It's all human

Everything digital in our daily life, everything based on electricity has been thought and made by a human being. Every single watch, alarm clock, smartphone, computer, server, digital device has been designed and - in the end - is being operated by a human. Even AI. Every time we are working on something, mistakes happen from time to time. In software development, these errors are called bugs. They are not intentional but occur because our brains work that way. Sometimes it is a part of learning, sometimes a lack of concentration (What's that bird?, distraction by emotions, feelings, thoughts) or stupidity. Basically speaking: We are not perfect and neither is our output we heavily rely on.

What's perfect?

Perfect hardware and software would act differently than what we are used to. There would be no bugs, no bluescreens, stability would be 100%, outcome would be predictable under all circumstances.

What's human?

Emotions. That's the same thing that prevents us from being 100% logical, from being perfect. You yourself know best what it means to be human. Being perfect is not a part of that.

Faith in technology

We do believe in technology. It seems like it. Otherwise we wouldn't use and rely on it that much. This faith in technology seems never-ending, fearless, #todo and even greater than the faith in mankind itself.

The Stack and Dependencies

Things get built upon each other. Modularity is a key concept in software development that leads to a stack, like a building. Core functions are in the basement. They are stacked together like bricks. New functions build upon and require them. Software development has been working like this for the last 30 years. New buildings are build upon existing. The buildings built that way are tall and wide-spread. Like the cloud. As one can imagine: Tall old buildings tend to collapse. There have been attacks on basic bricks like ssh with the purpose to collapse some of the main buildings.

Putting things together

State-of-the-art humans can not develop perfect systems. Everything we rely on in our modern society is bug-driven.

Transcendence

This is where it's getting philosophical. Question: Can humankind invent something that is better, less error-prone, than itself? Can AI generate error-free code even though it learns doing our mistakes? Can we overcome our own limits in technology terms? Or is the pursuit of perfection an endless circle? Unrelated to possible answers: I am not aware of wide-spread systems that are certified, less error-prone than average hard- or software systems.

What now?

To decide this question, we have to make it simple. Putting philosophical questions aside, asking for solutions you can realize today and tomorrow.

What a solution could look like?

  • Education
    • use Wikipedia to educate yourself on certain topics
      • #todo list topics
    • browse this site
  • Responsibility
    • don't let Google manage all of your data for you
    • e.g. use password managers #todo
      • read Think
  • Think
    • If it is too good to be true, question it.
    • 1234 cannot be a good password.
      • Better don't use passwords at all.
    • Simplicity is better then complexity, because you can understand it.
    • Nature shows us that diversity is important. We should avoid monopolies and value diversity.

and now?