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Alien Anthropologists Study My E-Mail by John Sheirer An enlightening--and equally frightening!-- essay exploring the notion of how our culture might be viewed if all that remained of our way of life was a week's worth of e-mail messages in John Sheirer's in-box.

Techno-Trust by Brendon M. Marks If you can't trust your microwave oven or your toilet as far as you can throw them, what can you trust? Brendon M. Marks, one of our favorite techno-critics, examines these questions, among others.

Suppose the human race was wiped out by some cataclysmic disaster--plague, meteor, nuclear war--take your pick. Then suppose a thousand years from now alien anthropologists came to investigate our planet. Now suppose all they were able to recover of human culture were the senders' names and subject lines on a week's worth of incoming e-mails I hadn't yet deleted. What would they think of human beings with such a small sample of information about us? Well, they would probably figure we worked a lot. I have messages about seven individual meetings, five committee meetings, three department meetings, and two off-site meetings. With all that work, would they think humans had time for other interests? They might deduce we had an interest in geography based on all the e-mails I get from someplace called amazon.com. Our preoccupation with vanity would be apparent based on subject lines like these:   > "Regrow Hair, Guaranteed!"   > "This AB Machine Will Change Your Life!"   > "Lose Up To Fifty Pounds!"   > "Look Great For Spring!"   > "Get A Cellulite-Free Body!"   > "Add Up To Three Inches To Your Penis     Size" They would quickly learn that our interest in health and beauty wasn't just superficial:   >"Low-Cost Medical And Dental Coverage    Today!"   > "Get Drugs Without A Prescription!"   > "Paxil! Prozak! Effexor! Xanex! Zoloft! Valium!"   > "Viagra--Lowest Cost On The Web!" Our fascination with matters of economics would be hard to miss:   > "Make a Fortune!"   > "Lowest Mortgage Rates Of The Decade!"   > "You're Pre-Approved For A Gold Card!"   > "Bill Gates Wants To Give You $5,000!"   > "Why Pay More For Erotic Videos!?"   > "Relief From Credit Card Debt Is In Your     Grasp!" We would be seen as a race concerned with bettering ourselves through education:   > "New MBA Programs In Your Area!"   > "Distance Learning Opportunities From     Accredited Universities!"   > "Graduate Today!"   > "Suffering From Default On Your Student     Loans!?"   > "Bachelor's, Master's, Doctorate Without     Taking One Class!" It would be abundantly clear that we were a sexually healthy and open-minded people. Just in the past week, I've gotten e-mails from Tina, Nancy, Courtney, Amanda, Elissa, Sarah, Amber (three times), and several unnamed "Asian Beauties" who have all invited me to see pictures of themselves disrobed. Even several celebrities have written recently promising to show me "Everything!" As amorous as we were, the complexities and depth of our personal relationships would also be evident:   > "Check Your Girlfriend/Boyfriend For A     Prison Record!"   > "Low-Cost Divorce Mediation!"   > "Find Deadbeat Dads Fast!"   > "You Don't Need To Be Lonely Again Tonight!"   > "Meet Your Match At Match.Com!" Of course, above all else, our alien anthropologists would definitely recognize what an enthusiastic race of people we must have been, considering all those capital letters and exclamation marks we used. AUTHOR BIO: John Sheirer's poetry, essays, and educational materials have been published widely in print and on the Internet, most recently at Nights and Weekends and Ethical Oasis. He teaches writing, public speaking, and literature at Asnuntuck Community College in Enfield, CT.

Recently a friend related a true story. He was in the restroom at work, in a stall, quietly taking care of business when the toilet collapsed. Instantly, he was on the floor, pants around his ankles, and water spraying all over the place. If you can't depend on technology when you are at your most vulnerable, when can you? My friend is a husky guy, but well under the maximum weight rating for that device. Clearly, technology let him down, and it made me think about how much blind trust we place in technology. We put a twenty-cent pen in the pocket of a twenty-dollar shirt without even considering that it might leak. After all, thousands of man-hours (or person-hours) have gone into the research around the ballpoint pen, so that it will function flawlessly right up to the point where you're trying to write down a phone number. We hurtle down the highway at 70 miles per hour plus, without giving a thought to the fact that we might have to stop that projectile with very little advance notice. All we have to do is put our foot on the brake, and that car will stop, because technology says it will. However, if that's true, what causes all the fender-benders every morning that make me late for work? We also never think that the four bologna-skin tires that provide all our earthly contact could have been inspected by a guy who was just told that morning that profits are down, so he won't get a raise this year. Blind faith says those tires won't disintegrate into ditch-filler at the first sign of a little stress. Technology eliminates all those humanoid-related factors and makes us safe. Virtually every home in America has a microwave oven, and no one has noticed the correlation between that fact and the high incidence of toenail fungus, which according to the TV commercials, can only be treated from the inside. Well, if it can only be treated from the inside, it must have originated from the inside. Therefore, until someone can prove to me that there is no connection between food cooked in microwave ovens and this malady, I'm going to sharply curtail my use of the device. Besides, that last batch of Jell-O didn't turn out very well anyway. I think that's what caused me to have the dream about being trapped in a house filling with Jell-O pudding. I called out to Bill Cosby, but the spirit of Bing Crosby showed up instead. I always get those two mixed up. Maybe I've been standing too close to the microwave while it's operating, or maybe there's a leak in the door seal. One of the biggest areas in human history where blind faith was placed in technology is the good old Internet. We dial into a phone number somewhere and connect our personal computer to the Internet. The operative word being 'personal.' Is it really? Once we take that wire from the back of the CPU and plug it into the jack in the wall, who's to say what goes on? The whole world is on the other side of that phone jack and some of those folks are doing their best to separate you from your money. Sure, they try to do it with your consent, but failing that, who knows what they'll resort to? In addition, these new high-speed connections are even worse because your computer is always connected. Someone could be looking at your checkbook while you're watching "The Lion King" on DVD. It's almost the electronic equivalent of having a toilet collapse under you, leaving you lying on the floor with your pants down around your ankles. AUTHOR BIO: Brendon M. Marks was born and raised in rural upstate New York but now resides in Arizona. An information technology professional, runner, husband and father with a weird way of contemplating life, he has written a tongue-in-cheek column in three newspapers for several years and has published a collection of his greatest humor essays. Check out his Web site: Humorbook Publishing.

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