Blog Post #10: Why Does the Technology Debate Matter?

Technology is a topic fairly new to the world and yet has been evolving at an exponential rate for the last twenty years or so. From the release of the first smartphones phones came the spread of information like a virus through the internet. Everywhere you go and everyone you meet is engulfed by technology. But why does it matter? In today’s world, technology influences every aspect of what we do. In my own life, technology is a means of communicating with my family and friends, especially now that I am at school. Without it, I would feel completely shut out from anything other than campus life. In this instance, I am  For many others, technology has become even more vital due to health conditions; insulin pump, epipen, etc. While there are several ways that technology has positively effected many peoples lives, there are, as we so often see, ways that technology has had destructive repercussions. These repercussions are explored in an article written by Jean Twenge, a social scientist studying generational differences. In her article “Has Technology Destroyed a Generation?”, Twenge discusses the large shift in how trends appear. She writes, “Typically, the characteristics that come to define a generation appear gradually… trends that looked like modest hills and valleys [when graphed]”(Twenge 2). For the last 25 years, Twenge saw that change among generations occurred slowly and naturally. However, she then notes that recently this is no longer the case; “Around 2012, I noticed abrupt shifts in teen behaviors and emotional states. The gentle slopes of the line graphs became steep mountains and sheer cliffs” (Twenge 2). Here, Twenge emphasizes the negative effects that technology can have on youths who use them often. Technology has allowed for an influx of information that teens are not yet able to adequately sort through. They learn about new trends and try to incorporate that into their lives. As soon as it’s no longer “cool” they revert back to their old ways and start looking for new trends. This is what Twenge describes as the mountains and cliffs. Now I go back to the question why does all of this matter? Why is it so important to continue the discussion on technology? The reason it is so important is because we created the problem and now that we have created an almost irreversible process, we need to figure out how to fix it.