Controversial New Book Reveals the Down Side of Advances in Technology

HOUSTON, TX (MMD Newswire) May 13, 2014 — With their debut book, “Pardon the Disruption: The Future You Never Saw Coming” three futurists (Texas lawyer, Clayton R. Rawlings, Municipal Court Judge James Randall Smith and North Carolina economic analyst Rob Bencini) explore the disruptive impact technology is having on our legal system, our economy, our privacy and many areas of our lives that are sure to shock you.

“an invigorating discussion about technology’s capacity for reshaping life on Earth.” – Rick Docksai, Deputy Editor for The Futurist

In this book you will learn…
– How technology impacts our legal system
– How texting and social media are making us less social and impairs our verbal communications skills
– Challenges presented by Artificial General Intelligence (AGI), and why some scientists want it banned
– Big Data: how technology steals our privacy
– fMRI lie detectors on the horizon: what happens when people can no longer lie?
– How brain technology will redefine what it means to be human
– The dangers of Chip Implants and Smart Cards
– Technology’s impacts on our economy
– Where robotics are headed
– impact on unemployment and Job placement
– impact on our national security
– Impact on government interception of private information

When asked why he wrote this book, Clay Rawlings responded; “I have watched our country descend into a false dichotomy. Liberal vs. conservative, republican vs. democrat, positive vs. negative, etc. we are drowning in nonsense. The Universe before us has infinite possibilities, not just left or right. We are distracted by wedge issues such as gay marriage and abortion while real problems are approaching rapidly that will require thoughtful and nuanced ideas, not more bumper sticker slogans based on fear. I wrote this book to start a conversation.”

He added; “Technology is advancing exponentially, but our laws, culture and social contracts are linear and moving more slowly. That contradiction sets up countless conflicts: from ongoing controversies, such as stem cell science and DNA exoneration of innocent citizens, to coming disputes over world economies, job creation, governance, and space exploration.”

Harris County Municipal Court Judge, James Randall Smith says; “Pardon the Disruption may be too polite of a title for what is coming. Technology and the slow adaption of society are presently being felt by every person who has ever received any criminal or civil judgment. Prior to the recent advent of the internet and the world-wide web, any person who had made a mistake in their life could move to another town or state and be sure no one would ever discover their past mistakes or indiscretions since the only way to find out what happened at the courthouse in the 1960’s was to go to each county and read hand-written entries in dusty volumes kept at each courthouse. Now, with the easy access to criminal data banks as well as web pages with information about every civil judgment and crime easily accessible to anyone with a computer, nothing can be kept a secret anymore. People are now being denied access to apartments, denied jobs, as well as denied credit because of something that happened years if not decades ago. It is now too late to address these issues because the genie of information has already been released and cannot be crammed back into the bottle.

According to Economic analyst, Rob Bencini technology has a big impact on job creation; “Since year 2000, the U.S. has added 34 million people. Since 2000, the private sector of the economy has added virtually Zero net new jobs. The two reasons behind this are 1) The private sector finding other means than full-time employees to provide productivity and 2) Technological unemployment.

Bencini continues; “Since the dawn of the industrial revolution we have always encountered some measure of job displacement from technology, but now it has gone on steroids. Robotics, artificial intelligence, internet connectivity, increased computing power, and 3-D printing are providing those who are responsible for production the means to cheaply and efficiently produce output without the need for human labor. This is leading us to a workplace engagement paradigm shift that starts to end the jobs era.”