One of the topics that Langdon Winner explains in his essay, Technologies as Forms of Life, that most intrigued me is his claim that "[most] changes in the content of everyday life brought on by technology can be recognized as versions of earlier patterns" (55). The example Winner gives is the dependency that parents have on cartoon shows on television in order to keep their child occupied. This example got me thinking of both consequences that technology has had on our way of doing every day tasks. For example, our methods of communication has changed drastically with the advancement of technology.
Before humans would send letters, then telegraphs, beeper messages, and most recently, emails and text messages. We have always had the necessity to send a message to someone but our method of doing it has changed throughout the years. We have now a faster, more efficient way to relay messages between short and long distances. We have gone from a handwritten letter taking multiple months to be delivered through a land or marine mail service to sending a text message that takes seconds to reach anywhere in the world through a tiny, handheld machine. The advancement of these technologies have added new activities into our lives.
However, not all adaptations have had positive consequences on our patterns. Going back to the earlier example of the parent's task of entertaining their child, children used to be able to go outside and interact with other children such as neighbors and family members. Now, parents have resorted to handing their child a smartphone or tablet in order to calm and entertain them. This seems to cause children to focus on the small screen in front of them. The effects of this new pattern change is still too early to notice but what good can come from a generation of children addicted to technology and not developing interpersonal skills?
Interesting thought. It really is quite amazing when you think about it. Getting a message from one place to another now takes milliseconds when it used to take weeks and even months sometimes back in the day.
ReplyDeleteI am concerned that growing up with technology from an early age will have unintended negative consequences too... but I also like to look at it as a sign of a developing society and the consequences could turn out to be more positive than negative for all we know. Embracing technology at a young age, while it may have unintended effects, can still be a good thing depending on the kind of technology and the environment into which it is introduced in my opinion. But, as you said, it really is too early to tell what the long term consequences of this new kind of growing up will be.
I just wanted to point out that maybe its not such a bad thing to grow up with technology, because I did kind of like today's kids and I turned out fine. For the most part at least. :)