walker

January 25, ‘16