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 |  Subject: The Number of His Name  Tue Feb 16, 2016 8:15 am | |
| The Number of His Name
Prophecy - Signs
Tuesday, February 16, 2016
Wendy Wippel
Andreas Sjostrom is vice president of the Swedish technology company Sogeti and according to his LinkedIn profile, a “trendwatcher, with a focus on digital transformation and its impact on customer experience”. Last week, however, he stopped watching trends and set one. And its impact? For future humanity,, apparently, a matter of life or death.Andreas, you see, a techno-geek since childhood and, familiar with microchips now commonly implanted in pets to monitor their location, decided to himself play guinea pig in a test-run of the use of microchips in humans. So he got himself a microchip kit online and enlisted Scandinavian Airlines as a research partner, who agreed to encrypt his frequent flyer number on the microchip, called a near field communication chip (NFC).The chip being roughly the size of a grain of rice.Then he found a nurse that would agree to inject the chip into his hand.Now on to Paris. . Andreas arrived at the Stockholm airport, checked in, and then proceeded to security.Although the airline was in on it (they facilitated encryption of his frequent flier number on the chip, after all) security guards at the airport were not. And as Andreas approached the crowded security queues, the posted guard-- before scanning, or even seeing Andreas’ passport or any other credentials, received confirmation from her scanner to let Andreas through.The news report describes her as being “confused”. I’m thinking that is putting it mildly. .Essentially Andreas himself (more specifically the microchip embedded in his hand,), verified his own identity.Bottom line: Andreas breezed through security with just a wave of that hand.The technology isn’t new—if you open doors with a security badge at work, or swipe your credit card at the grocery, you’re using a form of it every day. But Sjostrom is the first human to have his credentials permanently attached to his future corpse by said technology.Sjostrom, who wrote an essay at the age of 13 describing “writing code that helps people” as the most satisfying thing in life, said he turned himself into a guinea pig because he just wanted to know if the embedded microchip would work in an airport setting. And as a really frazzled, really frequent flier, Andreas described the success of his experiment like this:It’s not battery powered so it can’t run out of batteries. I can’t lose it, it is awakened by the scanner when I get close to it. “I am actually carrying the right to travel. You could strip me of everything and the system will let me in anyway.”Today’s airport setting implied.And as somebody who is routinely challenged by the material world (losing my keys and my cards on a daily basis), this sounds, on the surface of it, pretty attractive.I saw a folksy sign for sale in Cracker Barrel yesterday that pictured a person holding a lariat that said “I’m so scattered I don’t know if a found a rope or lost a horse”.I laughed real hard because that totally describes me.But as good students of the Bible (and, specifically, of prophecy) are you thinking what I am thinking?In a wider context, the system could also keep you out: - Quote :
- Then I saw another beast coming up out of the earth, and he had two horns like a lamb and spoke like a dragon. 12 And he exercises all the authority of the first beast in his presence, and causes the earth and those who dwell in it to worship the first beast, whose deadly wound was healed. 13 He performs great signs, so that he even makes fire come down from heaven on the earth in the sight of men.14 And he deceives those[e] who dwell on the earth by those signs which he was granted to do in the sight of the beast, telling those who dwell on the earth to make an image to the beast who was wounded by the sword and lived. 15 He was granted power to give breath to the image of the beast, that the image of the beast should both speak and cause as many as would not worship the image of the beast to be killed. 16 He causes all, both small and great, rich and poor, free and slave, to receive a mark on their right hand or on their foreheads,17 and that no one may buy or sell except one who has the mark or[f] the name of the beast, or the number of his name. Revelation 13: 11-17 NKJV
Sjostrom acknowledges that there are concerns with this with microchipping humanity, including possible misuse, but explains that it’s only through the use of the technology that the problems will be revealed.As for problems, I’ve seen enough political thrillers to recognize one right off the bat; Heads and hands can be cut off and used by people who don’t really own them.Eventually, the technology would have to focus on analyzing DNA. And that, ostensibly, would make the microchips, the “mark” obsolete.Which, could only mean one thing: :Soon and very soon.Sjostrom, by the way, bought his microchip from a Seattle-based company called Dangerous Things.I’ve said it before. You just can’t make this stuff up. |
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