Magic Technology

Technology so magical that it is cheaper to replace than repair. Integrated circuits, for instance. It would probably take a multimillion dollar electron microscope to repair an IC, if at all possible.

Contrast this with simple mechanical devices.

Even a car engine from the 60's would be difficult to repair in the 18th century.

The problem with MagicTechnology is that the more we become dependent on it, the more subsumed to technology we become. Indeed, if disaster strikes (as it does frequently) we become helpless.

PervasiveComputing has this problem associated with it. While we become more powerful -- another property of MagicTechnology -- the power is fleeting. One electromagnetic pulse wave would wreak unbelievable havoc.

There was a story on CNN about how brownouts and rolling blackouts in California because of the summer heat wave were a BadThing for SillyValley. Some companies are putting the most critical systems on a UPS-backed carryover to generator system, similar to what some hospitals I worked at in Houston have done for years to carry them through hurricane power outages. The larger companies have even gone into talks about sharing costs for a co-generation facility.

Ease of replacement is a virtue for PervasiveComputing, however. The parts will be so cheap that replacement isn't an issue, like when you drop a biscuit and the dog snaps it up, so you just reach for another one. I wonder if anyone has considered the environmental cost?

Re: 60's car. Try to build a spark plug or lathe the cylinders precisely enough.

Even though I can't personally repair a 60's car -- I have neither the expertise nor the tools to lathe cylinders or build a spark plug -- the number of people that do have this expertise and equipment is significantly higher than the number of corporations with the necessary equipment to fix an IC with an electron microscope. Thus, a 60's car isn't MagicTechnology, but an IC is.

This notion of "replacing" implies a modular design. It reminds me that ChristopherAlexander preferred wood, which you can cut to length, over bricks, which come in fixed, pre-defined sizes. Wood can be customised precisely by the end-user. The advantage is greater efficiency as well as less dependency.

Wood can be treated as a magic technology if you don't understand it. Whether you repair or customise, rather than replace or buy in stock lengths, is sometimes up to you.

"Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic." - Arthur C. Clarke

"Any sufficiently analyzed magic is indistinguishable from science!" - The web comic Girl Genius, by Phil Foglio and Kaja Foglio

See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clarke%27s_three_laws

see MagicChairCopier