The Blind Spot – A Short Story

[…]
And my heart owns a doubt
Whether ’tis in us to arise with day
And save ourselves unaided.
Robert Frost, Storm fear (1913)

Early in the morning, Squad N010 arrived on the beach. The weather was very windy and cloudy, the sky looked pale and a pungent, pervading smell of rotten algae made even more unpleasant the fact of being in that place at that hour. Gatekeepers – as squad members were usually called – were not cowards. On the contrary, they were determined to accomplish their duty till the very end. Nevertheless, over the previous weeks many of them had continuously seesawed between eagerness and terror – both emotions being so powerful to almost paralyze their minds.

The Squad Captain, Erskyin Kolbahrt, ordered a quick inspection of the shore to make sure that all landmarks stones were in place. It was essential that every member of the team knew exactly where to position himself at the agreed hour. Kolbahrt, by the way, did not feel very well – his mind being still affected by the long-term symptoms of the Beta Syndrome he had contracted a few months earlier.

The Loop of Democracy

Irrational Absurd Triangle Escher Triangle Geometry

Back in 1992, American political philosopher Francis Fukuyama published the influential essay The End of History and the Last Man. His main thesis pointed out that, after the end of the Cold War, liberal democracy was destined to become, gradually, the final form of government. After 25 years, we may argue that (somehow) he was right – but probably not for the reason he thought. Even if we certainly live in deeply chaotic times, history is far from being come to an end. Nevertheless, liberal democracies may represent the final (or terminal) form of government (at least in Western countries) not because they are the best option available, but because of the incapability of conceiving something different. In other words, I fear we are not moving forward since we are short-sighted, and not because we have found a settlement so good that it is preferable not to leave it.

The Finger and the Moon

One of the most daunting aspects about technology is represented by the highly unpredictable consequences it always implies. Mankind creates and shapes technology, but we may argue that the latter tends to produce – as we are reminded by Newton’s Third Law of physics – an almost “equal and opposite reaction”. Sometime, the outcomes are better than expected; sometimes, they are worse; sometimes, they are not expected at all, and they may even turn out to reverse the effect initially meant to be obtained. We could say, by using the own words of French poet Paul Valery, that we are increasingly embedded into a very complex ICT-led system “that is leading us… we do not know and can by no means imagine where”.

Take the internet, for instance. It was initially conceived to connect electronic devices and people by creating a horizontal network: the core idea was to communicate and share data and information in a simpler and faster manner. Economic elements appeared to be secondary, if not irrelevant at all. With the creation of the World Wide Web by Tim Berners-Lee in 1989, this idea was brought to the entire globe and gradually spread to a massive scale, ending up involving billions of people. After more than 25 years, many people are enjoying the advantages brought by the internet. But the incoming revolution so widely praised in the 1990s seems to be producing also unexpected and unintended outcomes.

American Heroes

Over the last few years, two American heroes such as Chris Kyle and Edward Snowden have been portrayed by two Academy Award-winning directors, Clint Eastwood and Oliver Stone, in two features: American Sniper (2014) and Snowden (2016).

Both young and certainly brave, Kyle and Snowden decided, quite early in their lives, to serve their governments – the former in the US Navy SEAL, the latter in the CIA. What made them heroes was the common, strong, will to protect American people: but whereas Kyle decided to go to Iraq to fight an outer enemy in the so-called “War on Terror”, Snowden ended up leaking data and information to oppose the US government itself. Hence, we have two narratives which play with American founding myths and values in profoundly diverse manners.