For this week’s Flora Friday Films, we had watched a Black Mirror episode revolving around a dystopian society where everyone has a ‘grain’–a device inside them that allows them to record everything that they see, hear, and experience. Not only that, but this device also allows them to play everything they experience back to them.

An interesting question Ty posed before we began the movie was “would you guys like to have this device?” For me personally, I suppose it wouldn’t be terrible to have such a technology, but I don’t want it to record every aspect of my life at every moment. What happened in the Black Mirror episode was that the main protagonist got obsessed with playing things back to himself, which led him to finding out about his wife’s ex and past lover, and throughout the episode he was very tormented by his wife’s past. Having this sort of device into existence would definitely facilitate this kind of obsession, I think. Memory is a really powerful thing, and having that device and the power to replay our memories exactly as it was made can be dangerous. With that device, we could potentially play back every embarrassing moment, every regret, every moment in our lives we would rather not have to relive. Even though we don’t want to relive those moments, we would play it back to ourselves, because that’s just how some people are–some people ruminate over small things and get really distressed over it–as we all saw with the protagonist in the episode.

But still, I can see the benefits of having this device. Imagine if we could record lectures and play them back, for example. I definitely wouldn’t mind having a more convenient version of a cellphone camera/recorder. I think one big thing is that I would like to have control over what I record. Not just everything I see, as demonstrated in the episode.

The previous week we watched Black Mirror: the Entire History of You. Before watching it, I always heard that Black Mirror is one of the greatest scientific fiction series ever.

Life is too short, but somehow we forget some of our most important memories: our birth, the first time we walked, the first word we said, the first person we saw…Sometimes I am curious: what if there is a camera/equipment planted in me that records every moment of my life? I would be able to replay my best memories over and over again – running on the grass with my childhood best friend, the look of my first secret crush, cuddling with my mom and sitting on dad’s lap…those priceless moments that are so easily forgotten. What if I can even record my dreams? Every time I woke up from a long, beautiful dream-whether it was flying on a broomstick with Voldemort chasing after me, or greeting foreign royal families as a princess in a castle, or skating with Yuzuru Hanyu on winter olympics… So many details were lost within 5 minutes of waking up. I know that a “grain” implanted in me would let me keep those memories intact, even after years. Isn’t that brilliant – living in a dream.

It did not seem to work well for Liam in the show. He used his “memory” to prove his wife’s disloyalty. He made his wife to show him the video of her cheating on him. Eventually, lying alone on the floor, he decided to get rid of the implant. This, to me, does not make sense. With a photographic memory, crimes can be detected and no one can lie to other people or perjure themselves on stand. And by crime, I also mean cheating in marriage. However, even though it is easier to detect cheating in the marriage, the fallen apart life of Liam’s is by no means the technology’s fault. First, his wife chose to cheat on him with the understanding that this memory will be recorded. And she did not choose to delete it. Second, Liam chose to rip the band-aid off after finding out about the affair. He could’ve pretended he never knew about this affair, if he really wanted to keep the marriage and forgive his wife. This is his decision.

Eventually, a photographic memory would not only make all the best memories in our lives not easily forgotten, but also our exams would be so much easier, and we would be living in a world with more honesty and relationships would be more straight forward. Whether that’s a good thing or not, it is another day’s topic.

My first Rose Scholar experience was a Flora Friday Night Film. We watched an episode of black mean, a British show set in a dystopian future that highlights how technology could potentially affect our lives. In this specific episode, little devices referred to as “grains” are implanted behind a person’s ear. This grain has the ability to document every experience a person has, allowing them to file and go through these memories in the future.

The protagonist, an unemployed married man with a child, attends a dinner party his wife is at. While there, he sees his wife interact with one of her old college friends, who later find out is an ex boyfriend. Not only is the protagonist embarrassed about his last job interview, but he sees the way his wife and her friend interact, immediately becoming suspicious. Notably, they also meet a woman who does not have a grain; hers was stolen in an aggravated assault case.

In the end, the protagonist finds out his wife had an affair with the friend and questions whether his child is his. After reacting, his wife and child leave him, and we see him going through his memories while his life deteriorates around him. The episode leaves us watching the protagonist ripping out his own grain, bleeding into his bathroom sink.

Before we watched the episode, we spoke to people around us, and I thought the grain would be a bad idea. The showing supported that. Not only does it have people living in the past, but it leaves no room for mistake. Every moment is documented, and there is no security in learning from your past mistakes. While I believe that the protagonist should know his wife had an affair, there was better ways to find out. And there was definitely a better way t solve the problem. But now he is stuck with no one, and the memories are no longer comforting, but a curse. So much so that he rips out his grain.

The third episode of Black Mirror showed us the benefits and drawbacks of the technology that allows human to retain all their memories.

After watching this movie, I become more aware of the moral and enthical controvercies that come with the techonological progress. This is an important lesson to me because my career plan is to work as a researcher in engineering physics and will most likely face such porblem.

Regarding the specific topic of using a device to store all of one’s memory, I will still use it if it becomes available, even after the movie showed all the problems. The movie listed several examples of such technology. But I believe the benefits is more than what it has shown. For example, as a student I have always hated thoughtless memorization of contents such as vocabulary. With such technology students will only have to see those contents once and will have more time to devote to other studies. Moreover, police can use this techonology to solve crimes easier with the witness providing accurate statements.

Yet, one cannot ignore the problems that come with this techonology. The movie only showed a glimpse of the main problem: who should have the access to such memories. Not just between married couples or ex-boy/girlfriends, but also between the government agencies and civilians. As shown in the beginning of the movie, the security checked the protagnist’s memory. Suppose that the police needs to investigate a crime, should they have the access to the memory of the suspect?

Even with the problems in mind, I still believe human should pursue techonological progress because this has always been the way which  humanity develops.

Last Friday, as my first Rose Scholar event of the semester, I attended the Flora’s Friday Film viewing of an episode of Black Mirror. To be honest, this was the only event I could make that week, and I mistakenly thought the movie was Black Swan. GRF Ty introduced the series as a modern Twilight Zone-esque work, but I had no idea what that meant, and am still not quite sure, but I was open to the idea of watching it.

The episode was described as a world in everyone has access to records of everything humans see, hear, and do. Before watching the episode, Ty asked us to talk a little with the people around us about what that world would be like and if you would want to be in that world. My immediate thought is no. There were absolutely no benefits that came to my mind. While being social is nice, my privacy is even nicer. I could never think to live in a world where anyone could know what I did at any point in my life. That was scary. Some other people mentioned that they did not want to have information about other people and how that was the scary part, but I still maintain that a total loss my privacy is much more terrifying that having the ability to access other people’s information.

After the show, when discussing how it was with other people, someone else who also had not seen this episode before had a similar note. The technology in the episode wasn’t as developed as we expected. When the description of the premise is that everyone can access the memories of what people see, hear, and do, I was picturing a world in which we all kind of have a connected, collective memory in which the memory as an accessible recollection of information was what was recorded. I was thinking that such a memory would encompass all sensory information – feeling, actions, smell, pain, etc.

Instead, the memories are clips of what people see and hear in perfect wide-angle view (that’s not how vision works, but I guess for the sanity of the viewer it’s acceptable, but also kind of weird) and these memories can be projected onto either your eye so that only you can see it or onto one of many screens that exist in the world. There’s an implant behind you ear with a controller that you physically hold to manipulate, which also seems like a bad idea, so only you have immediate control over viewing those clips. It wasn’t a hyper-connected society where everyone knew everything – it was a weird way of recording first-person what people do. One big thing that was bothering me was the implant. The processing power and the information transfer to project memory clips onto different screens must involve a lot of heat generation, which would be bad for the device and the head it’s in.

The episode was weird. The concept seemed contrived and its low-tech feel was distracting. I get that what I was picturing as the premise would be hard to pull off in a TV series or movie, but I was just disappointed by the promise I perceived it didn’t live up to. The series was definitely hyped up before the episode started, but if the other episodes are similar, I probably won’t watch them. Ty mentioned that this was one of the less grim episodes, but honestly it didn’t really seem grim to me at all. Perhaps the execution of the technology in the show was a whole lot tamer than what I expected and therefore a lot less personally uncomfortable, but it just wasn’t my type of show.

Last Friday, I watched my first ever episode of Black Mirror and to say the least, I was definitely shocked. One of my friend’s had told me what the general idea of the series was, but nothing could have prepared me for what I saw. This episode had to do with an implant that gave you the ability to go back and watch everything you had ever seen. The main plot of this episode was that the main protagonist’s wife had had an affair in the past, and he kept on replaying every single little event that contributed to it, eventually leading to him ripping out the implant out of his body because it had essentially taken over his whole life.  There have many times where I have thought about having unique abilities such as the power to read someone’s mind, but watching this episode made me reconsider my previous position. I have come to the conclusion that technology has the power to kill a human, quite literally, because it can drive you absolutely crazy. What’s even scarier is that in today’s day and age, we have an ever-increasing dependence on technology, and the more this escalates, the more problems will be created that could have been avoided if it were not for the paranoia that is a result of technology that enables us to replay every moment of our life. If it hadn’t been for that implant, the protagonist wouldn’t have become obsessed with his wife’s past. This episode created a lot of food for thought, because you don’t really think about these things until you see them in action. I look forward to watching more episodes to see what other issues the world could face.

Last Friday, I attended Rose’s screening of Black Mirror‘s season 1 finale, an episode entitled “The Entire History of You.” In a dystopian future, characters have had their necks implanted with tiny grains that record everything the user does, says, sees, and hears. Therefore, the consumer can replay  moments from their lives anytime. As our society unceasingly proceeds with technological advancements, the Black Mirror poses the question: Should we be able to relive our memories at the click of a button?

Based on this episode and my own logic, I say no. Although watching old memories may seem fun, similar to viewing nostalgic home movies, there are too many costs that would burden our society were we to adopt memory grains. Under this technology, trust would disintegrate, the bliss of ignorance would be destroyed, and living in the present would no longer be an desirable option. Rather than trust loved ones, we would be able to investigate the truth through our and their memories. Sometimes the truth comes at a price, as humans discover things that ruin their happiness, uproot their relationships, and break the comfort and stability of the present. Honestly, although the truth is what we humans constantly seek out, ignorance can be desirable.  With memory grains, humans would constantly nitpick at past interactions and relive good moments in their history, possibly wishing to return. By living in the past, we stop ourselves from making progress in the present and creating fun, new moments, memories, and relationships.

The primary character, Liam, manifests all these pitfalls of the memory grain. After a dinner party with his wife (Ffion), friends, and a man named Jonas, Liam drives himself mad replaying memories from the occasion, repeatedly, from dusk until dawn, analyzing his wife’s facial expressions, dialogue, actions, and reactions in the presence of Jonas. Eventually, after much intense interrogation, Ffion admits to a previous relationship with Jonas, before her marriage to Liam. So, Liam, angry, beats Jonas and demands that he remove, on a TV screen, every memory he has shared with Ffion. Afterwards, while replaying this disturbing memory with Jonas, Liam discovers that one of the memories removed by Jonas implicates his wife in an affair with Jonas, around the time when Liam and Ffion’s baby was conceived. His wife insists that the affair is over and that Jonas wore a condom, but Liam, mistrustful, forces her to replay the memory of her sexual encounter with Jonas and discovers that Jonas did not wear a condom. Therefore, Liam’s baby may not even be his own. With this memory grain, a marriage has been destroyed and a fatherhood thrown into question.

Liam has thus showcased the memory grain’s power to promote mistrustfulness, ruin relationships, stability, and comfort, and encourage an inability to live in present. So, although the memory grain would undeniably give us a greater ability to access ultimate truths – at what cost? Is the truth worth it if it destroys our happiness, our trust, our love? In my opinion, it isn’t. Sometimes, as hard as it is to say, ignorance is blissful, and people couldn’t function or live in the present without it.

I am really not a big fan of science fictions but I really do enjoy the Black Mirror.

While almost everyday I wish to have a better memory which can record all the formulas in Mathematics so I don’t need to review the old stuff again and again, which can memorize all the names of people I met so I can feel free to greet anyone on the road and which can actually store all the good memories I had before since I kind of can’t remember my preschool days now.

Before seeing the Black Mirror, we had a small discussion on whether we want to have those skill -everyone has access to a memory implant that records everything they do, see and hear. At that time, I thought that skill was pretty cool and didn’t think about the negative aspects. All I could thought of is what I couldn’t reach before could be reached now. Until the part that the man is having an interview, I still think it’s a great skill since you can actually replay that scene and see if three interviewers are paying attention, to know their final decision. Also, we used to have limited attention on one or two person but with the ‘replay’ clicker, we could now observe more people, more small details that we tend to neglect.

However, the latter part of the film actually more emphasizes the negative aspect of that skill and made me to think the interesting functionalism between human interaction. With the ability of keeping privacy, people can actually avoid some tension of telling the truth and become closer with each other. And the availability to all resources is not always good since it also exposes your own resource to others and leaves you no room to have your own secrets. When everything has to be transparent, the life gets tougher since you have to always behave the same and everyone else surrounding is watching at you which really causes a lot of stress and intension.

When I was watching Black Mirror last week, I initially thought how helpful it would be to have the ability to look over your actions, and other people’s actions throughout your life to see if there was something that you missed. Many times, when people get caught up in a particular moments, they lose sight of other events happening around them which results in them not being able to correctly predict what their next moves should be. For example, say that I am going to a business meeting and I am so preoccupied with making sure that I can say everything correctly,that I am not at the moment paying attention to anybody else’s body language or expressions in the room. Later, I can go look back at my presentation and notice the facial expressions and body language my team members are making to see whether or not they actually liked what I had to say in the presentation. I can then go back and use this as a learning experience to change the way I present, or the content of my presentation. However, without this technology, I would rely on my memory of what my workers’ expressions were when I made the presentation, and sometimes this memory can have flaws. This would cause  excess worrying, and my mind possibly making up alternatives to the situation that didn’t really happen.

However, all technology has positives and negatives, and while a major positive of this technology is that it allows us to reflect about our actions and use them as a learning reference, it also prevents us from “living in the moment”. If we were able to relive every moment of our lives, we would never be able to move forward. For example, if bad events happen to us. There may be a temptation for people to keep viewing those bad events, and having thoughts as to what they could have done to prevent a situation. This would lead excessive obsession with the past which isn’t healthy. That’s why it is important for technologies such as this one to have restrictions. This technology could possibly be remodeled so that these stored memories delete after 24 hours similar to the Snapchat model.

Overall, I would not be comfortable having this technology be used mainstream. Although it can be very useful, I feel that everybody will make their selves slightly crazy with over-analyzing all their moves and other people’s moves around them. I think that people must focus to appreciate the past, but always move forward because this type of technology makes it appear that the past is the reality which isn’t true. This technology will be very stressful for people long-term.

I watched the first episode of “Black Mirror” in my dorm, to decide if I wanted attend the Flora’s Film event. Having seen it, I decided that while I liked the series, it was not something I wanted to watch with a group of people. But then, I wasn’t able to make it to the farmer’s market on Saturday.

In “The Entire History of You”, most people have a device which records everything they see and do. These memories can then be played back, either privately by their “owners” or on screens for other people to see. The main character of the episode, Liam, discovers that his wife was unfaithful to him with the aid of “inorganic” memories. At the end of the episode, he chooses to remove his memory device.

I was not wrong about the film being awkward to watch with a group. But the group setting was also appropriate, given that “The Entire History of You” is about a world in which our intimate experiences – memories – are shared with others.

Personally, I would consider living in a world in which my memories were potentially accessible to others a nightmare. My concern would not be only for my memories, which I would control, but for other people’s memories of me, which they would be able to share freely and without my knowledge. If such a device existed as exists in “The Entire History of You”, then it would be impossible to have ownership over yourself, your image, and how you are perceived.

An interesting point was made in the discussion after the film. Photography, video, and social media sharing function very much like the memory sharing in the Black Mirror episode. That we engage in these activities willingly suggests that we are not bothered by the loss of privacy they entail, and possibly would not be bothered by the much greater loss of privacy from shareable memory. But I think there are important distinctions between the world presented in Black Mirror and our current world. For one, our social media presences generally represents a conscious effort to present ourselves in the best possible light – we chose who we want to be online. In contrast, shareable memory might be more “truthful” and unfiltered. Yet, there is also a scene in “The Entire History of You” in which Liam’s wife edits her own memory. Thus it is possible that, even in a world where we were able to show people our “truthful” memories, we would still be able to manage our identities.

“The Entire History of You” while awkward, was ultimately entertaining. I liked the premise of “Black Mirror,” revealing the dark sides of technology we generally view as beneficial. I will likely watch the remainder of the series. But not with other people.

The third episode of the Netflix series Black Mirror, entitled “The Entire History of You”, poses a futuristic setting in which technology has progressed greatly: a small chip can be injected into a person’s neck and can record every moment in his/her life as it happens.

Personally, I think this technology could prove to be beneficial in certain situations, such as identifying or catching criminals, finding contradictions in a person’s testimony in court, etc.  However, I also believe that technology like this can be used by a lot of people for their own gain and to find fault in others.  In this episode, the main character becomes obsessed over trying to find out whether or not his wife had an affair in the past.  He watches past events over and over and zooms in on various people/details just to try to catch the lies in what his wife is telling him.  After finding out that his wife actually had an affair, he removes the chip from his neck so that he won’t have to remember what she did.  This raises one question…because his brain isn’t removed from his head, wouldn’t he still remember that his wife had an affair due to long term memory?

This episode definitely criticizes the future of technology.  It essentially claims that if people have the chance to use enhanced memory, they will use it to search out the mistakes and question the motives of others–even those that they love most–instead of trying to make society better.  This will lead to a general mistrust among all members of society, and as a result, technology will create a cynical society.

As a science fiction nerd, I am a huge fan of stories that use fantastic scenarios to explore human behavior. As a result, I have always loved Black Mirror’s exploration of human relationships with technology. However, I have also had misgivings about technophobic elements of various episodes in the series. A frequent criticism of the show is it promotes a Luddite message.

I think “The Entire History of You,” while being an engrossing  piece of science fiction, is actually unreasonably technophobic in its themes.

At the very end of the episode, Liam removes his Grain to help him deal with separating from his wife, Ffion. The episode ends just when he removes it, so there is no definitive answer for what occurs afterward. However, Liam’s problem is not the technology itself, but the way that it brings out his worst tendencies. Even without the Grain, Liam is an insecure, paranoid, jealous, violent man. Removing the Grain has done nothing but remove a tool for improving his memory. He can still fixate on the past and be haunted by the ghost of his wife without its aid. People do this all the time today, without Grain technology. If anything, the removal will actually worsen his tendencies, since he now has a more unreliable memory that will exaggerate anything he fixates upon.

However, the characters and the editing of the episode itself imply that removing the Grain will truly improve Liam’s life.

The most prominent pro-Grain character in the episode an old friend of Ffion. She’s toad-faced, rude, and intolerant. Her behavior is reminiscent of that of a close-minded, conservative, and pushy family member at an annual reunion. This is clearly intended to be a negative portrayal of pro-Grain individuals.

In addition, the structure of the final scene implies that Liam is freeing himself by removing the Grain. As he is prying it from his head, images of Ffion flash across the screen, implying that he is literally removing them from his thoughts. The episode ends exactly when he completely extracts it. This suggests that his story is completely over now: removing the Grain has ended his trial. If there had been a lingering shot of him viewing himself in the mirror, or another image of Ffion, then I would believe that the episode’s themes were not technophobic. However, it ended then, so I’m inclined to believe that Charlie Brooker intended to convey that removing the Grain provided some sort of relief to Liam.

This week’s featured film was an episode of Black Mirror entitled, “The Entire History of You”.  The particular fictional dystopian universe presented a world wherein people could relive moments of their lives with the click of a button.  The plot revolved around an obsessive and jealous husband, Liam, that abused this advanced technology in order to prove his wife was cheating on him.  His neurotic behavior immediately became apparent to the viewers after he continuously replayed and overanalyzed a job interview in the beginning of the episode.  This compulsiveness drastically increased once he had a slight inclination of his wife’s indiscretion.  After seemingly irrationally picking at straws and having a complete breakdown, it turned out that his suspicions were right- his wife was cheating on him.  In the final scene of the episode, Liam removes his chip (which sounds as painful as it looked) that allows him to replay memories.

Did the ending surprise me?  Was I shocked that this technology led to completely neurotic and obsessive behavior?  No and no.  The premise that this was a bad idea for mental health immediately dawned on me once I heard the description of the episode.  People already overthink constantly and neurosis is not something that I think should be enhanced.  Liam was just one example of the product of a society with technology but definitely would not be a singular one.  People could relive their most embarrassing moments endlessly and be afraid to ever react naturally to any situation.   Or, people could stay stuck in their best memories forever, essentially becoming the embodiment of “stuck in the past”.  This isn’t forward thinking technology- in fact, it’s just the opposite; new technology should be promoting a better future, not exacerbating the past.  Dwelling on past mistakes makes it almost impossible to move on from them or grow from them.  I left that screening solely thinking: How could people not end up like Liam when all they have to do is press a button?

Last week’s Flora’s Film Friday featured an episode of the British science fiction show Black Mirror, entitled “The Entire History of You”. Having seen an episode of Black Mirror prior to this event, I was prepared to embrace the show’s cynical but inventive perspective on the possible advances of technology and how our society might adapt to them. In this episode, the vast majority of people have a “grain” embedded in their head that connects to their brain and records all of their waking experiences, to be re-watched and reflected on by both the person living those experiences and anyone they choose to share these recordings with.

This episode was unsurprisingly (for anyone familiar with the show) shocking and dark, providing ample fodder for discussions on the benefits and drawbacks of this technology. Before watching the episode, I had discussed with people around me whether or not we would want to have this technology in our own lives. I was in favor of it, while the two people I was talking with were against the idea. Based on the outcome of the episode, it’s very clear that there are very real dangers to having every moment of your life available to watch in your head over and over, ready to be over-analyzed. The main character in the episode was overwhelmed with relatable emotions such as jealousy, paranoia, and anger, but these emotions were inflamed by access to technology that we don’t have.

The episode clearly fell on the side of a cautionary tale, demonstrating the downfall of technology that would store all your memories. Nevertheless, it was interesting to see how the episode portrayed the people who lived in this society and how they reacted to this technology. One character chose not to have a “grain” and she was treated with a range of reactions, from curiosity to disdain. It struck me that this can parallel our current society very easily: how would you react if you met someone who chose not to own a smartphone, or indeed any cell phone at all? Cell phones, especially those armed with cameras and social media, can do a commendable job at recording significant parts of our lives, and people often spend unhealthy amounts of time using them.

Ultimately, I think the ability to relive any past moment at the click of a button would be an incredible gift that humans are not equipped to handle well. We have too much of a proclivity to dwell on past experiences, especially negative memories, and while personally I would be interested in having this sort of technology at my disposal, I think the episode did a realistic job of portraying how it could be misused. We are defined by our memories, as much as by what remember as by what we forget, and the ability to forget is one we should be grateful for. To paraphrase Albus Dumbledore, it does not due to dwell on the past and forget to live.

This week’s Flora’s Films was an episode of Black Mirror titled The Entire History of You. The basic premise is that the story takes place in an alternate universe where almost every person is implanted with a chip that allows them to preserve everything they hear and see as permanent memories. Like a computer, memories are stored where they can be re-played over and over and shown to others.

At first, I was ambivalent about the idea. I’m quite a sentimental person so I like to try and preserve meaningful memories through writing or photographs. Being able to relive memories would be fascinating. At the same time, having this technology destroys some of the things that makes us humans. When we remember something, we are actually remembering the last time that we thought about that thing. In that way, the brain distorts our memories until it is less rooted in fact and more focused on our thoughts and feelings surrounding an event. The technology proposed in the Black Mirror episode would remove that very human element of our memories.

The other obvious problem about the ability to remember everything is how it can be abused. In my opinion, the anti-technology trope in works of fiction is a bit tiresome, but I like that this episode made its point without being too didactic. I think the technology to implant a chip into our brains for similar purposes could be available in our lifetime. For example, Elon Musk is supporting a company called Neurolink which is focused on designing devices than can be implanted in brains. While this could potentially help ameliorate neurological diseases, it could have terrible effects if a company (or a government) gained the power to literally control your brain. It’s fascinating and frightening at the same time, but one should definitely consider the consequences of having such technology, especially since it could be plausible in the near future.

Some cool articles about memory and brain chip implants:

https://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/am-i-right/201307/your-memory-isnt-what-you-think-it-is

https://www.theverge.com/2017/3/27/15077864/elon-musk-neuralink-brain-computer-interface-ai-cyborgs

The episode of Black Mirror that we watched focuses on a world in which memories are replayable, shareable, and deleteable, and it highlights the potential pitfalls one can fall into with access to this sort of technology. In particular, characters often replay incriminating words or phrases in their memories, almost to the point of obsession. However, these effects are certainly not limited to this science fiction technology. In the show, characters would beg for “redos,” in which someone replays and broadcasts their memories for others to view and critique. In our world, however, this same level of encroachment on others’ privacy is not foreign. With the rise and reign of texting and emails over vocal communication, it is all too easy to pick out a phrase or share a screenshot of a conversation and then proceed to dissect and annotate far beyond the significance intended by the sender. For the main character of the episode, repeatedly returning to this action proved horrendously destructive, costing him his family and his own mental health. Technologies such as these have their place to be beneficial tools with moderation, but when personal control is lost, this sort of access can be detrimental. Perhaps human beings are built to stress accuracy and clarity of understanding, but the introduction of replayable technology in any form has the potential for terrifying consequences.

Black mirror is a TV series on Netflix that makes social commentaries about society. The episode that we viewed criticized society’s reliance on technology. I believe that the technology fueled the main protagonist’s obsession with his wife’s affair. Only after he re-watched clips multiple times was he able to find evidence against his wife. He may not have even noticed his wife’s actions towards the antagonist without this technology. Constantly playing the clips of his wife with suspicious actions only fed his paranoia. I believe that this technology negatively impacted the protagonist and the society as a whole. While there are notable benefits of such a device, overall it would lead to the dependence of society on such devices. I definitely plan to watch other episodes and see if they are equally thought-provoking!

I had never seen Black Mirror before, so I was not sure what to expect. However, I was pleasantly surprised! It reminded me of a modern Twilight Zone. The episode left me pondering the effects new technology has on society. As we’ve seen with social media and cyberbullying, a plethora of problems can arise. Nevertheless, I don’t think that the crazy main character’s obsession over his wife’s cheating was a direct consequence of the camera in his brain. That obsession would have been there regardless of his ability to film her interactions and if anything, it helped him find out the truth. If I was offered such a device I would definitely take it. The device could also be a tremendous boon to detectives and the police. I really enjoyed this episode and will definitely begin watching Black Mirror.