Absence of Malice (1981)

[Paul]

Since we are looking at old movies, Absence of Malice is one of my all time favorites. The newspaper scenes remind me of how far we have progressed (is progress the right word?).

Ah - even the opening scene is fun to watch. People are sitting in a smoke-filled room and watching a movie reel. Now we'd all be sitting around watching a PowerPoint. Wait - maybe that is so 2000.

 

[Robert Heiny]

When I come across a reference to "progress," I ask myself, "Progress toward what?" It seems to me that the use of the word "progress" or term Progressive are ways to hide a goal that not everyone will accept. Yes?

 

[LPH]

When I come across a reference to "progress," I ask myself, "Progress toward what?" It seems to me that the use of the word "progress" or term Progressive are ways to hide a goal that not everyone will accept. Yes?

Since the movie was made before personal computers - there are "many people" (See? I can be like Donald Trump) that would argue the computer age progressed man from an age of slow to fast communication. The progress allows us access to information.

Now - the flip side - we've progressed to a era in which misinformation spreads quickly.

Fortunately the basis of the movie remains: reporting every sneeze as news does not make someone a good reporter. It just makes them sleazy for using people.

 

[LPH]

When I come across a reference to "progress," I ask myself, "Progress toward what?" It seems to me that the use of the word "progress" or term Progressive are ways to hide a goal that not everyone will accept. Yes?

Since the movie was made before personal computers - there are "many people" (See? I can be like Donald Trump) that would argue the computer age progressed man from an age of slow to fast communication. The progress allows us access to information.

Now - the flip side - we've progressed to a era in which misinformation spreads quickly.

Fortunately the basis of the movie remains: reporting every sneeze as news does not make someone a good reporter. It just makes them sleazy for using people.

 

[LPH]

When I come across a reference to "progress," I ask myself, "Progress toward what?" It seems to me that the use of the word "progress" or term Progressive are ways to hide a goal that not everyone will accept. Yes?

Since the movie was made before personal computers - there are "many people" (See? I can be like Donald Trump) that would argue the computer age progressed man from an age of slow to fast communication. The progress allows us access to information.

Now - the flip side - we've progressed to a era in which misinformation spreads quickly.

Fortunately the basis of the movie remains: reporting every sneeze as news does not make someone a good reporter. It just makes them sleazy for using people.

 

[Paul]

Progress assumes there is a destination. What is the final destination for technology?

 

[Robert Heiny]

I use technologies as tools to accomplish something else. Technologies are inanimate even when they interact in ways that make them look alive and willful. Self correcting, yes. Can they replicate, yes. Can they intrude into animate life, yes. But, they are only tools for one or more people to use them to accomplish something else. Yes?