September 17, 2026
THE DAILY McLUHAN DIALOGUES™ • McDialogues™
Understanding the Grammars of Electric Culture and Propaganda Science™
An Exploration of Technology Ecology as an Anchor in a Sea of Change™ and Tactical Training in Counter-Propaganda Science™
by Nelson S. Thall
Former Director/Chief Archivist, Marshall McLuhan Center On Global Communications, Ross, Ca. and McLuhan Media Scientist, Former President/Director, Marshall McLuhan Centre On Global Communications, Toronto, Canada
THE JUDGE WHO BECAME A WITNESS
The Human Expert Is Not Allowed to Overrule the Algorithm
A Student of Technology asks:
Mr. Thall, Australia is using an algorithm to decide how much home care an older person receives. Newly released emails show that an override was built into the software, but the law forbids assessors to use it. The government now proposes letting a senior official overrule the algorithm in hard cases. What has happened to human judgment?
Nelson S. Thall replies:
Human judgment has not disappeared. Human authority has. The algorithm is not some intelligence that arrived from outside mankind. It is human classification extended into a technological system, amplified so that thousands of cases can be processed according to the same rules. That sameness is the printing press's old promise, every copy identical, now applied to people. It is also a real promise of fairness: like needs, like classification. But Professor McLuhan showed us the danger of failing to recognize our own extensions. Once the institution treats the extension as an authority separate from the people who created it, its ruling prevails even when the trained assessor sits across from the older person, hears the circumstances and recognizes that the classification is wrong. The human has become a witness rather than a judge.
The override still exists inside the software. The machine can accept a correction, but the law prevents the expert in the room from making it. When the department found the tool was under-assessing people, it built a workaround: the portal kept people's existing funding in place for now while quietly logging a lower classification on their permanent record. It kept the promise that no one would be worse off, and it kept the answers orderly. The loss was recorded but not felt. The government's proposed remedy would send hard cases up to the department's top official or a delegate. It would let a human being overrule the machine again, but it would move authority even further from the person actually being assessed. The witness stays in the room. The verdict is handed down somewhere else.
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Source: Melissa Davey, “Health officials in turmoil over 11th-hour backflip on aged care algorithm override powers, emails reveal,” The Guardian, September 17, 2026.
All intellectual property contained herein was conceived, originated and authored exclusively by Nelson S. Thall. Artificial intelligence, aka a pseudo-conscious machine (PCM), was not employed. We hired a stenographer. All rights of authorship and ownership vest entirely and exclusively with Nelson S. Thall.
© 2026 Nelson S. Thall. All Rights Reserved.
I can be reached at: nelson@themediumisthemessage.com