Making Connections... Or Not!

Society surrounded by the youngest generation of technophile, who knows everything about technology since the smartphones were invented, is a fact that the world is living right now. What about the rest of Technology’s history? We are used to talk about the latest cellphone invented, the newest generations of cars or a big 3D TV with the most impressive high definition ever made. When we need to talk about a past, even a recent past, as the computer’s invention, we fall in unknown information.

We have a wonderful tool in our hands. It connect us to the history, because it has the written history of anything we can ever research – it may contain the wrong information, but this is a question on how we research it. The problem is that we do not research! The internet is a technology that was supposed to make a bridge between society, old facts, new facts and future facts but nowadays, I see that, sometimes we are just stacked in present and future.

Moreover, for us to know what people need and also, to know how a community behave in a certain situation, information is needed, history facts, the past. It is hard, or I would say, almost impossible to build a new tool, make an invention without knowing what happen here a few years ago. That is the reason why we live in a Technological Determinism¹ where technology controls society. Even thus we own technology as our invention; we do not use it properly or in our favor all the times.

Maybe one day the history will not be important anymore, but then I think we will not think as well, because we will be machines or robots. By the time we are not robots yet, I really would like to understand how can tech connect us to the future and the past but we only know what did not happen yet and what is happening right now. Is that possible: a society without memories?

¹ Technological Determinism is a term invented by Thorstein Veblen, an American sociologist.

Tech Man X Rustic Man

NOTE: Before reading the text you may consider that “male” in here means something powerful both for men and women: as a great feeling. This is not a sexist opinion, since we can apply everything I wrote for men and women. The main source (except for the image) is my brain.

Men tend to feel powerful when they have a good tool to show people or when they use it even if the tool is not useful. This can be noticed when we compare people who have a newer technology device, as the newest cellphone, with those who have a bigger and heavier tool to work with, as the best hammer in the market. In both cases they may feel better with those kinds of equipment, even if they are completely different types of technology.

Thinking about the “new technology”, from nowadays, as cellphones, laptops, HD Television etc., it is possible to see that each day we have a behavior that is more common in our society: teenagers “need” to have a great cell phone to show their colleagues, instead of learning from their parents how to handle a hammer or a screwdriver. If they do not have the best device, they are going to be considered a child. It can be the opposite too. Adults nowadays are really worried about having the greatest technology in order to be part of a society!

On the other hand we still have a generation, maybe X generation or some before that, that wants to work with drilling machines or bucksaws, maybe because for them it is a pleasure to know that they are capable of dealing with problems that can be fixed by them or even that they are completely talented to build something. It is probably a reward to show it to everyone, maybe that is the reason why we still have a few "Home Depots" around the world, and they are always full of people building their own furniture, houses etc.

Logo from the band: "Tool"¹

Yes! In both cases they feel male! That is the word, male! And it is really interesting that we still have such different parallels in a society that is constantly taken as high tech (even though we have tech hammers). Do men really need an apparatus to feel important or more masculine? It is curious to think that "an extension of ourselves", as Marshall McLuhan said, can help us (men, women) to arrange an identity. We can try to be good people, have the best job - but in today's society what is important is to have the newest tool.

Source:

¹ ¹Unknown Author. (Unknown date). File Tool Logo Early, 25 October, 2005. Retrieved from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Tool-logo-early.jpg

To Start: A few questions!

      So far, we already know that technology is all around us. It is here, right now while I am writing, it is the light that gives me the power to see, and it is the cell phone I carry with me... But as Robert Aucoin once said in the class: "how many of us think about what type of technology we are bringing with us today?".

     The answer comes so quick for everybody. We do not think about that at all. People nowadays are so used to having technology helping with everything and every task. We do not even stop to think if this is all necessary. Is it?

     Today we had a great experience in the Earth and Ecology class, that there is also a very good question to answer and it is all about technology. We were discussing who does not have a cellphone and then Casey Brant asked if someone knew what cellphones were made of. The answer again came so quickly. Almost everybody uses it, but almost nobody knew what cell phones or any other type of technology was made of.

     It just makes me think a little bit about it. Most people use it to upgrade their cellphones each year and do not think about how much time and money they are losing just by choosing a new device. Or they (by them, I mean us - I also have to include myself) do not think about how bad is to the environment to keep changing devices, cellphones, laptops, TVs and etc. Yes, we do use a lot of resources from Mother Nature to have access to all of this amazing high technology.

     To sum up, after choosing a new device each year, how much time do we spend on using it without having a different or a real type of relationship outside the machines? Or how bad do we affect the environment by changing our devices? Can we live with Technology or is Technology living our lives?