Technology and its inventions are so intertwined in every aspect of society as we know it and have been for enough time to a point as been for an extended period. From much of society’s perspective, it’s become challenging to begin to imagine life without it. Technology Changed Our Lives much of the tools we use in our daily life are the result of technology, and we often don’t think twice about that fact as relying on technology is our norm.
However, despite it being such a significant crutch in society’s lives, it remains crucial to reflect on how technology has impacted our lives in both positive and negative ways. Doing so allows us to analyze essential shifts regarding fundamental aspects of our civilizations within society, such as agriculture, transportation, education, communication, medicine, and growing business.
What is Technology?
As individuals within our society, it’s key to understand what exactly “technology” is. Without this fundamental knowledge, one cannot understand how technology has immensely shifted and impacted our daily lives.
The foundation of technology is turning scientific knowledge into creation through methodology and practices used to create goods, inventions, and services and complete objectives, such as scientific or industrial practices.
All forms of technology generally involve equipment, but the result can be anything as complex as a rocket ship or as simple as primitive tools. There are a variety of classifications of technologies. They each serve their unique purposes to improve society and or our lives as individuals.
Origins of Technology
The word ‘technology’ itself originated from the combination of the Greek words, ‘techne,’ meaning “arts and crafts,” and ‘logos,’ meaning “word, speech.”
Scientists estimate that the first tools came to exist over three million years ago, meaning that it precedes the origin of humanity. Additionally, our ancestors can take credit for stone flakes that served as knives and stones working as hammers discovered in Kenya.
Daily use of technology, though less extensive, existed in even the earliest communities through the creation of tools from stone, pottery from clay, methods to contain fires with wood, weapons, and many other inventions that assisted them with their needs.
Over time, advancements in technology continued at a rapid pace and have continued to do so.
Positive Impacts of Technology on Society
Technology is heavily pushed in society as it’s proven time and time again to have many positive impacts on life as we know it. Reverting to life without it would be extraordinarily implausible and impractical as it has deep roots in every vital part of society due to the convenience and assistance it provides.
Agricultural Practices
With the evolution that society has undergone and continues to go through due to technology, agricultural practices experienced some fundamental changes.
In the past, methods exclusively consisted of manual labor and work animals. The agriculture field now incorporates sophisticated technology, including machines, sensors, robots, and GPS software, to make jobs less strenuous and more efficient through automation.
These improvements allow for increased food production and job efficiency by eliminating much of the setbacks that come with manual labor. They’ve also contributed to a decrease in harmful environmental and ecological impacts associated with agriculture. Also, people now understand Better Eating Habits for their lives.
Transportation
For many of the destinations individuals need to reach daily, it would be highly impractical or inconvenient to travel on foot. Luckily, the application of technology to create transportation methods such as buses, cars, boats, planes, trains, etc., eliminates a good portion of time that one would spend traveling to their destination.
Transportation has also become a central backbone to the modern world, serving as a substantial economic growth and globalization source through vehicles and extensive roadway systems.
Improvement on Communication
The ability to communicate with others without having to be face-to-face is a remarkable technological advancement that has allowed society to maintain connections, call in the case of an emergency, and build relationships, among other things.
Telecommunication systems have almost always been a macroscale part of communities, whether through smoke signals or text messages. In today’s day-and-age, we have methods to reach somebody within seconds, such as email, texting, phone calls, DMs, comments, etc.
Communication through technology is essential for casual use, as well as professional use. Businesses utilize various platforms to keep track of workflow and reach everyone within the workplace within minutes.
Education
Technology is a significant part of the education that today’s kids receive. Instructors often use what the internet offers, such as videos to show kids, games to play, and platforms, as a means to provide lessons and work. These teaching methods allow students to remain engaged in their schoolwork and be eager to learn.
Many schools are reducing their use of paper by switching their resources to mainly electronic, providing tablets, laptops, and other devices that can aid students in learning instead of physical books. This shift allows for students always to have access to the newest information and learn more efficiently. Technology also grants students the opportunity to participate in remote learning. They’re able to learn from anywhere, including their home, on an online platform, whether through video calls or lectures and lessons previously set up.
The internet and other forms of technology have also provided educational resources on basically any topic, whether for extensive research on a subject or if a random question popped into your head. It’s no longer necessary to travel to a library, which may have outdated information, every time you want a question answered.
Technology has also allowed professionals, such as scientists, to learn more about the world. Aspects of nature that are invisible to the human eye can be made visible with human creations.
Health
Notable advancements in technology have saved countless lives through the development of life-saving methods. Illnesses and injuries that doctors in the past would have never thought possible to treat can easily be detected and cured before it’s too late now that patients can access the newest and most efficient treatments and diagnostic tools.
The digitalization of health records has also made it simpler for doctors and patients, and their families to access all the information on their diagnosis and medical history. Technology has made it possible to store all data on a patient in one platform and make it simpler to form informed opinions on the next steps for one’s medical care.
We have also created unique tools to improve the quality of people’s lives and make them more manageable, such as prosthetics.
These accessibility and medical improvements have historically contributed to an increase in humans’ average live spans.
Upgrading Business Practices
Technological improvements lead to drastic improvements in the strategies that businesses use. From the hiring process to communicating with employees to brand promotion, everything has become simpler and more efficient, coming a long way from printing ads in papers.
Businesses can also now have a much more accurate sense of statistical data through automated software tools that pump out information in real-time. These tools have made it much more efficient as it eliminates human error and limitations in the data processing. Collecting mass amounts of data is also made easier now than ever before. Having an online database is much easier than shuffling through folders every time you want to look something company-related up.
Trading has become much smoother through methods such as e-commerce, which allows businesses to manage swiftly, send, and securely and conveniently receive payments, even from foreign countries.
Better Goods and Services
In our digital era, people can easily give feedback on goods and services they’ve purchased. Because of this, you can get an idea of what business you’d like to shop at, as well as reject any companies with a substantial amount of negative feedback.
The potential of receiving negative feedback if their service is less than stellar also serves as motivation for businesses and employees to provide their best goods and services to the consumers to avoid running the risk of chasing customers away.
Entertainment
Technology has provided revolutionary changes to how we spend our free time and entertain ourselves.
If you’re bored, a solution is as simple as turning on a television or a device where you can consume media. It’s no longer necessary to physically travel or do physical activity to access yourself, as many forms of entertainment are accessible worldwide for the enjoyment of consumers.
Accessibility for Disabled Individuals
Assistive technology is a fantastic field of study that provides a sort of compensation for those with disabilities. It allows for an improvement in the quality of life and the ability to be a functional and partially or fully self-sufficient member of society.
Rehabilitative and assistive technology can aid individuals with many kinds of disabled individuals, such as people with cognitive, physical, hearing, mental, visual, etc. disabilities. Through inventions developed throughout history, many have received an opportunity to work, travel, enjoy hobbies, learn and participate and school and other education-oriented activities, access information, and integrate into society.
Economy
Technology has been a top driver of financial success globally and nationally in economic communities for quite some time. Since technology is the ultimate way to increase production efficiency and links with society and individual well-being, it’s an enormous contributor to economic boosts.
If technology suddenly stopped being produced, the economy would likely crush as an overwhelming amount of consumer purchases involve or rely on technology.
Negative Impacts
While technology has some fantastic benefits that have significantly improved our quality of life, do not be fooled. Issues triggered by technological inventions are still present.
As a society, we must take a step back and look at what technology-caused issues exist and how we can improve within ourselves and our communities to prevent the worsening of these problems due to negligence.
Resource Depletion
Technology has made it increasingly easier to collect resources. However, natural resources such as scarce earth elements and minerals, food, and fossil fuels are depleting at a rate that is too rapid. Eventually, this can lead to a lack of sufficient resources.
People having access to such technologies that can provide access to the rarest of minerals, such as gold, only increases people’s greed and want for more without considering the global consequences that extreme depletion can have on society. Not only is this an issue that takes a toll on the health of the environment, but rare minerals are a critical point of contention, leading to many conflicts centered around access to specific resources.
Pollution Increase
Industrialization is a majorly consequential contributor to the pollution of our natural world. Many technological practices lead to fossil fuels, climate change, air pollution, and toxic waste.
Everyone has a carbon footprint and can take steps to reduce it, but a weighty factor in this issue is large factories that produce large amounts of air pollution.
As long as our actions contribute to these issues, severe problems remain. These complications have the potential to threaten the entirety of our society.
Physical Health Concerns
Many technologies, such as smartphones and laptops, can lead to eyestrain by capturing one’s attention for extended periods, potentially causing blurred vision, dry eyes, and physical pain. An excellent rule to combat this is the 20-20-20 rule, in which, after 20 minutes of continuously staring at your screen, look at something 20 feet away for approximately 20 seconds.
The light from your devices can also lead to issues with sleep due to lengthy periods of exposure to the blue light emitted by your screens, which can disturb your circadian rhythm. To avoid this issue, it’s a good idea to engage in relaxing activities as a way to wind down before bedtime.
Additionally, the way many people sit hunched over while engaging with technology can lead to issues related to posture due to sitting in the same position for hours. A way to prevent this is to sit straight while using your devices and take breaks that consist of standing and walking around.
Mental Health Concerns
While a positive of technology is that you can use it to form and maintain connections with others, it can also serve as an isolation method. For example, many feel isolated after extending periods of scrolling on social media. Additionally, many people, especially teens, develop addictions to their devices in the information stored in them, whether it be to escape from the real world or simply because they have entertainment accessible 24/7.
Having negative interactions on social media instead of positive ones can lead to higher levels of depression and anxiety. For many who are more inclined to compare themselves to others they see online, technology can quickly become a source of newfound insecurities and negative self-perception.
A method of combating the potential issue of social media becoming a stressor is to set time limits on your apps so that you’ll spend less time engulfed in that world.
Human Behavior
Having the technology to assist you with nearly any action is extremely impressive and convenient, which is a positive.
However, humans have become overly reliant on technology to the point where they look to apps and other innovations to assist virtually any task in which they can receive assistance. Because of this, many individuals have become too lazy and may not survive without it as they are not self-sufficient.
Let’s Recap the content now,
Society has used technology as a crutch in daily life since the origin of humanity. It serves to improve productivity, increase convenience and efficiency, and make tasks significantly more straightforward.
While many positive effects are associated with having unfathomable amounts of technology at our fingertips, there are also some challenges and issues from the same source. Therefore, it’s essential to reflect on the societal evolution prompted by technology to tell us what humans did right and wrong.
In the future, technology is likely to continue to be innovated and expanded. It’s up to humankind to decide whether these changes will be positive or only further issues that have been historically present.
