information realization

for Wendy's mag.

I am surprised at the amount of information a brain can process at once. I was stuck in traffic today, sitting right on a bridge near the Covington railroad bridge. 89.7 wnku was on the airwaves, they were featuring a program on Woodstock for the aging hippies and trying to make it appeal to kids. I was halfway paying attention, just listening to the words and thinking about where i would promote next. the commentator went on about how the Woodstock had progressed. There was some talk about the Dead warning that the show wouldn't be sucessful if it rained. Someone threw some mud at them as soon as it started raining. or something like that. They played the audio clip of the dude saying "maybe if we all try hard, we can get it to stop raining." His voice progressively getting louder to rouse the tripping mudpeople. Another audio clip is cued up in the background. Right away i recognized it as Red Hot Chili peppers from the album Mothers milk. Right away footage of them performing came into my imaginary eye. I thought it was out of place for Woodstock but i was answered by the jockey telling about the woodstock 99 where fans of Red Hot Chili peppers conjured bon fires, violence and moshing. I was proud that he continued to say that it was reflective of the times just like the first woodstock was true to being peaceful and motivating people to change the world.
I am truely flabbergasted by the amount of information that we can think of instantaneously and simultaneously. I heard somewhere that the information contained in the New York Times is greater than the amount of information a regular person in the Roman Times acquired in their entire lifetime. I find that hard to find, I know the philosophers and scientists of roman times could process extraordinary things. they could perform brain surgery, used batteries from vinegar and copper, and many high tech things. How will this evolve in the future. Will people shorten things so much that one word could mean a whole commonly used paragraph. The internet has already created a series of letters that mean a whole phrase, leet speak it might be called. It is fascinating how so many professions use their own specialized short speak. Will that become common usage as people evolve?
You Decide.
by Jonathan Hancock