Sherlocks Posted February 14, 2017 Share Posted February 14, 2017 Its great that we have medicine and don't die from things like a cold anymore like it was thought to be in the old days but we are so reliant on technology we can barely function on our own. Now, this would be great if say everyone had the money and resources but we have so much poverty and unemployment and are forced to pay money for something as simple as housing. Without housing, we are on the street which is also illegal. Its also technically illegal to live off grid unless maybe you live somewhere that is very deserted then you making your own rules. Money was what started it all. Instead of training goods, we traded promises. Now, these promises are hallow and don't promise any real goods they are backed by gold and credit and credit is simply more promises never being met. It seems when you drop a person in hopeless situations their brains will work for a creative solution, but we never get put in situations where its live or die so we don't learn anything. Link to post Share on other sites
Sally Posted February 14, 2017 Share Posted February 14, 2017 Who are you talking about when you say "we"? There are millions of people around the world -- some of them in developed countries -- who are in situations where it's live or die. Link to post Share on other sites
Sherlocks Posted February 14, 2017 Author Share Posted February 14, 2017 3 minutes ago, Sally said: Who are you talking about when you say "we"? There are millions of people around the world -- some of them in developed countries -- who are in situations where it's live or die. We as in humanity. Humanity created medicine and that is something only a modern civilization has a good concept of. In the past, people were drinking mercury which we now know is very very bad for you. Again they wouldn't be in those situations if we weren't so advanced technology wise. a poor man starves on the street why factory farms and supermarkets throw away thousands of food. Why not give it to the poor? because stupid regulations and money. Link to post Share on other sites
Sally Posted February 14, 2017 Share Posted February 14, 2017 But you said "but we never get put in situations where its live or die so we don't learn anything." Since that's patently not the truth, how does the rest of what you said make sense? Like this Link to post Share on other sites
just an owl Posted February 14, 2017 Share Posted February 14, 2017 No. Link to post Share on other sites
Anthracite_Impreza Posted February 14, 2017 Share Posted February 14, 2017 Technology no, capitalism, profiteering and corporate rule, yes. Link to post Share on other sites
Yatogami Posted February 15, 2017 Share Posted February 15, 2017 Humanity has two options for survival. Transcendence of the human race (become something other than human via natural evolution/Eugenics) or Cyborgism (embrace technology, relinquish humanity. There is more than one way to survive, and neither of them is remaining human. Link to post Share on other sites
TheMadCheshire Posted February 15, 2017 Share Posted February 15, 2017 It could be. I mean people freak out now if they lose their phone or can't access social media and people today are losing the ability to interact with their fellow people in real time or face to face. Link to post Share on other sites
Sherlocks Posted February 15, 2017 Author Share Posted February 15, 2017 6 minutes ago, LivingForEveryoneElse said: It could be. I mean people freak out now if they lose their phone or can't access social media and people today are losing the ability to interact with their fellow people in real time or face to face. Tobe fair Some of us weren't too skilled at that to begin with. Link to post Share on other sites
J. van Deijck Posted February 15, 2017 Share Posted February 15, 2017 Most likely it does, but me, as a machine, have rather little to say about it. :< Link to post Share on other sites
TheMadCheshire Posted February 15, 2017 Share Posted February 15, 2017 2 minutes ago, Sherlocks said: Tobe fair Some of us weren't too skilled at that to begin with. That's true. Not intending to offend anyone. But in the grand scheme of things, I feel like its becoming more common and is going to become even more so in the future because children are being raised in the era of technology has just lost the skill because of its lack of use, like how cavefish lost their eyes Link to post Share on other sites
SorryNotSorry Posted February 15, 2017 Share Posted February 15, 2017 I don't think technology will be the downfall of humanity; if anything, willful ignorance will be. If you're rich, you can hire someone else to fix your technological messes. But if not, and you don't have the know-how to fix it yourself, you're generally screwed. The US is not a culture which values technological know-how. Ergo, there's a ratchet effect. People who never learned technology, who don't trust it, or are afraid of it turn to superstitious explanations instead, and the cycle repeats until it collapses, or until enough people ditch superstition and give empirical evidence a try. Link to post Share on other sites
Skycaptain Posted February 15, 2017 Share Posted February 15, 2017 Mankind may well misuse technology to create their own downfall. Antibiotics are a case in point. Overuse and simultaneously not taking a full course are allowing the development of resistant strains of pathogens. Link to post Share on other sites
binary suns Posted February 15, 2017 Share Posted February 15, 2017 14 hours ago, Tofu God said: Humanity has two options for survival. Transcendence of the human race (become something other than human via natural evolution/Eugenics) or Cyborgism (embrace technology, relinquish humanity. There is more than one way to survive, and neither of them is remaining human. this is complete whackery. wtf lol! y'all underestimate the strength and perseverance of humanity. a more interesting question really would be, "is humanity the downfall of earth?" lol. Link to post Share on other sites
Anthracite_Impreza Posted February 15, 2017 Share Posted February 15, 2017 18 hours ago, LivingForEveryoneElse said: It could be. I mean people freak out now if they lose their phone or can't access social media and people today are losing the ability to interact with their fellow people in real time or face to face. In fairness, phones are bloody expensive, it's perfectly rational to freak out if you lose them. Plus, I never had any social skills to start with and think they're way overrated. Link to post Share on other sites
Joe the Stoic Posted February 15, 2017 Share Posted February 15, 2017 The human population has skyrocketed because of technology. So no. Link to post Share on other sites
Sherlocks Posted February 15, 2017 Author Share Posted February 15, 2017 10 minutes ago, Joe Parrish said: The human population has skyrocketed because of technology. So no. Yet we still have so many poor people. Link to post Share on other sites
Yatogami Posted February 15, 2017 Share Posted February 15, 2017 5 hours ago, Every Red Heart Shines said: this is complete whackery. wtf lol! y'all underestimate the strength and perseverance of humanity. a more interesting question really would be, "is humanity the downfall of earth?" lol. Hav you never read any science fiction? My answer is thinking about how humanity will most likely be in 10k or more years. Link to post Share on other sites
RK800 Posted February 15, 2017 Share Posted February 15, 2017 20 hours ago, Anthracite_Impreza said: Technology no, capitalism, profiteering and corporate rule, yes. ^ This ^ Link to post Share on other sites
Skycaptain Posted February 15, 2017 Share Posted February 15, 2017 3 hours ago, Joe Parrish said: The human population has skyrocketed because of technology. So no. Which is the biggest problem. Our population is either unsustainable or rapidly becoming unsustainable Link to post Share on other sites
Joe the Stoic Posted February 15, 2017 Share Posted February 15, 2017 1 minute ago, Skycaptain said: Which is the biggest problem. Our population is either unsustainable or rapidly becoming unsustainable Actually, that does not happen. Birth rates are declining. The exponential growth mankind has had the last 300 years is coming to an end. Link to post Share on other sites
Polygon Posted February 15, 2017 Share Posted February 15, 2017 If technology kills us all, it'll be our fault, not the technology's. Technology's just a tool. Our application of it gives it its meaning. The casing of a missile could just as easily been used for all sorts of other things. Technology's effect on us depends a lot more on the human condition than it might seem. I don't see it happening. Maybe indirectly? Either way, I wouldn't go blaming technology for our own destructive habits. Link to post Share on other sites
Correner Posted February 16, 2017 Share Posted February 16, 2017 Everything depends on the human condition. However, we are a species doomed. We are still evolving and will eventually accumulate enough changes that we will be classified as a new one. Also looking at our current planet, the only way to eliminate poor people is to have all resources be incredibly scarce and for farming to be non-viable. Link to post Share on other sites
LittleGoody2Shoes Posted February 17, 2017 Share Posted February 17, 2017 On 2/14/2017 at 7:01 PM, Tofu God said: Humanity has two options for survival. Transcendence of the human race (become something other than human via natural evolution/Eugenics) or Cyborgism (embrace technology, relinquish humanity. There is more than one way to survive, and neither of them is remaining human. I'm all for transhumanism. Link to post Share on other sites
Busrider Posted February 17, 2017 Share Posted February 17, 2017 I wouldn't blame poverty on technology. To me it seems as if there were times in the past when folks had a chance to work their behinds off fulltime +x, without even making enough to eat! Due to technological progress even the poor & unemployed have a chance to be fat now in 1st world countries. As sad as it is; it is progress for sure. Would you really fancy living as a domestic servant somewhere at least 200 years ago? - I wouldn't! Link to post Share on other sites
NerotheReaper Posted February 17, 2017 Share Posted February 17, 2017 Well while technology might have its faults here and there, but it is pretty amazing how far we have come. Smart phones are computers in our pockets, when back in the day computers would take up entire rooms. Now we all carry them in our pockets basically. Technology and the Internet is what allows us all to communicate with each other even across the world, that is pretty cool. Technology is also pretty helpful for students, doing research is a lot easier instead of looking through the large encyclopedias that could kill a small child with how much they weighed. Yeah technology isn't flawless, but I wouldn't say it is "the downfall of humanity", humans been screwing things up for years even before technology. They also have been terrible before all this cool technology. Link to post Share on other sites
BenJD Posted February 17, 2017 Share Posted February 17, 2017 Technology has the power to both help and hinder humanity equally. The biggest problem I see with technology is the pace of technological progress far outpaces evolutionary progress. People still have lot of primitive tendencies that don't fit with a post industrial technology driven society. We still fight and compete for resources even when they are abundant for example. Of course resources aren't always or even often abundant. Link to post Share on other sites
sculapius Posted February 17, 2017 Share Posted February 17, 2017 Uh, dude, your original post doesn't address how technology will be the downfall of humanity. It's a post about money, and the current economic and political system used in most developed nations of the world (capitalist democracy). That... doesn't really relate to technology. Link to post Share on other sites
SorryNotSorry Posted February 18, 2017 Share Posted February 18, 2017 23 hours ago, BenJD said: Technology has the power to both help and hinder humanity equally. The biggest problem I see with technology is the pace of technological progress far outpaces evolutionary progress. People still have lot of primitive tendencies that don't fit with a post industrial technology driven society. To tweak your post a bit, I think you mean sociological, not evolutionary. One case in point is burn care. Nowadays we have the medical technology to save people with close to 100% 3rd degree burns, and doctors are not just asking "can we save this person", but "should we save this person?" Someone that badly injured will never be restored to their pre-injury condition because they'll likely need years of physical therapy to regain some quality of life. I don't know about you, but I wouldn't want to live any longer if I was in that position. Another case in point is robot ethics. We can make robots do all kinds of things, but should we give them sentience if we're just building them to fight our wars for us? I don't think even a machine should be put in a position like that. A third is cancer therapy. We know about things like Hayflick limits, checkpoint inhibitors, and monoclonal antibodies, yet—there's no way to sugar-coat it—we just let people die if they can't pay. I can only venture that this is due to some deep-seated elitism. Link to post Share on other sites
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