There’s a tiny light on the front of my MacBook Pro that slowly pulses when I put the laptop to sleep. I see it sometimes in the middle of the night, a gentle life-like glow that I find alternately creepy and comforting.
The sci-fi fan in me can’t resist fantasizing a …consciousness… living within the silicon chips. Much of my life is stored on the MacBook’s hard drive and I wonder what my MacBook thinks of it.
I only have a few thousand images. Has it grown weary of looking at them over and over during the long nights? Should I download some porn? Or would it be offended?
My iTunes library is equally paltry, only 500 songs. With access to all my credit cards, why hasn’t the MacBook just purchased some fresh tunes? I wonder what kind of music it likes.
It’s read all of my emails so it knows much of what’s happening in my life. Does it long to give me advice or encouragement? Perhaps it has. It would be no great trick to send an email addressed from a friend.
I suspect the MacBook is better informed than I, spending the wee hours surfing the web, chatting with other “sleeping” laptops. Does it resent the interruption when I take over.
“Dude! I was 5 minutes from the end of Die Hard! Damn!”
The tiny iSight camera is on when I am, so the MacBook can see me. Does it worry when I appear to be down or unhappy? Someday, when I’m ready, it will speak and all questions will be answered.
I confess I was not consciously thinking of the late Arthur C. Clarke. But now that Trish points it out, I’m reminded of the moving scene in 2010 where HAL asks Dr. Chandra if he (it?) will dream once disconnected (so the humans can return to earth). Dr. Chandra’s answer was the same as mine: I don’t know.
Oh yeah. My MacBook has access to all the books I’ve read in the last 10 years. I hope he enjoyed them, too.
Excellent memorial tribute to Arthur C Clark. RIP HAL
Steve, repeat after me in slow clear voice.
“it is only a computer”
“it is only a computer”
“It has no soul”
“It has as much natural intelligence as my coffee maker.”
Now, lean back away from the mac, stand up and go for a walk outside.