Technology is a Force Multiplier

The more access we have to technology, the easier it becomes for fewer and fewer people to have a bigger and bigger impact on more and more people. And as the impact gets bigger, we have a hard time taking in the fact that so few people could really have such devastating effects. So, for instance, even though all the evidence really does point to the fact that he acted alone, 50 years later many people still can’t believe that one jerk with a gun could break the hearts of millions of people or, a century earlier, ignite a vast European civil war, fought in two acts known as World War I and World War II, that destroyed that civilization and fundamentally changed the geopolitical structure of the world.Likewise, with the force multiplier of technology offering a huge assist we now live in an era where 19 jerks could achieve on 9/11 something that no nation-state 50 years ago could have achieved.Those are two big examples. But the vast majority of examples are much smaller and are not shown by physical acts of violence, but by intellectual and spiritual acts of great goodness or epic stupidity. The internet is the great force multiplier for these things, an immense unfiltered purveyor of wonderful information and damnable lies. It is affording hitherto unheard of opportunities for unknown people to do wonderful things (like the delightful work being done by Fr. Robert Barron, the Vlog Brothers, and Jonathan Coulton, or cool ideas like Kickstarter funding all kinds of inventive and good undertakings.  Heck!  Youse guys have demonstrated many many times your own selfs that the Internet can be an awesome tool for good with your spectacular feats of generosity to people in need).But as with all things human, technology is also enabling quacks