Fear Of New Technology Analysis

Brooke Gladstone and Josh Neufeld are the authors of the article “The Influencing Machines”. This article is about technology and is written through a comic-style form. Gladstone’s main idea on this article is that we should not fear technology. Gladstone’s and Neufeld’s comic-style article about technology is the best way to convey her argument because it gives visuals to express her argument, has a different form of arrangement of her details and thesis, and she gives examples of modern technology that should not scare us.

Technology has always been a controversial subject between conservative people and innovators. Some people believe that it is a great tool to connect cultures and improve education and innovation in our society today, but others view it as a menace in our lives. “Growing Up Tethered” by Sherry Turkle and “George Orwell...Meet Mark Zuckerberg” by Lori Andrews both view technology as a dangerous tool. They believe in the many drawbacks of technology and the harm it can do to our lives with no explanation of the positive effects it has had on our society. “Our Future Selves” by Eric Schmidt and Jared Cohen plays the role of a positive look at technology and its role in our lives today. It gives examples of how advancing technology helps us and improves so many peoples’s lives. We can use Schmidt and Cohen’s essay as a lens to view the other two texts and gain a different understanding of what they are writing about.

    Danny Crichton, in his article, “Fear Not The Robot,” tells that this fear is typical. It is like a revolving door. Every few years the fears come back. Typically they are caused by books and articles.

Technology has not always been something that was used as a means for people to adapt to new, scary surroundings. Technology is also hard to comprehend when the person trying to understand it when in the wrong environment. There was once a time where technology itself was the new, scary situation many people found them in. New technologies like computers were something people had to adapt to because of how new and strange it once was. People needed to learn how to use new technologies to better society and make life easier for everyone who could access these newer technologies. This point was brought up in Davidson’s essay where she discussed her project at Duke University. The project at hand was designed for the entire freshman class who were given iPods. There was only one caveat being that the students were “simply asked […] to dream up learning

We as people rely on technology too much by expecting the machine to do something by the click of a button and get angry when the machinery isn’t working. At the beginning technology wasn’t thought of too much but at this point technology is getting people addicted from kids to the elderly.

When assessing the risks of digital technology’s role in our future, many reflect on the developments of new technology throughout history. Nicholas Carr, author of “Is Google Making Us Stupid?” uses historical examples to support his claim that we should fear technological advancements. In contrast, Brooke Gladstone and Josh Neufeld, authors of “The Influencing Machines,” examine both sides of the issue and ultimately conclude that we should not fear technological development. One technological development Carr as well as Gladstone and Neufeld examined was the printing press. Carr asserts that most of the arguments about the printing press turned out to be correct including that it “would undermine religious authority, demean the work of scholars

This quote derived from Brooke Gladstone and Josh Neufeld's “The Influencing Machines”, voices the anxiety that other people feel when being introduced to new products and how they could destroy society overtime. It gives us insight as to what trends are helping the people vs. the one’s that aren’t. Take the fidget spinner, this product was created for kids with ADHD as a means to alleviate stress and help them stay still, but as its popularity increased so did its use with children who do not have ADHD. The use of it in schools has led it to being banned in some states such as: Florida, Illinois, New York and Virginia. This quote suggests that society will concede to outside influences and will be utterly lost to the point where they are

Technology has made it easier for us to fix our mistakes but not learn from them. Turkle had met professors at MIT when students had transitioned from slide rules to calculators. The teachers had all exclaimed that students had become sloppy. “Professors insisted that required students maintain a mental sense of scale, whereas those who relied on calculators made frequent mistakes in orders of magnitude.” We are too quick to have technology solve our everyday problems instead of resolving it ourselves to better understand our mistake in the first place. We no longer question or have interest in how technology can handle our tasks, but wonder what else it can accomplish on its own. “When people say that something is transparent, they mean that they can see how to make it work, not that they know how it works.” Turkle states “For never has our world been more complex, hybridized and global.” Since we become so dependent on items to make our daily lives stress free, could mean future generations will not know the mental exercise of resolving a conflict without computers. We have become accustomed to waking up and checking the bright screen first thing in the morning. Some individuals prefer this interface to

Electronic devices are consuming the lives of everyday people. Everywhere you look someone will be locked in staring at their phone screen, unaware of what’s happening around him or her. Electronic devices have become a daily necessity for people. Electronic devices are a controversial topic today. While some believe that electronic devices are harmful, others believe these devices benefit society. In, “A Thing Like Me,” Nicholas Carr brings up the extent on which humans depend on devices. The dependence on electronic devices has consequences. The consequences that come from electronic devices are in takes away from face to face communication, the devices cause distractions when driving which can lead to serious injuries or even death. Electronic devices also have changed the way of learning, people no longer feel the need to learn when typing a question into Google gives people the answer. Electronic devices are a part of society and can cause negative impacts in peoples lives everyday. People do not realize the consequences that electronic devices bring into their

In Mark Hagerott and Daniel Sarewitz article a future in denial it states that technology is something to fear because of the negative effect it has on a person’s own individuality. The authors try to persuade and inform the audience by using sci-fi movies to correlate real world problems such as the Edward Snowden scandal or the NSA wiretapping scandal with something more understandable and relatable such as a movie. I think the authors of the article are however unsuccessful in their approach because there is a lack of structure, not enough viable sources, and the authors use fear tactics that intimidate the reader.

Throughout history people are afraid of the unknown people kill one another because they are afraid the other person might kill them first, so they strike first. The fear of new technology is the same, individuals do not understand so they want to kill it off, or they do not want to give technology a chance. This is an irrational fear because technology can bring great advances to the world such as the printing press and the telephone.

In the world there are many different and developing types of technology that can offer many benefits, but at the same time cause many problems. Technology comes in many shapes and sizes and does many different things. Whether it’s a house that can do everything for its inhabitants , or a device that can make the paralyzed walk again, society is moving forward in the world of technology although it may be controversial.

With all these new inventions the world has become a place to be feared. The idea of

This underhanded dismissal is constructed carefully, and works together with the patronising tone of the previous description, “naturally afraid”, “challenged” and preferring the “the safe, the predictable”, all suggest a cowardice in the opposition to the new technology. This description is intended to influence the reader to view this kind of group as undesirable, and in reducing the power of the group by ridiculing them so, Voxi attempts to position the reader to believe that new technology is advantageous and should be welcomed. Later in the opinion piece, Voxi suggests that those hostile to the concept of new technology are incapable of coping with the changes, declaring it is a “fundamental challenge”, this, in addition to Voxi’s later mention of “older people” largely comprising the disapproving demographic, suggest an inability, or weakness rather than just dislike. This distinction proves important in ridiculing those in opposition to what Voxi proposes as the

People argue that technology can be dangerous because Technology contains information that many would rather it not have. It influences minds in bad ways, and it allows people to share information, which they would otherwise not be able