Technology in Today's Society

Hope Hendry

Professor Petit

HUMA01, Tutorial 4

September 23, 2010

Intellectual Wasteland

Technology is an inevitable force in today’s society. Whether it is in the form of an alarm clock or a written piece of literature, it is everywhere we look, work and play. To me technology is expected; when I wake up in the morning, or go to bed at night, it is so involved in my life that I do not even realize it anymore. Technology allows me to mentally advance, in terms of knowledge being at my fingertips, but restrains me spiritually, in that I can no longer fully understand something using my own imagination.

The internet is an online library of information that is at my disposable every minute of every day. It fills me with insightful knowledge about different topics, and answers my questions with a high degree of effectiveness. The information online and in paperback books are the same; however, typing in exactly what I am looking for and clicking a button is easier than going through a book. Technology makes my life easier, because I no longer have to take the time to look at something, and think “What is that?”, but rather, read what someone else has said that, that object or thing is.

Writing is the ultimate form of technology, in that it is permanent and everlasting. I no longer have to memorize information people have told me in the past, but rather, write it down on a piece of paper, or look up an article on the particular information given. Written work has literally “become” the minds of people, like Plato stated, “Writing is inhuman, pretending to establish outside the mind what in reality can only be in the mind. Writing is simply a thing, something to be manipulated, something inhuman, artificial, a manufactured product” (1). This quote is stating that writing is a technology, and that writing out the thoughts that you have created in your mind is inhuman. They belong ‘in yourself’ where you can interpret and help them evolve. Writing them out, and...