Thursday, July 14, 2022

[Script] The Sins of Silicon Valley - Act 1, Scene 1 (continued)

 Voice Over: At the beginning of the 20th century, a lot of very well meaning people sold us a certain idea about science.  Gleaming tubes and clip boards and shining white lab coats.  

Images of scientists and cool labs.


Voice Over: Science Marches On! Became as American as Baseball and Apple Pie


Images of Home type American values Early 20th centuries


Voice Over: But from the beginning…Science had a dark side.


Images of Dark Experiments and Abominations of Science


Voice Over: The things that we build are just tools, so they say.  But isn’t that part of the problem?


Images of RUR, Frankenstein and Metropolis


Voice Over: The tools are indeed not bad, but what about the people who build them, and the people who run the machines?


Images of Oppression, Indifference and Bureaucracy


Voice Over: From the beginning of the enlightenment, our artists have warned us that science can be abused, and most of us have listened.  But the mad ones among us, those wonder workers…they heard the opposite message.


Images of Mythology, Forbidden Science, Mad Science, Prometheus


Voice Over: Firestealers, wonderworkers, sages, magicians, alchemists, engineers, doctors, scientists; the new shamans of our modern topia, half dis and half ut; which topia is it? It depends on who wins.


Images of conflict and debate


Voice Over: There is a culture war in America right now, just as much over technology as over religion, politics, gender, race and identity.  And only recently, and frankly for the first time, are some of us standing up and asking…wait….who should WIN this culture war? Indeed, most people are only just becoming aware that we’re fighting this front in the culture war at all.


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