Doc Hoff’s #BlogBlogProject | “The Power of Technology: Is It Advancing Too Fast?” by Lauren D’Amico
As a professor of political communication, I’ve been sharing blogs written by my University of Delaware students for the last decade. This blog was written by Lauren D’Amico, a senior Health Sciences — Medical Diagnostics major at the University of Delaware for an assignment in my writing class, “Technology and Politics.” She wrote this blog as a response to our course readings on the rapid development of technology in the last century.
Isn’t it crazy to imagine that television was invented less than one hundred years ago? I find it even crazier to imagine that the first iPhone came out just fifteen years ago. Less than 7% of the world was online in 2000, today over half the global population has access to the internet.
I found this timeline of some of the popular technological breakthroughs since 1969. The timeline only goes until 2018 and, as you can imagine, we’ve seen many new technologies since then. In 2019, “Wordly, an artificial intelligence-based system provides simultaneous translations capabilities in 15 languages for events, replacing in some cases the human interpreters.”
In just the past four years, artificial intelligence (AI) “has continued to advance rapidly, with major breakthroughs in natural language processing, computer vision, and autonomous systems.” Another popular breakthrough we saw in 2020 was Tesla starting a full self-driving car in the United States, and “as of February 2023, Tesla has about 360,000 participants in this program.”
To my surprise, it was difficult to find sources that gave a clear list of new technological breakthroughs since 2018 throughout the 62,100,000 results I received in my search. I assume this is because of how many inventions there have been, and how highlighted this topic is in society.
According to an article released by CNET in February of 2020, studies showed that “more than 60% of all respondents said they worried that the pace of technology was too fast and that governments don’t understand it enough to regulate it. Another 66% said they worry that technology will make it impossible to know if what people are seeing or hearing is real.” In addition to this, “trust in technology fell globally by 4%, with declines of 7% in the U.S. and 6% in Australia.”
These studies involved surveying more than 34,000 respondents, across 28 markets globally. Considering that this article was released in 2020, and technology has only continued to advance exponentially, I imagine these rates to be even higher than they were in 2020. Therefore, it is no surprise that the world has opened its eyes to the rampant growth of advancements in technology, and many people are worried as to what this means for our future.
Chapter four of our course textbook, Jamie Susskind’s Future Politics, opens with the statement: “As time goes on we’ll increasingly find ourselves surrounded by technologies of extraordinary power, subtlety, and complexity — most of which we can barely understand let alone control… the digital lifeworld holds in store a magic show unlike anything we’ve ever seen” (Susskind, 2018). Susskind further states that through our onward journey a part of the digital lifeworld, “the main risk is that we lose track of our political and moral intuitions, unwilling or unprepared to think critically about changes that we come to take for granted” (Susskind, 2018).
By now, we all know there are many risks that come along with technology use. It’s important we get a grasp of how to protect ourselves now before we dig an even deeper hole into what seems to be technology completely taking over the world.
While these new means of communication, entertainment, and information have offered many benefits, their increased use has also brought increased concern for issues regarding disinformation and segregation. Many people worry that the rapid advancement of technology could lead to negative consequences such as loss of privacy, displacement of jobs, increased surveillance, and the list goes on. Therefore, is it necessary to have plans implemented in order to stop the pace of technological advancements?
I believe it’s important to keep in mind that technology is just a tool. Technology can be used for good and bad purposes, but it is up to you how you choose to incorporate technology into your life. Although we can’t control the rate of technological advancements, it is crucial to be mindful of new technologies and ensure they are developed responsibly and ethically. Thankfully, there are actions we can take in order to protect ourselves from the potential negative impacts of technology.
This includes educating ourselves about the benefits and risks, setting boundaries and limiting usage, and advocating for regulations and guidelines that promote responsible usage of technology. It’s important for regulations and guidelines to be placed in order for people to better understand the potential risks associated with advancements in technology. If this were the case, then people would be less worried about the pace of technological advancements and focus more on how society as a whole can ensure technology is used for beneficial purposes and minimize potential risks.
This blog was written by Lauren D’Amico, a senior Health Sciences major, for my University of Delaware Technology and Politics writing class this spring, 2023.
