When we were young, we all had vast and unlimited imagination. Inside my head, I was simultaneously entering Hogwarts, becoming the High Queen of Narnia, fighting the Minotaur in front of Camp Half-Blood, and reading in a magic tree house. My mind was always going here and there throwing a bunch of “what if” questions in everything I encountered. I do not recall most of the things that passed through my mind at this time, but there is one thought that I clearly remember and still hold onto. Let me introduce you to my childhood invention: the Mind Flash Drive.
In elementary school, I remember that I had to memorize a lot of Chinese characters. (By the way, it is a thing in Korea for parents to teach and make their children learn the shapes and sounds of Chinese characters when they are young, because a lot of these sounds are used in the Korean language.) I also clearly remember that I absolutely hated it. The younger version of myself did not understand yet why I had to memorize these crazy drawing-like characters as they did not interest me at all.
And around that time, I started noticing how computers worked. I would stand next to my dad when he was working on word documents at home and was fascinated by how simple the process was. He would type whatever information he wanted in a document and no matter how complex it was, the information was instantly stored and remembered by the computer. Then he would move the document to his flash drive and bring it wherever he wanted.
As you may have imagined, this is when my mind started to combine these two things. Since I absolutely hated intentionally memorizing all the Chinese characters, what if my mind also worked like a computer? What if there was a flash drive that is unique to my mind which I can plug into a computer, type in whatever information I want to store in my head and connect it back to myself? With this Mind Flash Drive, my life would be so much simpler; I don’t have to put in such effort to memorize anything, I can instantly know every single detail in an encyclopedia and always have a script right inside my head whenever I am giving a presentation where notecards aren’t allowed. The elementary school myself would spend hours lying on my bed, imagining a world with my own Mind Flash Drive.
Of course, now that I am more mature and aware, I instantly can think of so many instances where this Mind Flash Drive can be abused. In order for this technology to happen, humans would have to essentially be robots that can be programmed with machines. Also this would create a new sort of hierarchy in our society where those already with access to information can have unlimited amounts of data stored right in their heads while others without access will fall behind and behind. To some, it could be the greatest weapon of all: a very simple and effective method of brainwashing the entire population just with the help of a few hackers. And most importantly, it gives me the creeps to think that everything inside my head that defines who I am can be manipulated on a computer.
Now if it falls down to the two choices, I would without doubt choose to memorize all the Chinese characters by myself without a computer, but it is still quite interesting to think and imagine this “what if…” once in a while. Do you have any childhood inventions that you still remember? Tell us about it!