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Technology does not care about human values.



People are downvoting you, but this rung true with me. Sure, technology is created by humans, but a lot of the reason I see people (kids included) "overusing" technology is social media.

Social media does not care for human values. It cares for growth/self-preservation, views/interactions, and revenue. This is fine for things like TV, which tend to be more opt-in, but when you're carrying around a device all-the-motherfucking-time that's constantly pulling your attention away from real experiences and real people to suck you into an addictive cycle of meaningless interactions, I would say that's dangerous territory. Not because it's doing harm per se, but because it steals attention from things in life that bring us real meaning.


How can this be true? Technology is created exclusively by people. Our values are baked in.

Filesystems have a concept of ownership, ask your dog what that means.


Technology is created mostly by market demands and military needs, this is not at all the same thing as human values.


I think it's more accurate to say that technology reveals the edges and contours of our values.


That's a good way of stating it actually, something to think about.


Neil Postman (Technopoly) and the Heusemanns (Techno-Fix) both advance this concept signficantly.


Links:

Techno-Fix, by Michael and Joyce Huesemann (note spelling): http://www.worldcat.org/title/techno-fix-why-technology-wont...

Technopoly, Neil Postman: http://www.worldcat.org/title/technopoly/oclc/557091816




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