Timothhy Birdnow

In many ways I loathe the modern world. Here is a prime example of why.

My CPAP machine was on it's last legs. While I need the darned thing since I have a serious heart condition and obstructive sleep apnea is very hard on your heart I've never enjoyed it because it takes forever to fall asleep with it on since it forces all manner of fluids out of my sinuses and into my throat. The end result is coughing for about an hour before I finally fall asleep.

But I can live with that; I love the machine because I sleep better once I do fall asleep and I seep deeper and longer.

So naturally the makers of CPAP machines have to go and redisgn the darned things.

My new machine is sleeker and smaller and that's a good thing, you would think. But it does not have a sim card to record data for my doctor; instead it has a wireless connection that broadcasts in real time.

And you rent the machine for one year and then you own it. BUT if you are non-compliant in using it the insurance company stops paying for it and you have to shell out the entire cost of the machine. What this means is they report your usage, and they watch your usage carefully.

I used my old machine for a couple of days after receiving the new one and some dude from the company called to chastise me. He called and then demanded I verify my date of birth and other such personal items. I told him to go pound sand; I didn't know for sure he was with the company and it could easily have been a phishing expedition, for all I knew. I douut it was; he was just trying to find out why I wasn't using the machine.

The point is, it's nobody's business if I am using it or not. It's the way they use technology to seduce us to allow our privacy to be invaded. This is the way it always starts; with a nanny system where everyone is in your business. Eventually what started as a convenience becomes a necessity and then is mandatory. Before you know it you've lost your fundamental freedom.

I know; people will say "it's just one little thing" but like water it's just one little drop until you have a flood.

When I got my first CPAP there was nothing like this. They did not hold the threat of non-payment over your head, and spy on you to make sure you comply with their rules. They paid for it and it was between you and your doctor. But now technology is allowing the insurance company to babysit you lest "their" investment be wasted. How long before the government steps in and makes it a criminal matter to fail to use your CPAP and thus wasting insurance company dollars - or Medicare money?

At any rate I resent the whole thing.

But then there's more to this story.

My old CPAP had a reservoir that could last for two days if you were lucky. CPAP's require distilled water to hydrate your sinuses. I mean, the thing is basically a compressor blowing air up your nose and that dries your sinuses out. So what did they do? This machine has a smaller reservoir to keep with the cool, sleek look, and it only lasts a little over half the night. Six hours tops. So I keep waking in the night with burning in my nose and nasal cavity. I start sneezing my head off. If I don't get up and refill the stupid thing I won't get back to sleep.

In fact I thought at first I was getting a cold because I kept sneezing and my sinuses burned and I didn't realize the machine was out of water. Now that I know what it is I have had to get up every night just to service the machine. My old machine required no servicing when I was trying to sleep.

So for aesthetics they made this machine horribly impractical and for what?

That is such a modern thing; to fix something that isn't broke and in the process break it.

So now I have a machine that spies on me and that wakes me in the night demanding I feed it like a cholicy baby.

All I wanted was a simple device. All I ever want with anything is a simple device. I hate all the bells and whistles that you cannot escape any longer. Take my computer (please!) There are all sorts of convenient little things about it, little key shortcuts and the like that I am forever accidentally hitting and causing chaos. I don't need all these aps they put on this machine, nor do I want them. I just want a basic computer that does basic stuff. Modernity won't let you do that; you must become part of the Borg Collective.

Take cell phones. I have a simple flip phone, a Consumer Celllular Iris. It is fine for my needs but I am forever running up against this modern age with it. For example, my doctor wanted me on MyChart and so they set me up for it. The way they did that was to send my phone a web link, something completely useless to me. I tried copying it from the phone into my computer but it didn't work - it was a complicated, lengthy address and I don't see well enough to be able to do that. So I couldn't do what a much simpler task would have allowed. They are making it increasingly impossible to live without a smart phone.

I had a smart phone but my bad eyesight made it impossible to use. By the time I actually answered any call they had hung up; it was too convoluted an answering process. The thing was always dropping calls too. Once I had been trying to get ahold of a doctor for days and then they called and the damnable call dropped! This was a very important call. Enraged I tossed the machine on the couch with too much vigor and it bounced off and landed on the floor, breaking in the process. That was the one and only experiment I did with smart phones; now I use flip phones that cost thirty to forty bucks.

Don't even get me started on my laptop. It only downloads from Microsoft and it is full of pop-up adds that block everything. Oh, and since I have to expand my screen to see the ads are always blocking text. But to get rid of those I have to get an ad blocker and that will have to come from Microsoft or I'll have to take this computer out of s-mode. I did that before and the machine simply "disappeared" my cursor, making it useless. I had to exchange that machine for another.

I warn everyone - this modern technology is like the chain Ebeneazor Scrooge was forging in life. He made it link by link and yard by yard, and in the end it was intended to wrap him forever in Hell. Little by little these technologies have been wrapping us and in the process we are losing our humanity, nay, our salvation itself for the convenience of Grubhub aps or Uber rides.

I am not a luddite and always believed there is a positive role for technology. But now, with AI coming in, and deep fakes everywhere, we are facing a very dangerous point in our history. Technology is about to make our world into something not just unrecognizable but it will take away our freedoms in a manner never before seen.

Let me get religious for a moment; several of the things in the Bible, the prophecies, make perfect sense in light of modern technology.

The Book of Revelations says:

1 Then I saw a second beast, coming out of the earth. It had two horns like a lamb, but it spoke like a dragon. 12 It exercised all the authority of the first beast on its behalf, and made the earth and its inhabitants worship the first beast, whose fatal wound had been healed. 13 And it performed great signs, even causing fire to come down from heaven to the earth in full view of the people. 14 Because of the signs it was given power to perform on behalf of the first beast, it deceived the inhabitants of the earth. It ordered them to set up an image in honor of the beast who was wounded by the sword and yet lived. 15 The second beast was given power to give breath to the image of the first beast, so that the image could speak and cause all who refused to worship the image to be killed.

end

Fire coming down from heaven is an obvious reference to air warfare. But the "image of the Beast"? In times past I thought maybe that meant the dude was on television, but now I think it means he'll us AI in his image to manipulate the public. This sounds very much like AI to me.

And of course the Mark of the Beast can be easily done now and I can see how, with this powerful AI in place, it would be almost a necessity. Computers can now steal identities with ease and with so many people doing e-commerce (in fact it's growing increasingly difficult to use cash for anything) securing identity will become a top priority. How to do that? An implantable chip would make perfect sense; you would use a scanner on your computer or smart phone to prove your identity.

And then they own you.

We are rushing headlong into Armageddon and I see no way to stop this juggernaut. I know that technology can't be stopped; the guy with the greatest tech always wins in the end as history has shown. But we've never dealt with tech like this before and frankly, we worship it. That's what that Bible passage I quoted above means. AI will be the Golden Calf of the whole world.

In the end Jesus will, of course, simply brush all this aside "with the sword of His mouth and the brightness of His coming" in other words with words. Christ's reign will begin not because of His warmaking so much as His speaking the truth. How words will be able to drown out the words of the Beast (which is described as a flooe pouring from his mouth in the Book of Revelations) is beyond me but somehow God knows how to do it.

But I'd rather put the Apocalypse on hold for a while - at least until after I am room temperature (and that doesn't mean I want to have lizard DNA make me into a reptile.) But I find it increasingly hard to not join into the mad rush to the brink of destruction. There is no place for a man who just wants to live simply and be left alone in this modern world.

A pox upon it! I was perfectly comfortable in the twentieth century, and maybe even before.

Posted by: Dana Mathewson at March 05, 2026 01:15 AM (lBLsY)

Posted by: Timothy Birdnow at March 05, 2026 09:01 AM (oflqW)

Posted by: fiunre at March 05, 2026 10:47 PM (pGa/a)

Posted by: Dana Mathewson at March 07, 2026 01:16 AM (lIkkw)

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