A Rant About “Technology”
I have not been convincingly shown, and seem to be totally incapable of imagining for myself, how any further technological advance of any kind will bring us any closer to being a society predominantly concerned with preserving its existence; a society with a modest standard of living, conservative of natural resources, with a low constant fertilit
... See moreUrsula K. Le Guin • Dancing at the Edge of the World: Thoughts on Words, Women, Places
Technology is a genie in a bottle, and we're the ones holding the cork."
—Patrick Nielsen Hayden
As a culture we are divided about this. Some of us seem to believe that technology is going to solve every problem; others believe that it will destroy civilization. I fall somewhere in the middle. Technology is wonderful! And also terrible. And both and neither, just like the people who use it.
Tiffany Shlain • 24/6: The Power of Unplugging One Day a Week
He taught his son: “What is technology for? Why do we even make technology? We make technology because it takes the parts of us that are most human and it extends them. That’s what a paintbrush is. That’s what a cello is. That’s what language is. These are technologies that extend some part of us. Technology is not about making us superhuman. It’s
... See moreJohann Hari • Stolen Focus: Why You Can't Pay Attention--and How to Think Deeply Again
We tend to think of technology as shiny tools and gadgets. Even if we acknowledge that technology can exist in disembodied form, such as software, we tend not to include in this category paintings, literature, music, dance, poetry, and the arts in general. But we should. If a thousand lines of letters in UNIX qualifies as a technology (the computer
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