In Defense of Technology (2014)

In Defense of Technology (2014)(tmagazine.blogs.nytimes.com)

28 points by sloria 11 years ago | 8 comments

ThomPete 11 years ago |

I think what is missing from this conversation which both this article and people like Marc Andreesen forget is that technology isnt just progress its also change.

The thing is we are not all actual beneficiaries from technology. In fact a lot are victims who loose their jobs, get smaller paychecks and basically lost the ability to offer their skills to the workforce.

Technology gives and technology takes. What it takes is increasingly important to have a critical view on because something more fundamental is going on I think that is going to be increasingly clear.

AdeptusAquinas 11 years ago | |

Technological change has destroyed industries and livelihoods in the past, but it also created more opportunities as it went. The anti-luddite argument is that there were more jobs made available to the people despite the heavy labour intensive work being disrupted.

These days though it might be different. An interesting extension to your point, and using your terminology, is that the rate of what technology 'takes' is possibly beginning to exceed the rate at which it 'gives'. Things might be changing too quickly for the market to adapt and ensure gainful employment to people.

ThomPete 11 years ago | | |

Thats my point.

Look at these two graphs

https://plot.ly/~BethS/8/job-growth-by-decade-in-the-united-...

http://www.technologyreview.com/sites/default/files/images/d...

The more jobs created have been because of globalization not because technology creates more jobs. (My claim)

Furthermore the less money is being made even though production goes up (because of technology)

This is the problem we are facing and so I am simply not buying the luddite fallacy argument it is in itself a fallacy.

Another way to look at this is that technology replaces higher and higher levels of abstract thinking.

The horses that where replaced by cars didn't find new jobs.

smackay 11 years ago | | |

One thing to consider also is a society's ability to change. Rapid industrialization and urbanization were hugely disruptive but were probably manageable, though it took some time to solve all the problems. With people living longer and job often requiring many years of education and training in order to become proficient in a given career choice, the changes over the next 50 years or so might be harder to absorb.

Software development is probably a decent model of what's coming for the rest of the population. Rapid technological change is already reducing the career expectancy of programmers to about 10 years before moves into management or consulting are considered necessary. The cost is that a lot of expertise is lost and the results are often inefficient with many wheels getting re-invented.

SocksCanClose 11 years ago |

Your frame of reference is a bit off. To wit:

You say: "technology isn't just programs, [it is] also change... a lot [of people] are victims who lose their jobs..."

When in fact, the "victims" of this process aren't subject to the technology, qua technology (technology is simply a tool - derivative of the Greek "tekhne" for "art" or "craft"), which is to say, one doesn't create a technology which then has a mind of its own (yet), but rather, they create tools that other individuals then have a choice to either use, or not.

And so when you say "technology gives[,] and technology takes," what you really mean is "people chose how to spend their [time/money], and [those choices have consequences]."

Which is to say that you are implicitly saying "We ought to decide how people chose to spend their [time/money]".

Would your reaction be the same to the ironworker who made a living on horseshoes two hundred years ago?

Of what do you wish to be "Critical"? Of choice? Of giving people the ability to spend less of their time and energy on certain tasks?

Five hundred years ago human beings spend most of their time producing life-sustaining staples -- growing what for bread, chickens and cows and hogs for protein, vegetables for vitamins and nutrients. Now we can buy a week's worth of sustenance (which used to quite literally consume 12 hours of labor per day), grown to higher standards, in greater quantity for less than $50 -- the equivalent of a single day's labor at minimum wage.

Do you wish to be "critical" of this tekhne as well?

ThomPete 11 years ago | |

The factory worker does not have a choice about whether his employer want to use robots or not.

You are proving my point by applying the very flawed logic of the luddite fallacy that I am really critiquing.

Retra 11 years ago | |

>they create tools that other individuals then have a choice to either use, or not.

Language is also technology. It is probably the most important technology we have. But you can hardly argue that people make a choice to use language. Sure, you could choose to learn a new language, but that only handicaps you unless you're moving somewhere. And even then, that might be a massive waste of effort.

guywithalogin 11 years ago |

Technology for me will ultimately be judged by the degree in which it's use requires the commodification of my self. From my taste in entertainment to more invasive information such as my location and who I interact with, I feel it's important to put into consideration who I'm trading this information with and for what in exchange.

As long as a service requires my submission into an database which will be sold off and used to strengthen marketing and other forms of persuasion, I have no choice but to assume the worst case usage. With that assumption I feel it is most ethical to mostly not participate.

I hope that I'll be able to sit back and hop on when popular tech services have given me an alternative form of payment other than my person as an information commodity. I have no idea as to whether that day will ever come.