Learning About Technology and Relationships from Wendell Berry

The useful part

David Berlinski Eric Cassell David Coppedge Photo provided by David Coppedge. Jonathan Witt Share Facebook Twitter/X LinkedIn Flipboard Print Email American farmer, poet, author, and conservationist Wendell Berry died recently at 92 years old. I took the opportunity to do a fresh reading of one of his most famous essays, "Why I Am Not Going to Buy a Computer," written in 1987.

How it works

• Here, I review each of his reasons and explore how it connects to our choices about artificial intelligence and modern technology.
• In his farming work, he used tools he could purchase locally and repair himself, including manual tools or equipment he could harness to horses.
• For his writing work, he kept it simple: "I work with a pencil or a pen and a piece of paper." In his essay, Berry describes the beautiful working relationship he had with his wife, Tanya.
• She typed his work on a Royal standard typewriter, flagging edits as she worked.
• First, Berry writes that he doesn't want his work as a writer to have a direct dependence on companies that use environmentally destructive methods to generate electricity or energy.

What to take from it

"She is my best critic," wrote Berry, "because she is the one most familiar with my habitual errors and weaknesses." He notes that people have often told him he could improve things if he bought a computer. A single AI-focused data center (100MW), for example, can consume as much electricity as a small city and more water per day than an average town (five million gallons every day). Discarding the "Old Model" Next, Berry points out that technological innovation almost always encourages or requires the discarding of the "old model" in favor of the new one.

Example or evidence

• Today, AI companies are striving to meet current and future AI demand by building large data centers to house the material equipment that fuels AI-driven computing.
• Little wonder, then, that many are concerned about the effects of building more data centers to power AI.
• He mentions strip mining of coal in particular, which involves the removal of large amounts of soil and rock that disrupts landscapes and results in air and water pollution.
• Virtually all of our consumption now is extravagant, and virtually all of it consumes the world.

Details worth keeping

What's interesting is that most if not all of the reasons Berry offers for choosing not to buy into the personal computer craze of the late '80s are equally good reasons not to give into the AI craze of the mid 2020s that we are currently experiencing. First, that Berry was not resistant to technology of any kind. He gave us a great example of how to master technology.

Related coverage

• Grist: Throughout his career, the writer and farmer found joy in a world without end.