DOES IT PROMOTE KNOWLEDGE ?

As new technologies make it possible to move information faster than ever before was are dazzled by the million of gigabytes that move across the world in nanoseconds. Yet we hardly ask questions about the quality of the information : what is it that we are communicating ? Is it relevant ? And does all this information add up to knowledge ? The challenge is to get the information to where it is needed through the most cost – effective method possible. Only when information helps people communicate and participate and allow them and their rules to make informed choices does that information became knowledge . The growing gap between the knows and not –knows . If we want to turn information into knowledge , and give the developing world changes to take a short cut to prosperity , the knowledge has needs to be bridged urgently.

Here we are not talking about the top –of -the line computers in each classroom , we are talking about a teacher who is trained and motivated , a classroom that has school children who have enough to eat so that their brains are not stunted by low – Calorie intake . The Scriptures are right ; “Knowledge is a sword , and wisdom is a shield “. Perhaps nowhere is the raw power of knowledge as relevant today as it is for the two – thirds of the world’s people who live in the countries of south , the holy trinity of the information age – television , telephone and computer – is present if at all only in its cabled satellite television incarnation.

Advance information technology are supposed to shrink distance but they don’t necessarily bring people together . better communications through satellite may give people a wider array of programming to choose from but it does not guarantee that they will be more tolerant of diversity .Knowledge may be a sword but it is double edged . the delivery machanisam for knowledge is today in the hands fewer fewer people. More and more of the message propagate a global consumer monoculture.

Aghilesh .M