Within the Internet lies Africa’s clay of wisdom

[NASSIR]

Within the Internet lies Africa’s clay of wisdom

 

By Philip Emeagwali

Friday, December 07, 2007

 

ACCORDING to history books, gun-wielding European slave traders kidnapped one in five Africans and transported them across the oceans to the Americas. A less visible, but no means less drastic technological tool of suppression, is the compass, a device used worldwide for navigation. In the same way that Britain used its maritime knowledge and the US harnessed its intellectual capital to rule the world, the early slave traders used the simple compass to wreak havoc on civilisation.

 

It is a sad fact that the innocuous navigation tool originated during and was fuelled by the Atlantic slave trade. The technological development of the innocent compass, invented in China for religious divination 2,000 years ago, allowed Africa to be ravaged in unspeakable ways.

 

It was the compass that created the Atlantic slave trade, enabling the early colonial navigators — and their blood merchants — to chart an accurate course from Gorée Island, off the coast of Senegal, to Brazil; paving the way for the trans-Atlantic slave trade, which began on August 8, 1444.

 

This trade in human merchandise covered four continents and lasted four centuries, and serves as a shameful beacon for the depravity of human greed and conquest.

 

The compass became the de facto weapon of mass destruction, which led to the de-capitalisation and decapitation of Africa. It created the African Diaspora with one in five people taken out of the motherland. It was the largest and most brutal displacement of human beings in human history.

 

Today, it is hard to imagine that such destruction and the wholesale abduction of a race could result from a tool as common as the compass. Yet, as a people who survived the slave trade, we must draw our strength from lessons learned from the past and draw our energy from the power of the future. And the power of the future lies in “controlling” technology and harnessing it for the benefit of mankind, not for his destruction.

 

The people of Africa must take note that the Internet is our modern-day compass, and within it resides our own clay of wisdom. As we prepare for our great journey into the cyberspace of the future, with its technological promise — its clay of wisdom — we must understand the strategic value and potential of this all-important tool.

 

Our image of the future inspires the present and the present serves to create the future. Africa’s lack of substantial technological knowledge of the Internet and its potential may lead it to be assaulted or manipulated in unexpected ways, just as it was devastated generations ago for the lack of a simple compass.

 

We didn’t recognise the power of the compass then; the danger is that we don’t recognise the power of technology today. While Africa merely contemplates the future, the West, the quickest off the mark to wield technology’s weapons, actually makes the future. This fact, and how the power of technology can be wielded against the poor, was brought home to me clearly when I received the following email recently:

 

“About a year ago, I hired a developer in Africa to do my job. I am paying him $12,000 a year to do my job, for which I am paid $67,000 a year,” the sender wrote. “He’s happy to have the work and I’m happy that I have to work only 90 minutes a day. Now I’m considering getting a second job and doing the same thing.”

 

Technology in the hands of others has been used to exploit Africa for centuries. But now it is time for Africa to grasp technology and finally embrace the modern age’s clay of wisdom and advancement.

 

Africa has the chance to show the world how technology can be used for good, not evil. And the people of Africa can use today’s technology, not to mimic their own exploitation, but to right the wrongs of the past and empower themselves with the same tool that has been used to oppress them in the past.

 

Africa can provide a shining example for the world in using technology for its own upliftment and the benefit of mankind. This time, it is our choice.

---------------------------------

 

What is your take on this article?

 

 

I agree with his points that other civilizations, for instance, Islam did not use its inventions to wreak havoc or exploit the weak but to advance its good values and save humanity from the dark ages. The question is would the now revitalized European hegemony (as was in the 2nd phase of globalization before World War II ) and America in the current 3rd phase of globalization embrace this historical reality and technology.

 

The navigation tools was invented by Islam and its need came after strenuous efforts to perfect the direction of Qibla (direction to the Pilgrimage) as well as the times of prayers.

It was Islam that integrated diverse cultures and formed one powerful systemization that connected four continents. The west must stop believing the theories of Huntington that Economic exchange brings people into contact but not into agreement and thus the clash of civilizations. I agree with him that Africa must be open to the global market by dictating its own terms and to adopt to the new technology for its own good.

 

“Some Westerners…have argued that the west does not have problems with Islam but with violent Islamist extremists. Fourteen hundred years of history demonstrate otherwise” (Huntington)

 

Source: Via Hiiraan.