Our society is hungry for more powerful technology. We want bigger, faster, better, and more powerful as soon as possible, and it doesn’t really even matter what we apply these words to. It could be a car or our internet, we just want to hear the words. As our advancing technology keeps pushing our direction toward a highly advanced future it’s almost too late to look around and ask whether we even should be going in this direction. We want our big technology but if we’re inconvenienced by it we are the first to complain.
We want to ensure that our incomes are fully automated and we want our bank account to be smart enough to pay our bills without ever bouncing an electronic check. Yet as the pace of our world speeds up we are also loudly crying about how we only get about 5 minutes with our physician when in fact we want the personal touch. We ask that our cars be smart enough to tell us whether we’re driving at the maximum fuel efficiency but we don’t want to be bothered by cell phone calls in public.
While we think the 50 inch plasma TV is really quite cool we haven’t yet figured out how to make it energy wise. We are hesitant to hand out directions to strangers for fear of talking to them and yet we live with our Bluetooth GPS system right at our side. We want the gift of an internet business income without the requirement of putting forth actual effort and energy.
While it seems like we have only recently arrived at this crossroads this isn’t entirely true. We started allowing robots to replace humans in plants all over the country back in the late 1980s. As technology encroaches on our world more every day we have to start wondering where we are heading and what we’re going to do about it.
When jobs are replaced by robots there will be great dissention, poverty, and hunger in our streets all in the name of progress. Is it possible that we can move forward with our technology and still maintain the human element that we need so desperately?
For every meal unnecessarily interrupted by a cell phone and every family member that we put off in exchange for another hour on the computer the more we give our lives over to our great advancements. Yet when we turn the cell off and shut off the computer early and go for a walk we take back pieces of ourselves.
Yes, technology has been an improvement and many loves have been positively touched due to our progress. As a society we will all determine our future dependence on technology and its role in our world. Our actions over the next few years will determine whether the jobless count rises thanks to improved technology or if we learn to turn off our cell phones for a nice family meal.
