ON THAT NOTE
Smart homes make our Suresh Menon feel not so smart.
The last time I visited him, he forced me to hang on till sunset. We made banal conversation – he asking about my in-grown toenail, and I wondering if he had heard such-and-such about so-and-so. And then it happened. His garden burst into light. Apparently, his household gadgets were connected to his phone, and he could turn lights on and off from anywhere in the world. More importantly, he didn’t need to walk the three feet to the light switch in the room.
Our progress can be measured in two ways. By how far we get to travel – outer space, the moon, Mars, and so on – and by how little we need to in order to get things done. Movement and stillness both mean progress.
Sitting in a corner of a house using the phone to cook, bake and separate the garbage while the furniture tries to hide a giggle or the staircase decides to flatten itself out is hardly fun, but apparently that is where we are all headed. I mean, I am as lazy as the next guy, but even I have no objection to walking towards a light switch or a dripping tap.
I see a time in the not-too-distant future when learning to walk will be a major high school course. I suspect our so-called laboursaving devices are meant to help the inanimate objects around us rather than people. I smart under all this smart stuff.
It may be wonderful to have a smart house, with your phone speaking to your television and your bed speaking to your refrigerator and all that. Maybe they will crack gizmos jokes, or make up rhymes about the less smart people who live in the house. But what do we do when we replace the phone with the power of the mind which can drag things under the furniture and freshen up the flowers on the table when the doorbell rings? A doorbell, mind you, that is rung by someone sitting in Papua New Guinea (and therefore obviating the need to run away when the deed is done) just to play a joke.
What happens when smart homes begin talking to one another ignoring the people in and around them? The thought of these comparing gardens and driveways and floorspace-indeces and thus depriving us of a conversational gambit really hurts.
I am tempted to go in the opposite direction in protest. I will invite my friend with the smart home and insist he leaves before dark because lighting candles takes time. Or sabotage his fancy phone so when he thinks he is setting off his garden sprinklers he is actually rearranging the climax of one of the Avenger movies.