#7 / The Path Ahead

I am kicking off a new class at UCSC today, once again presenting my course on "Privacy, Technology, And Freedom" to thirty or so fourth-year Legal Studies students who are completing their "Capstone Thesis" requirement. Students must complete this course, and their Capstone Thesis, in order to graduate with a Bachelor's degree in Legal Studies.

As I begin this new class, directed at fourth-year students, soon to graduate, I can't help but remember the course I taught last Quarter. That course, entitled "The Ethical and Political Implications of Emerging Technologies," was given to first-year students in Crown College. That course, in other words, was directed to students at the beginning, and not the end, of their college career.

On the last day of class, in that Crown College course, I provided those first-year students with a little advisory on what would be their "path ahead." That advisory works for those just about to graduate, too. In fact, this famous poem by the Spanish poet, Antonio Machado, speaks to us all.

I encourage you to click this link, to be able to follow along as the poet tells us: 

Traveler, your footsteps

Are the path – and nothing else;

Traveler, there isn’t any path;

You make the path as you walk.

You make the path as you walk,

And when you look back

You will see the pathway that

You will never be able to travel again.

Traveler, there isn’t any path,

Just the traces of your footsteps on the sea.

And here is the poem itself, as set to music: 

Image Credit:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QHcypSLIp_A&feature=youtu.be