As I watch humanity move faster and faster, I run to do more and more at breakneck speed, even though technology threatens to surpass our mental abilities, something is wrong. The deep-seated idea that we seem to want to implement, the crazy promise of technology-based, has been broken.
Whether we realize it or not, behind all this amazing technology we create hides a subtle but powerful promise: we can do more in less time and thus achieve a better quality of life.
Oh, the idea is tempting at first. Let’s build a machine that will do the job twice as fast! We can work in the morning and play in the afternoon. In theory, this works very well, except that it is rarely used in practice. No, once this amazing machine is built, it will work 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, working up to the bone, so we can produce billions of times more in less time! By all rules, a lot more people should hang out. Or at least have a high quality of life. But are they?
How is it that our lives are fueled by machines whose speed, although doubled every two years, we as a nation are poorer than ever, tired than ever, and less able to enjoy life as we know it? Who doesn’t walk with lots of lines on the front, even when the world passes by? What stress levels are lower thanks to amazing technological advances? I don’t know many of them.
Ladies and gentlemen, the conspiracy is underway. Yes, indeed. Our job as a society is to take care of each other and improve the quality of life personally and collectively, but the technology that promised it does the exact opposite. In fact, it accumulates wealth in the hands of fewer and fewer people, and in a very real sense it takes away everything else, creating a new kind of upper class, “technorats” if you like, able to use technology to their advantage. . And is our life really better, despite all the useful benefits of technology?
Of course, we can report on efficiency improvements. Information can be transmitted faster and in greater quantities than ever before, and computers can process numbers with increasing increment.
But have we ever stopped to ask if it was always good? Computers allow people to make faster mistakes. Think about it for a moment.
And in addition to “operational profit” and increased production, what are the real tangible benefits in human terms? Are the workers happier or do they work as many hours as they did in 1960?
And another important indicator: do people feel a closer connection with all gadgets for interaction?
Ironically, technology tends to isolate people rather than unite them. It promotes anonymity and division, encouraging us to communicate at ever longer distances, using pieces of metal and plastic to interact. What happened to the handshake heat? Are you looking for someone in the eye? Something is lost in the digital revolution and it is in an elusive and perhaps more important area of our lives.
What about the tremendous speed of technology; It makes the world more efficient, doesn’t it?
Can anyone cite studies showing that increased production and a huge amount of goods, services and food are actually distributed to those in need? Does the human family as a whole benefit from the surplus, or is the wealth concentrated in the hands of those who can profit from unforeseen income?
Again, this answer is clear; the human family as a whole is not reaping the benefits of technological progress, as evidenced by comparable or worse levels of poverty, literacy, living conditions and the general living conditions of people around the world. Of course, some segments of the population benefit, but we are seeing the result of the ‘digital divide’, in which the middle class disappears, while the ranks of the upper and lower classes continue to grow, mainly due to technology. which increasingly unites power in the hands of those at the top. For those who want to be careful, this has always been a harbinger of trouble.