I love my computer. I love high-speed Internet. I even love the new IM feature that lets me pester my colleagues so much more efficiently.

But sometimes the stuff that pops up on my computer screen gives me a funny feeling -- a sense that there is a gremlin in my hard-drive, trying to warn me that technology is not all about democratizing access to information, building vibrant virtual communities, etc. etc. -- it can also be about new ways of exerting social control.

Today, I came across two news stories in quick succession, and thought I saw my gremlin at work. The first was from eSchool News Online, and explained how Cornell researchers have adapted some computer exercises that had been used to train monkeys for space travel into computer games for human 4- and 6-year-olds. The researchers wanted to see whether these youngsters' brains could be trained to pay better attention for longer periods of time. The second was from an NBC station in North Carolina, and told how police had, twice in the past week, used Tasers on violently disruptive high school students inside their schools.

The Cornell research is part of a wave of new investigations into the stages of development of the human brain, and how experience can shape that development. It's a fascinating field with exciting implications for addressing learning disabilities and for better understanding cognitive growth. But it raises some ethical and cultural questions that I don't often see discussed. If sitting young children down to play monkey games can change the way they use their brains, how will we use that knowledge? Will it be to unlock every child's potential -- or to engineer quieter, more biddable students, inured at an early age to sitting quietly at a keyboard?

Tasers, which work by delivering a powerful jolt of electricity that causes every muscle in a victim's body to contract at the same time, have been used by law enforcement agencies since 1998. They have been welcomed as a non-lethal and effective method of subduing violent individuals.

(The NBC-17 story on the web includes a poll, which asks readers if they support the use of Tasers in high schools. When I checked, not many had taken the poll, but 85 percent thought that was a fine idea.)

But the jolt of a Taser can cause side effects, including a spike in blood pressure, irregular heartbeat, even cardiac arrest. A Newsday special report in April said that 100 people have died following Taser jolts. A 14-year-old who was Tasered by police went into cardiac arrest, but recovered.

Still, the Taser's reputation as a no-blood, no-bruises approach to messy situations -- may make it a little too easy to pull the trigger. I can't think how else a Miami officer wound up delivering not one but two Taser jolts to a disturbed 6-year-old in a school office.

It's not that I don't appreciate the enormous promise of new brain research for kids, or don't think that Tasers are a valuable tool for people with a very tough job. I just think it's important that we don't let powerful new technologies sneak up on us and become an unquestioned part of our cultural landscape without thinking through what they might mean and what unexpected changes they might bring.