Have you ever noticed how much we’ve all come to rely on GPS?
It’s on our smartphones, built into our cars
and some people even use GPS trackers
to track their luggage and laptops while traveling, it’s everywhere.
So many elements of our modern world rely on GPS, or the Global Positioning System
The most famous two examples are driving and flying.
In his book, Pinpoint: How GPS is Changing Technology Culture and our Minds
Greg Milner asserts that the pervasiveness of GPS has led to many new applications for the technology,
but also some unforeseen dangers such as “death by GPS.”
The author argues that the very way in which we think has been affected by GPS.
The author sites a recent example: a Canadian couple on their way to Las Vegas
who followed their GPS’s directions and took a detour into a remote part of Nevada.
They didn’t tell anyone where they were going, and soon they were stranded in the wilderness.
One of them died looking for help,
the other managed to survive for 50 days before being rescued.
Milner says: “Whenever anyone hears one of these death-by-GPS stories,
I find that the first thing you ask is
‘What was going on in their heads? How could this happen?
One way to look at it is by what cognitive scientists and psychologists call the cognitive map,
that’s our sort of innate, in-grown ability to understand our surroundings
and where things are in relation to other things.
Now, as anyone who uses GPS to get around, especially in a strange area, knows,
you don't need that part of your mind to really do that.
You don't need context, you just need to follow those directions.
And so, as a consequence, you don't really have to know whatever's going on around you.”
Then the author goes on to say “Some have even expressed concern
that the ubiquity of GPS is changing the way modern people think”.
The author concludes his article by sharing some sage advice
“Essentially, I think what's happening is that we're losing our ability to have broad cognitive maps.
When you looked down at a map, you had like sort of a bird's eye view
of where everything was in relation to everything else.”
Now, as much as I agree that it’s good advice to learn how to read a map
instead of relying entirely on GPS,
the author’s advice is also peculiarly ironic.
Why do I say this?
Because the author is implying that by having a “birds eye view” of where we are, like birds have,
this will reduce our dependence on GPS and strengthen our internal cognitive maps.
But this advice is quite simply contradictory because birds actually fly following a GPS.
That’s right,
Scientists have discovered some interesting developments in studying how birds navigate.
For centuries, scientists have struggled to find out how migratory birds can reach the same spot
each summer and winter, generation after generation without getting lost?
Can they navigate? The answer is no.
Rather, birds are controlled by a GPS.
Similar to the autopilot modes in our various means of transportation,
birds navigate, detect their directions,
and follow a certain route in the sky using their GPS.
That GPS unit in your car is certainly clever technology
but pigeons beat you hands down
they have GPS built right into their brains!
Researchers like Le-Qing Wu and J. David Dickman at Baylor College of Medicine
have spotted a group of 53 cells within pigeons’ brains
that respond to the direction and strength of the Earth’s magnetic field.
The question of how birds navigate using – among other signals – magnetic fields
is the subject of much debate.
These new “GPS neurons” seem to show how magnetic information is represented in birds’ brains.
According to Wu and Dickman’s study, neurons in the brains of pigeons
encode the direction of the Earth's magnetic field,
endowing the birds with an innate internal GPS system,
which surprised the researchers most of all.
There are many YouTube series, hosted by super enthusiastic and slightly eccentric quantum physicists
that explain that birds use quantum mechanics to develop their navigation systems.
One of these YouTube series is hosted by Jim Al-Khalili,
a Professor of Theoretical Physics and of Public Engagement in Science
at the University of Surrey, in great Britain
and author of several popular science books,
he appears regularly on radio and television.
In 2007, he was awarded the Royal Society Michael Faraday Prize for Science Communication.
Professor Jim Al-khalili spoke about one of these migratory birds,
the European Robin,
and how this species may be relying on the Quantum entanglement to develop its navigation systems.
He said "What's becoming increasingly clear is that the humble European Robin
finds its way south from Scandinavia to the Mediterranean every winter
by following and seeing the Earth's magnetic field. And it does this with special molecules,
light-activated proteins inside its retina called cryptochrome.”
In brief, flying birds are not flying haphazardly.
They are controlled by a built-in GPS just like today’s autopilot function,
which is controlled by GPS as well.
Science proves that birds navigate by following and seeing the Earth’s magnetic field as a guide.
This means they know which way that magnetic field is pointing without a compass.
So just as Greg Milner feared,
when you follow a GPS, you are a follower being controlled by a machine,
despite the fact that you have a mind; you are usually choosing not to use it.
Birds, likewise, due to their built-in GPS are controlled and are not flying on their own.
This was a surprising discovery for scientists and physicists.
But you know what is even more surprising?
The Holy Quran, which was written 1400 years ago
told us that it is one of God’s signs that the birds in the sky are controlled.
In Chapter 16, verse 79, the Holy Quran says, "Do they not look at the birds,
they are controlled in the air of the sky? Nothing holds them aloft but the power of Allah.
Verily in this are signs for those who believe"
It seems Albert Einstein was right when he said his famous line
“God does not play dice with the universe”!