Nowadays,
people are more and more suspicious of technological innovation:
electromagnetic, WiFi and other waves, nuclear energy, fossil fuels,
Internet, cell phones, etc. Albert Einstein, the father of modern
physics, warned us of the danger of technologies: “It
has become appallingly obvious that our technology has exceeded our
humanity”. Must we fear new
technology ?
I would say that
technologies have more advantages than disadvantages, because humans
are generally clever and invent useful inventions to solve problems.
But, first of all, what is in fact “technology”
? Most people consider it as an innovation often linked to science
and electronics. The Oxford Dictionary agrees that technology is
“machinery or equipment developed from scientific knowledge”.
Nevertheless, these definitions are too wide, because we can say in that case that
a knife is technology… Therefore, we’ll only consider “new”
technologies, those that have appeared during the XXth and the XXIst
centuries.
One of
the principal goals of technologies is to win a war as fast as
possible. Technologies always evolve during big conflicts, for
example the automatic rifle, radio and artillery in the First World
War, and the nuclear bomb, jet engine and launchers in the Second
World War. In fact, technologies are often created with the aim of
killing as many people as possible... Civil technologies generally
come from military technologies. For example, Internet was originally
created by the American Defense in a Cold War context, so as to make
the communication between their troops easier and better encrypted.
Then, this technology spread all over the world to create the
Internet as we know it today. That’s also the case of the radio,
nuclear reactors, the jet engine, launchers, etc.
Are
technologies too much part of our lives ? All the
“high-technologies”, such as cell phones and mobile computers,
need a lot of waves (3G, WiFi, Bluetooth…) to work. But all theses
waves are perhaps dangerous to our health. Indeed, brain cells are
known to be very fragile. The electro-magnetic waves are accused by
some scientists of influencing the reproduction of these cells, and
to lead to incurable tumors. There are other dangerous technologies,
such as the nuclear plants which represent a gigantic danger for the
whole world, especially since the explosion of the Fukushima
reactors. It’s really disturbing to see the carelessness of some
countries, like France (which has more than 60 nuclear plants), or
Japan, concerning Nuclear energy. We mustn’t trifle with this
energy: just one milligram of radioactive particle can kill a human,
and there is up to 100 tons of nuclear fuel in just one plant… But
the multinational firms which construct these dangerous plants buy
every patent of safer plants, just to preserve their monopoly of the
market, and also to keep earning a lot of money. That’s also the
case for the fossil energies and petrol producers. So, we can say
that technologies are a danger for Humanity, because we have become
too dependent on these potentially dangerous technologies. It’s
very difficult to go back because of the profit factor...
However,
do not forget that mastery of tools is what differentiates us from
animals, and this theory is defended by philosophers like Aristotle
or Bergson. Technologies have made also our lives easier and safer.
The difference of standard of living between the early XXth and the
XXIst century proves it. Thanks to jet engines, we can travel all
around the world in just a few hours. Thanks to nuclear plants, we
have infinite sources of electricity. Thanks to Internet and cell
'phones, we can communicate everywhere with everyone at any time.
Technologies have brought people closer.
Last,
but not least, computers allow us to create plenty of interesting
things, and give us access to world wide knowledge, or even to
calculate gigantic equations in a fraction of a second. In fact,
technologies have increased significantly our capacity of thought. In
our society, which is principally based on exchanges between
countries, the new technologies developed in the XXth century occupy
a crucial position because they make use of communication
technologies. For instance, Stock Market exchanges need to
communicate with each other in order to coordinate the important
flows of money. In fact, new technologies are a means of making life
easier in our society.
To put it in a nutshell,
the earth is endangered by our species, but I think that we can find
the right balance between the risks and the benefits of technological
innovation.
