Our server costs ~$56 per month to run. Please consider donating or becoming a Patron to help keep the site running. Help us gain new members by following us on Twitter and liking our page on Facebook!
Current time: April 29, 2024, 8:31 am

Thread Rating:
  • 0 Vote(s) - 0 Average
  • 1
  • 2
  • 3
  • 4
  • 5
Technology, Good or Bad Overall?
#9
RE: Technology, Good or Bad Overall?
(June 22, 2019 at 8:30 pm)ColdComfort Wrote: By technology I mean the knowledge to manipulate nature to achieve some desirable end. I do not mean scientific knowledge in general. Descartes said we would become the 'masters of own destiny'.

The obvious plus, I suppose, is medicine. An effective painkiller for surgery is only about 150 years old. Antibiotics less than a century. Imagine getting appendicitis before all that. In WW1 at least they had ether if your leg or arm had to come off. But a gut wound meant you were likely to die from infection. In the US Civil War they cut off limbs while you were conscious. Yeesh!

On the other hand some of the intended and unintended 'benefits' of technology threaten human extinction and have already caused death and suffering on scales previous generations could not imagine. In purely economic terms parts of the world have been lifted out of poverty. Capitalism is sometimes praised for this. But the benefits we enjoy today have been built on the backs of people who lived lives of child labor and back breaking work in industry for poor wages. Unintentionally we have changed the environment so that the future of humanity is in doubt.

Overall, would you give up the benefits of technology to avoid it's negative effects?

You are posting this question using a device based on technological development, on a board which only exists based on technological development..

Just exactly how thick are you?
Reply



Messages In This Thread
Technology, Good or Bad Overall? - by ColdComfort - June 22, 2019 at 8:30 pm
RE: Technology, Good or Bad Overall? - by Anomalocaris - June 22, 2019 at 8:39 pm
RE: Technology, Good or Bad Overall? - by Brian37 - June 22, 2019 at 9:16 pm
RE: Technology, Good or Bad Overall? - by ColdComfort - June 22, 2019 at 9:45 pm
RE: Technology, Good or Bad Overall? - by Brian37 - June 22, 2019 at 9:51 pm
RE: Technology, Good or Bad Overall? - by Chad32 - June 22, 2019 at 9:44 pm
RE: Technology, Good or Bad Overall? - by Chad32 - June 22, 2019 at 10:17 pm
RE: Technology, Good or Bad Overall? - by ColdComfort - June 22, 2019 at 11:51 pm
RE: Technology, Good or Bad Overall? - by Abaddon_ire - June 23, 2019 at 12:57 am
RE: Technology, Good or Bad Overall? - by ColdComfort - June 23, 2019 at 1:19 am
RE: Technology, Good or Bad Overall? - by Abaddon_ire - June 23, 2019 at 8:12 pm
RE: Technology, Good or Bad Overall? - by brewer - June 23, 2019 at 7:59 am
RE: Technology, Good or Bad Overall? - by Chad32 - June 23, 2019 at 8:39 am
RE: Technology, Good or Bad Overall? - by The Valkyrie - June 23, 2019 at 8:43 pm
RE: Technology, Good or Bad Overall? - by AFTT47 - June 23, 2019 at 10:33 pm
RE: Technology, Good or Bad Overall? - by Anomalocaris - June 24, 2019 at 5:19 pm
RE: Technology, Good or Bad Overall? - by Brian37 - June 24, 2019 at 6:22 pm
RE: Technology, Good or Bad Overall? - by Anomalocaris - June 24, 2019 at 9:49 pm
RE: Technology, Good or Bad Overall? - by ignoramus - June 25, 2019 at 6:14 am
RE: Technology, Good or Bad Overall? - by ignoramus - June 25, 2019 at 7:27 am
RE: Technology, Good or Bad Overall? - by Angrboda - June 25, 2019 at 2:56 pm
RE: Technology, Good or Bad Overall? - by ColdComfort - June 26, 2019 at 3:19 am
RE: Technology, Good or Bad Overall? - by no one - June 25, 2019 at 3:13 pm
RE: Technology, Good or Bad Overall? - by Peebo-Thuhlu - June 25, 2019 at 3:37 pm
RE: Technology, Good or Bad Overall? - by Sal - June 25, 2019 at 3:49 pm
RE: Technology, Good or Bad Overall? - by brewer - June 25, 2019 at 4:01 pm
RE: Technology, Good or Bad Overall? - by Aegon - June 25, 2019 at 4:16 pm
RE: Technology, Good or Bad Overall? - by Anomalocaris - June 25, 2019 at 4:52 pm
RE: Technology, Good or Bad Overall? - by Anomalocaris - June 26, 2019 at 2:33 am
RE: Technology, Good or Bad Overall? - by Aegon - June 26, 2019 at 12:30 pm
RE: Technology, Good or Bad Overall? - by Fake Messiah - July 3, 2019 at 4:18 pm
RE: Technology, Good or Bad Overall? - by Macoleco - June 25, 2019 at 5:21 pm
RE: Technology, Good or Bad Overall? - by ignoramus - June 26, 2019 at 2:16 am
RE: Technology, Good or Bad Overall? - by veoli - July 7, 2019 at 5:21 am
RE: Technology, Good or Bad Overall? - by Chad32 - July 7, 2019 at 1:02 pm

Possibly Related Threads...
Thread Author Replies Views Last Post
  Can too much respect be bad? Fake Messiah 48 4531 January 14, 2020 at 11:28 am
Last Post: roofinggiant
  Emotions are intrinsically good and bad Transcended Dimensions 713 107276 February 25, 2018 at 11:32 pm
Last Post: bennyboy
  Name one objectively bad person ErGingerbreadMandude 57 14942 October 16, 2017 at 3:47 am
Last Post: Ignorant
  Technology is the key to survival....... trev22 15 2003 March 25, 2017 at 10:05 pm
Last Post: BrianSoddingBoru4
  Is there a logical, rational reason why hate is bad? WisdomOfTheTrees 27 3686 February 4, 2017 at 10:43 pm
Last Post: BrianSoddingBoru4
  Is developing a strong habit of philosophizing bad for your social skills? Edwardo Piet 31 4155 May 25, 2016 at 8:22 am
Last Post: Gemini
Smile a bad person Sappho 30 5028 December 8, 2015 at 7:59 pm
Last Post: Neo-Scholastic
  The bad guy Marsellus Wallace 18 5252 July 28, 2015 at 8:15 am
Last Post: Marsellus Wallace
  What makes a person bad? Losty 53 13105 December 3, 2014 at 6:38 pm
Last Post: Losty
  >without the bad you can't appreciate the good MusicLovingAtheist 19 3751 October 22, 2014 at 10:41 am
Last Post: bennyboy



Users browsing this thread: 1 Guest(s)