"Where can we guess this technology will lead, and if we get there, what should we do?"

Anything new with questionably unfathomable uses is going to scare people. With technology we are constantly surprised by innovations building upon each other and creating things that frequently blow our minds. Embracing these new technologies and seeing them for the tools that they are is an important aspect to evolving along with our tech-centered culture. Things come along that are new and powerful that scare certain people every year, but these new things quickly revolutionize whatever industry they pertain to and make us forget all about whatever antiquated technologies we once used (remember the introduction of the iphone?).

The article mentions Socrates and his fears about the future of writing, this is understandable when thinking about the time and how this “new” technology had the ability to change everyone’s life. It is even documented that Socrates himself never wrote down any one of his thoughts and lectures, his apprentice Plato took the task of chronicling his teacher’s voice through writing. Jesus and Buddha also never wrote down anything, but is life not more interesting because their followers did?

The example of writing may be an outdated one but there have always been fears of new technological advances that promise to make our life easier by accepting and building upon their proposed change. I have gathered in my life that there will always be a set of people that are generally resistant to change and will find any way possible to not embrace it. Whether it is blackberry phones, wifi connected laptops, or iPods; some people will hold out as long as they can before they “need” to buy or learn to use one.

The Forbes article “Technologies That Hurt Us” includes an interview with David Friedman, author of Future Imperfect: Technology And Freedom In An Uncertain World. Friedman states that areas such as biotechnology and nanotechnology may create real dilemmas that end up harming humans. Friedman makes sure to include that stopping the technological progress is not possible as the benefits are far too great. The author offers a set of questions to deal with the new technologies- "Where can we guess this technology will lead, and if we get there, what should we do?" These questions may not suggest much help on the situation at hand, but it gives us an interesting set of questions to ask when presented with new technologies that have the ability to change the world.

The Southern Illinois University online newspaper had an interesting article on the pros and cons of technology. The article includes a professor saying that soon there will be a generation of people that did not know that birds chirp because they constantly have headphones in their ears. This is of course a pessimistic example of the situation but the article concludes with the lesson of moderation.

The question of how relevant the moderation lesson currently is can be argued when our society is quickly becoming reliant on technologies that help make life easier. Perhaps moderation is not the key, just a conscience mind of behalf of the user understanding that the technology may not always be so reliable. We are going to use things that make life easier; it is our new human nature, and relying on such things is nothing new (people move to the suburbs because cars have the ability to take them where they need to go, fax and email make work communication more efficient, the printing press made literacy and communication explode).

Technology is going to evolve, people can decide to evolve with it or be left behind. Some may feel that we are becoming too comfortable and reliant on new technology, but it was created to help and help it will. You can find problems with anything and new technologies keeping us from "experiencing" certain things is just part of life. I don't experience the "joy" of walking to the post office because I can email something much easier. This frees time up and allows me to accomplish more in my day, ergo the technology is making my life easier and giving me more time to do what I want to do. Is it bad that I have more time to play soccer or jog because I chose to use technology instead of wasting more time on an outdated practice? You be the judge but the answer seems clear to me.

Here is a video showing what can happen if we don't crack down on new technological advances, most importantly robots.