[Blog Entry] It Only Works If You Use It

It Only Works If You Use It

I'm off rushing to work, so I'll make this quick.

Technology has provided us with a lot of amenities, and the latest gadgets offer various services which would make our life a whole lot easier. You can use your PDA, for example, to take down people's phone numbers and schedule your week. Certain mp3 players have voice recording capability, allowing you to leave yourself some mental notes (or star logs, if that's your thing).

However, it only works if you actually use it.

I used to have this scatterbrain friend who was disorganized and thought buying a PDA would help. It probably would have, if he bothered to check the schedules he had written down in his PDA. Alas, technology can only bring us so far. (Thankfully he's gotten his act together.)

Also in another related story is the Chinese calculator, the abacus. The abacus actually doesn't do any computing, unlike calculators. You don't just input numbers and the device will solve your arithmetic problems. The abacus doesn't work that way. Instead, it works as a marker, a tool for remembering which numbers have already been counted. You have to use your brain to figure out the rest. (It's a comfort knowing the human brain can outcount calculators.)