THE REJECTED TECHNOLOGY

Understanding Computers

I just arrived at my shop in the early morning hours and behold the first customer of the day, Joe.

Khan: Good Morning, Joe. You’re here today already. I can’t remember us scheduling an appointment today.

Joe: Morning sir, my sincere apologies, I ought to have informed you earlier before now, but I don’t have your phone number, besides I don’t even own a mobile phone.

Khan: It’s okay, no worries, I was only kidding, you don’t need an appointment to see me; you’re always welcome here any day, anytime.

Joe: Thank you very much, sir.

Joe and I walked into my shop; he helped me with my little bag and other things I brought along with me to shop, we both dusted the shop, swept everywhere, cleaned up the shop, and I was ready for the business of the day.

Khan: Forgive my manners. Have you eaten?

With the usual smile on his face, Joe replied, “Yes, I ate before leaving home. I’m okay for now”. “For now?” I asked with big laughter, “Does this mean that you’re going to eat later anyways?” We both laughed out loud and took our seats as we were ready to begin the conversation of the day.

Joe: I had a dream last night

Khan: About what

Joe: I had a dream that I could actualize my plan.

It took me about 10 seconds to understand what Joe meant; when he saw my facial expression and noticed that I now understood what he meant. We both burst into laughter. “Oh! Now I understand what you mean, so you meant that you had a dream, and in that dream, you were able to actualize your vision. I guess the vision of controlling the world. Haha,” I said.

Joe: Yes, right.

Khan: Well, I am not a dream interpreter, so I can’t help much regarding your dream.

Joe: Hmm, okay, tell me about computers; I want to know how they work.

Khan: Well, computers are dumb

Joe: Dumb? How? Do you mean computers are not intelligent?

Khan: Not literally, don’t get me wrong, computers can be super-fast they are even faster than humans; however, they remain dumb, this means that they only do what they are asked to do, they cannot think on their own without any instructions from a human.

Joe: Oh! I see. This is making more sense now. Is that why we need a programming language to communicate with computers?

Khan: Yes, absolutely correct.

Joe paused for a moment to comprehend everything he had just heard.

Joe: Please tell me more; I want to spend the whole day with you here, tell me everything I need to know about computers.

Khan: You can’t know everything about computers; no one can. Remember the famous saying- “No one knows it all, but I will try my best to educate you about computers as much as possible.”

While I was still talking, a customer knocked, and I had to excuse myself to attend to the customer. She came to purchase some computer accessories. After I finished attending to her, I went back inside to continue my conversation with Joe.

Joe: Welcome back sir, do you need any help?

Khan: No, don’t worry, the customer is gone; I’m done with her. So, where did we stop? I think we were still talking about computers.

Joe: Yes. Can you show me a sample of how to command a computer, please?

Khan: Not so fast Joe, there is still a lot you need to understand about computers before knowing how to command them. Please put something at the back of your mind; you are controlling a computer in such a way that it cannot say no to you, and doing so, you need to fully understand what it is, how it works, and how it’s going to execute your command.

Joe took a deep breath and asked, “Is this tough? Do you think I can do this” I smiled and responded with a question, “I thought you said you wanted to control the world; if you can achieve that with your supernatural powers, then I think you should be able to do this also” he stood up so fast and shouted, “No sir, No sir, you got me all wrong, I am not a magician. Yes, I want to control the world but not with magic, I want to make use of the modern technologies to achieve that”. Things became more interesting, “With the use of technology?” I asked, he responded, “Yes, with the use of technology.” Joe sat down, and we continued our conversation.

Khan: Computers are super easy to command/control; first, you need to understand how computers work. Computers are electronic devices that take input in the form of raw data, processes it under the control of instruction, which is referred to as programs, and in the end, it produces an output.

Joe nodded his head, showing that he understood everything I was explaining.

Khan: Computers generally carries out four functions

1. A computer takes in data as an input

2. It has a memory where it stores the data or instructions

3. It processes the raw data, after which converts it into a valuable information

4. It generates the output and then finally controls all the above steps

Joe: Interesting, so you mean to say that every electronic device generally carries out the four steps you just mentioned.

“Yes,” I replied with a smile on my face.

As a young boy, I didn’t want the information to be too much for Joe, so I asked him to stand up to go out for a walk while we continued our conversation. While we were outside taking a walk, Joe asked a question out of curiosity “Excuse me please, does humans also work the same way the computers work?” I replied, “No, humans work uniquely because we have the free will to decide on our own without anyone or anything controlling us, but that is not the same as a computer because computers need a human intervention before they can decide on anything, this means that human controls the computers and not the other way round.” Joe responded, “Oh! I see, now we are getting close to what I want to achieve” “and what’s that?” I asked, and he responded by saying that he wants to ensure that he can control the world, including humans, just as humans can control computers.

We continued our discussion until it was time for lunch; we were both tired, so we branched the nearest KFC for lunch; while in the queue to place an order, Joe looked around and whispered to me, “How I wish I could read the mind of everyone here” I replied, “Why would you want to do that?” He responded, “Because that’s the only way I can control everyone and everything around them.” After about 15 minutes of waiting in the queue, it was finally our turn to place an order; we both picked up our orders, sat down, and began eating.

We just finished eating and about to leave, I said to Joe “There are still more to learn about computers however this is where we are going to stop for today, but before you go, there’s one key important information I want you to go home with, Computer generally consists of two things, hardware, and software. The hardware is the physical component of a computer which you can see and touch while the software runs within the computer; they are the set of programs written to solve a problem; therefore, to control humans like you always desire, you have to think of what to use, either with the use of software alone or hardware”. We ended the conversation as he returned home, and I returned to my shop to continue my daily business.