Reading Reaction #3: How Much is Too Much?

Without any doubt, technology has proved to, literally, save lives. However, what society tends to ignore and not publicly share are the negative impacts a lot of new technologies are causing. In many cases, the invention of new technologies literally costs human lives. As Richard Sclove explained in his article, “Making Technology Democratic,” a huge battle society faces with technological advancements is that it is eliminating social interaction and, therefore, local autonomy. PBS introduces a specific scenario on the banks of the holy Narmada river that will submerge the entire self sustaining farming community that has lived there for centuries. With this, questions that need to be addressed are whether or not a price for human life is even achievable and if social skills are lacking due to social networking. True joy comes from friendships and relationships, but email, Facebook, twitter etc are all gradually taking precedence over meeting a friend for a coffee at the local coffee shop, for example, or in a case like the banks of the Narmada River, friendships are extremely strong due to the fact that the people of the village work together to literally survive (growing food, building shelter). However, proponents of these social networks argue that the sites enable people to keep in touch with many more people, but this raises another question; are the majority of people that communicate via the internet true friends or creating true friendships? If not, can you put a price on true friendship?

Proponents of the dam project will argue that, although an estimated 300,000 people will have to choose whether or not they want to flee or drown, it “will provide electricity, irrigation, flood control, and drinking water to an estimated 40 million” (PBS). “ ‘The Dammed’ raises important questions about the costs and consequences of modernization and development, as the global community re-evaluates the social and environmental impacts of large dam projects” (PBS (2003). The Damned overview).

Richard Sclove lends good advice for the kind of technology society should aim for. He explains the importance of having “relative local economic self-reliance.” And suggests “avoid(ing) technologies that promote dependency and loss of local autonomy” (Sclove 92). If technology could be better monitored, future generations would be in much better hands. Today, the technology craze and excitement over new discoveries has caused people to not even consider the negative impacts the new inventions could or are already having. The level technology has reached today is immeasurable, therefore, if it was monitored it is safe to claim that the effects of technology would almost always be positive. Unfortunately, with the technology race out of control today, the negative impacts on the environment and actual human interaction is installing future problems that society will need new technologies to fix; the beginning of a viscous cycle.

If new technologies are invented around the idea of “avoiding dependency,” the effects of new technology would naturally be effecting his or her community directly and, therefore, push he or she responsible for inventing the new technology to seriously think about what the effects would be, both positive and negative, before actually creating it.

Works Cited

Sclove, Richard. Resisting the Virtual Life;Making Technology Democratic pgs 85-101. San Francisco: City Lights, 1995.

Wide Angle; PBS. The Damned. 18 September. 2003. 8 March 2011.