GK Foundation debates: Modern technology - friend or foe?

Is modern technology friend or foe? That is one of the many questions to be answered at the GraceKennedy Foundation Annual Public Lecture at The Jamaica Pegasus hotel, New Kingston, on March 7, 2018 starting at 5 p.m.

Dr Parris Lyew-Ayee Jr, director of the Mona GeoInformatics Institute at The University of the West Indies (UWI), will deliver the lecture titled 'Tech Charge - Smart Homes, Smart Businesses, Smart Nations.'

It will be streamed live via GraceKennedy's YouTube page: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p03asCLQO0k.

The GraceKennedy Foun-dation, which every year selects a topic of great currency for its lecture, views the phenomenon of technology and its place in modern society as being particularly appropriate as Jamaicans debate issues such as the pros and cons of artificial intelligence, social media, and Internet security.

"We are having a hard time deciding whether this new and dynamic technology is friend or foe," said Caroline Mahfood, executive director, Grace-Kennedy Foundation. "We have had to adapt to many changes in the past two decades. The most revolutionary, perhaps, is in the area of finance, where the certainty of transacting business by cash has given way to the use of cards, mobile money, and electronic bank transfers. While the cashless society has many advantages, it has also opened up the potential for cybercrime, leaving us feeling vulnerable and skeptical," Mahfood said.

Citing the soon-to-be introduced National ID System as an example where the use of technology is being strongly contested, she stated that the application of a system that many perceive as encroaching on and even threatening their privacy is alarming.

"Jamaica, as a forward-thinking nation determined to have its place in the modern world, cannot avoid the relentless march of technology, which, as our lecturer points out, 'is neither bad nor good. It is, by definition, a tool that is developed and wielded by humans'. It is important, then, for us to understand it," she said.

Dr Lyew-Ayee Jr is ideally positioned to speak on this subject. As the conceptualiser and designer of the Caribbean's first and Jamaica's largest GIS navigation system, JAMNAV, which provides services to the public and private sectors locally, regionally, and internationally, he has contributed to the nation's own technological development.