The Effect of Modern Technology on Our Lives - Essay Example

Table of Contents: I. ……………………………………………………………………3 II. Introduction…………………………………………………………………..4 III. Advantages of Modern Technologies……………………………………..4 - 6 IV. Disadvantages of Modern Technologies…………………………………..6 – 8 V. Conclusion……………………………………………………………………8 VI. References…………………………………………………………………….9 The Effect of Modern Technology on Our Lives Name School Abstract The effect of modern technologies on our lives cannot be underestimated. Nevertheless, technologies may controversially effect on our life both causing harm and making our lives easier. Technologies have become tools for scientific development and the combination of classical theoretical science with modern developing technologies has brought significant results: modern technologies allow acquiring new scientific knowledge and its empirical proof for further improving of humans life. A real medicine has never been possible without technologies. With the development of technologies another kinds of production are also growing up while labor force is becoming cheaper and that allows satisfying all consuming needs of constantly increasing world’s population. But which is the most important, technologies made possible the appearance of new opportunities for communication and quick access to any information we need. But there are certain disadvantages of technology development as well. It became almost impossible to control the amount and quality of produced information, though it is a powerful tool for mind control. The fast rates of production catastrophically reduce a quantity of resources in the world, and at the same time “overproduction” takes place. So consumers’ needs constantly grow, resources are depleting, but massive production keeps increasing, rising people’s needs. The development of military technologies funded by governments raises a general level of military conflict possibility. Still, we can’t definitely say whether modern technologies are something good or bad: anyway they may destroy and build, they can cause physical harm or people can use them to treat each other. Introduction It is impossible to imagine our modern world without technologies; we don’t even notice how we aren’t able to live without them anymore. To estimate the effect of modern technology on our lives and definitely say that they are either something good or bad is absolutely unreal. The point is that technologies may controversially effect on our life they constantly do both cause harm and make our lives easier. Advantages of Modern Technologies It is hard to argue that the contribution that modern technologies have brought in our lives’ progress is almost unevaluated, because the opportunities we have now through the technological invasion are much wider than even ten years ago. The first aspect of the contribution we have to consider is definitely a fast development of modern science. At the very beginning of huge rise of technologies scientists were scared that technologies may destroy classical science, because the matter of science is to look for the essence of nature, it deals mostly with philosophical problems of “why?” and “how?”. When technologies are the result of practical needs they do not explore, but produce. But according to Melvin Kranzberg’s (1988) researches in spite of scientists’ fears the combination of classical theoretical science with modern developing technologies has brought significant results. Technologies have become tools for scientific development (Kranzberg calls it “the wedding of science and technology”) (p. 32). To explore the universe in more detail it is not enough to use just human body in researches: human eye can’t see small microorganisms and people can’t reach space without technological help. That’s why modern technology use is extremely important in acquiring new scientific knowledge and empirical proof of it for further using this information to make people’s lives better. For example, considering our modern medicine is it possible to imagine it without technologies? Even hard to count how many people’s lives were saved using technology. As Christopher Booth (1985) noted in his researches, a real medicine has never been possible without technologies, even the most elementary diagnostics needs at least stethoscope, which was invented in the beginning of 19th century (p. 269). Dralles’(2006) research showed that the main point of modern technologies in medicine is that they allow a minimum of personal invasion during surgery, which reduces human factor, because technologies are more accurate in technical aspect of medicine (p. 2). So the significant role of modern technologies in medicine is quite obvious, because there is no surgery or any diagnostic procedure that may be managed without new technical equipment. Of course some primitive procedures can be done without using equipment, but dealing with difficult surgeries there is no way to make them without technology. Also, considering technologies it would be strange to forget about industrial development concerning technological rise. In order to satisfy all the constantly growing needs of consumers in producing the newest technologies, big companies compete for leadership in technology market. (Daamen, Lans, and Midden, p. 205) This makes a production of technologies develop every day faster and faster. With the growth of technologies another kinds of production also are growing up, for example, agriculture almost stands on the basis of technologies, because using them is faster in cultivation of crops than to make it with people’s force; in addition, buying modern technology is much cheaper than paying big money for workers’ wages. This shows that rising of technological development is absolutely profitable for industry which main aim to satisfy all consuming needs of constantly increasing world’s population. But still, the most significant aspect of modern technology, which causes the biggest effect on our personal lives, is communication and quick access to any information. We’ve got used to permanent communication in such an extent that we don’t even notice how we can’t live without Internet, mobile phones, and messengers. Technology allows us to connect with any person we want any minute we need and it is so convenient, that sometimes our reality is completely concentrated on the hyperspace: we don’t even need to see the person we talk to next to us to feel his or her presence in the moment of speaking. This kind of communication helps people not to feel lonely when they are alone for some reasons. Moreover, which was already mentioned above, Internet provides us quick mobile access to any information we need. There are hundreds of databases with all available resources worldwide with all kinds of information for all tastes. Information has never been as easily accessible as now. The information progress has essentially and irreversibly changed both the world and its inhabitants. The new generation of people is significantly different from the previous ones and these changes are definitely just the beginning of new technological era. Disadvantages of Modern Technologies Since the technological topic is rather contradictory one there are many advocates of disadvantageous effect of modern technologies on our lives. First of all, the very last advantage of technologies mentioned above has also a lot of harmful aspects. Easily accessible information can cause bad effect on society and rising new generations. When anybody can both to receive and produce any information on the Web, it is almost impossible to control the amount and quality of the incoming information. The growth of information passing through technologies made the stream of information a powerful tool for mind control. This complicates our perception of the reality, so we cannot even notice whether we are under somebody else’s control. The problem of modern technology-based human has been a serious topic for scientific discussions so far. Herbert Marcuse (1964) in his famous book “One-Dimensional Man” describes a model of modern human, whose decisions are determined by producers of mass technologies and other products of the era. Technology provides that kind of rationality, which is stated by the owners of the technology, so people are constantly under the technological control (p. 13). Besides, considering virtual communication it is hard to argue with the fact that this kind of interaction frequently creates a phenomenon of loneliness in the web, when talking to people through Internet chat doesn’t give people cognitive satisfaction they get from real communication. The high level of mass production accelerated by using modern technology bears behind itself some really dangerous consequences, which effect on our lives we already can see nowadays. The point of the problem is that the fast rates of production catastrophically reduce a quantity of resources in the world. Recent studies showed that rising of agricultural engineering leaded to increase of agricultural production. This situation may very soon lead to depletion of land resources (Wittwer, 1975, p. 579). As long as people waste resources and don’t think about further consequences, corporations keep competing for gaining more and more profit from people’s growing needs so they develop the newest technologies that are able to get more resources and to waste them in more massive and cheap production. This causes even more problems, because fighting for consumers and making cheaper production leads to faster expiring of this production (and stimulates producers to decrease shelf life of these products). Since technology is one of the most popular productions nowadays, people are ready to pay for the latest gadgets to be in trend. But what happens to their old ones? Obviously, they become garbage. This “overproduction” (George, 1883, p.585) leads to the following results: consumers’ needs constantly grow, resources are depleting, but massive production keeps increasing rising people’s needs – the vicious circle. Also, we cannot forget about such profitable kind of technology production as a military one. The development of military technologies funded by governments raises a general level of possibility of military conflict in the world. This problem itself is also a kind of vicious circle, because producing weapon by one country stimulates the same military development in another country, which in turn provokes the first country to accelerate the pace of the production, etc. All this process of mutual provoking may one day cause serious military conflict in the world. So using of modern technologies sometimes may lead to really dangerous consequences; technology may turn into a serious tool of influence or even weapon depends on how to use them: wisely or malicious. Conclusion Even though discussions about effect of modern technologies on our life still continue in scientific circles, it is obvious for anybody that the object of discussion has its advantages and disadvantages. Technologies may be a serious tool for manipulation and connect people from all over the world, they may destroy and build, they can cause physical harm and also people use them to treat each other. That’s why we can’t definitely say that modern technologies are something good or bad. Perhaps the effect they cause depends on purposes they are used for. References: Booth, C. (1985). Technology Lecture: Technology and Medicine. Proceedings of the Royal Society of London. Series B, Biological Sciences, 224, 267-285. Daamen, D.D.L., Lans, I.A., Midden, C.J.H. (1990). Cognitive Structures in the Perception of Modern Technologies. Science, Technology, & Human Values, 15, 202-225. Dralle, H. (2006). Impact of Modern Technologies on Quality of Thyroid Surgery. Langenbeck’s Archives of Surgery, 391, 1-3. George, H. (1883). Overproduction. The North American Review, 137, 584-593. Kranzberg, M. (1988). Interdependence of Scientific and Technological Information and Its Relation to Public Decision Making. Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science, 495, 29-39. Marcuse, H. (1964). One-Dimensional Man: Studies in the ideology of Advanced Industrial Society. Boston: Beacon Press. Wittwer, S.H. (1975). Food Production: Technology and the Resource Base. Science, 188, 579-584. Read More