It is an unarguable fact that people depend on technology in their social, economic and political lives. However, saying that people have become overly dependent on technology may be subjected to some criticism.
The aim of this essay is to analyze the impact which technological innovations make on people and to determine how they transform our social life. The results of the analysis are intended to make the audience rethink the influence of the technological progress on our life. The intended audience comprises students and investigators of the technology and technological catastrophes, in particular.
First of all, it should be said that human beings are the makers of technology. One view is that technology has helped transform the world positively. The need to make work easier has driven man to become more innovative in coming up with technological advancements that can help accelerate the speed of our work. Communication has been made easier thanks to technological improvement. It is now possible for an individual in Paris, France, to communicate with another individual in New York City in real time. This can be possible using phones or social media. In large companies, most of the physical work is currently done using large machines. The machines are faster, more accurate; they are not fatigued, and can standardize production better than human beings.
The other scholars argue that accelerating technological development makes negative impact on people as they become overly dependent on the machines’ work. Moreover, the evidence is clear, since the significant natural disaster such as earthquake or tornado, which is able to destroy the technology in plants, factories or energy stations can put the nation in the social distress.
To my mind, the truth lies somewhere between the two views. The technological progress makes our life easier allowing us to combine the fulfillment of several tasks and be able to do our work with a higher quality. However, such simplification of our routine activities makes us really overly dependent on technologies. People forget how to live without them. This means that in case of war, famine or natural disaster, when the technologies may be destroyed, it would be much harder for people to survive.
In order to persuade the audience in my position on the topic it will be logical to give real life example. The tsunami, which took place in Japan in 2011, is one of the brightest examples. The natural disaster destroyed the nuclear power station. As a result the area was completely contaminated with radiation and a lot of people suffered from irradiation.
The opponents of my position will argue that the further technological development of the nuclear stations as well as the systems of the natural disasters prevention will finally eliminate the threat of such kind of catastrophes. In reply I would say that the nuclear power will never be completely safe anyway, because the long history of mankind shows that we are not able to predict the nature one hundred percent and the risk of the stations destroy will remain.
To summarize all above mentioned, it should be said that people really become overly dependent on technology. Undoubtedly, the technological progress cannot be stopped and its results actually make our lives more comfortable and easier. However, the complete reliance on technology makes people more vulnerable to the external threats as well.