A Techie Life Lesson

Here a little techie thought for personal reflection or to use in a cool youth lesson. In programming there are a couple types of logic that are used to produce results – Sequential and Combinational Logic.

Combinational Logic

Combinational logic makes decisions based on currently available input. Results are based on a limited set of data. In terms of social networking, Twitter is a good example of this type of logic to a point. When you post a tweet, that limited data is posted on a wall. Those who follow you get a snippet of your thoughts floating down their digital river for that isolated moment of your life. That tweet alone has no context, no history, and no connection to other information in cyberspace. Subconsciously your followers make a split-second judgment of your intelligence and your worldview every time you post your brilliant or not so brilliant 140 characters.

Porting this concept to real life, sometimes we make decisions based solely on limited available data. We make judgments of others without really knowing them. We take hearsay as fact and by nature we tend to believe one side of the story. How many times have we issued a final judgment on someone based solely on one person’s account of a situation or something we hear/read on social networking. Without context, we are essentially uninformed and not qualified to make decisions or judgments.

“First Impressions Last” is an example of combinational logic. Judgment is passed without ever knowing anything deeper than the surface. People who judge books by their cover are entrenched in tunnel vision decision making.  Have you ever purchased something on impulse only to be burdened with buyer’s remorse later? Buyer’s remorse usually comes when we did not collect enough data about the product we purchased. Impulse buying is driven by a limited emotional data set. A good consumer researches a product, finds the best deal, and makes a financial plan to purchase the item.

Making real-life decisions based on limited data is purely reactionary and rash.

Sequential Logic

Sequential logic makes decisions based on a history of previous inputs. Results are based on a wide array of information past and present. A good example of this is Facebook’s friend finder. Based on your friend list and history of fan pages, Facebook’s algorithm prepares a set of possible friends you haven’t connected to yet. Advertisers use a history of keywords stored in cookies on your computer to serve up relevant ads to you. Google has an option to store your web history on your Google account for the sole purpose of tailoring advertisements to your demographic. These services use a history of your text inputs to produce a relevant set of results.

When dealing with people, it’s important we don’t make haste in scrutinizing others with limited data. It would behoove us to get to know a person before we criticize them or judge their character. Too often we only hear one side of the story in conflicts. A responsible person will hear both sides of the issue before making a decision. It’s easier to make an armchair judgment than taking time to learn about a person. It’s hard work to find a person’s context. It sometimes involves painful details and emotional investment.When you learn someone’s history it fosters trust and appreciation. It also builds community and strengthens diversity.

When you make important decisions with a wide array of information, you are wise.