Technology concepts and applications

Technology -- blessing or curse?

Building a better mousetrap, or using technology to solve the world's problems has become reduced to even a more absurd exercise through what Siva Vaidhyanathan calls in his 2007 introduction to Rewiring the Nation: The Place of Technology in American Studies "techno-fundamentalism." This is the idea the problems created by past machines can be fixed by future machines. For example, the lack of world security generated by nuclear technology can be solved by Star Wars rather than a conscientious effort to reduce nuclear proliferation. This belief in progress as inevitable and good is misguided, says the author. Technology is only as great as the morality and spirit of the society that wields the technology.

Video technology, when put into the hands of individualistic Americans is turned as a way of expressing the self rather than turning one's eye upon the world. The Panama Canal, the Cotton Gin (and the slave system this technology sustained), and the ability of GPS technology to track individual's movements, are all examples of how technology has had a questionable impact on modern life. Technology is blamed rather than human error and a failure of compassion, in the inability to respond to or track the progress of Hurricane Katrina. The manipulation of the human body through the technology of plastic surgery has resulted in the compulsion of many individuals to abuse their bodies, and feel pressured to achieve a standard of perfection that grows increasingly higher, the better body-morphing technology becomes in the hands of doctors.

Response

Yes, technology generates problems, and it is shrewd and apt to point out that for every net gain to certain members of society via technology there is a net loss. The hand weavers of the 18th century were put out of business by 19th century factories that could manufacture clothing cheaply, computers have probably collectively caused the art of calligraphy to die, and made even professional writers overly reliant on spell check and less willing to rewrite their work from scratch. However, would any of the authors included in the collection summarized in the essay really wish to go back to a world without antibiotics? Technology has enabled people whose vision would be a blur to see with 20/20 perfection, and made travel financially accessible to millions who would have been relegated to the narrow point-of-view of their homes. While it is easy to find detriments to these benefits (exploitations of local economics through tourism, the dangers of unfettered exploration in the New World, etc.) few really long for the good old days before pasteurization, and the fear of scientific knowledge, as seen in the debates over Darwinism and stem cell research are probably more dangerous than the risks of current technology.