Our society is hungry for more powerful technology. We want bigger, faster, better, and more powerful as soon as possible, and it doesn’t really even matter what we apply these words to. It could be a car or our internet, we just want to hear the words. As our advancing technology keeps pushing our direction toward a highly advanced future it’s almost too late to look around and ask whether we even should be going in this direction. We want our big technology but if we’re inconvenienced by it we are the first to complain.

We look to technology to automate our incomes just as much as we look toward automated banking to remember to pay our bills for us. On the flip side when we are deprived of our fair share of time with our physician we are ready to complain about our fast paced world. The intelligence of the average car is perpetually increasing but we are the first to feel offended by a public cell phone conversation that seems inappropriate to us.

We want a 50 inch plasma TV but we haven’t found a way to make them more energy efficient so they’ve been banned in the state of California. We use our Bluetooth GPS to help us get around but we still don’t give directions to those who dare ask without purchasing something first. Of course, we want the automated internet business income but we don’t want to actually have to work to make it profitable.

We’ve been using technology to displace people since the 80s when many plants went with automated robots to replace the human worker. In today’s times, we are closer to finding more people looking for work and begging for change as we automate more of our world. Progress may drive us straight into poverty.

As the robotics of tomorrow threatens the jobs that feed families and the amazing automation that we can create takes away the need for human service, where exactly are we headed? When are we going to start combining the best of technology with the best of the human element?

The longer we allow technology to come in between us and our family and friends the more we sell out to its power. Yet if we can all remember what is actually important in our world we would be able to decrease technology’s importance in the world and perhaps we could come back to the human touch.

While technology has the opportunity to improve our lives greatly we also have to remember that we still have a role in what happens to our society. The small decisions we make as well as the large decisions we make carry an impact all around us. It doesn’t matter if we don’t recognize it. It happens. And because of this we will have to strike our vote as a society when it comes to how far we will allow technology to rule our lives.

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