Albert Einstein once said, “I fear the day that technology will surpass human interaction. The world will have a generation of idiots.”
A few days ago I was reading an article my teacher, Mr.Voley, gave to me from The Washington Post. It was about the man who committed the heinous crimes in Newtown, Connecticut. It has provoked me into thinking about the negative ways technology has affected us: mentally and physically. Adam Lanza, the shooter in the Sandy Hook Elementary massacre, found community among gamers. He avoided interactions with people as much as he possibly could, spending most of his time in his room playing violent video games. Instead of socially interacting with humans, he did so with virtual ones on a screen. “It was an illusion of companionship without the demands of friendship,” one lady told Michael Rosenwald of The Washington Post. This is a clear example of how technology can hurt you mentally.
A couple of weeks ago I was watching Savannah Gutherie’s Dateline story about being too digitally attached to your electronics. She gave evidence by challenging four Californian college girls to go without all of their electronics for two weeks. One of the ladies believed that after eight hours of living without her Smartphone, she was experiencing anxiety, headaches, the feeling that she was possibly about to puke, and even having withdrawals. I believe, some of the quotes from them, show just how much people are mentally attached to their technology like, “No phone, no life,” and “I feel like I abandoned my phone.” They even said not being online is like having a digital death.
A few of the ladies didn’t know what to do without tweeting, texting, hash tagging, and all the other social networking they’re a part of. They improvised and bought magazines on the latest celebrity drama. While driving somewhere they had to use the old school way of finding their destination: a map. They weren’t able to decipher it so they had to stop and ask a person where to go. Not being able to text and drive, like one of them usually does, caused one lady to scrawl out her to-do list on a notebook.
An additional comment one of the women made was she believes some things you just can’t say to another in person. It makes it easier to communicate sometimes if you just text them. People should feel like they are able to say anything aloud to each other.
Technology also has benefits. For example: it makes financing more manageable. You can now swipe and pay for items with your credit card using a machine that you can hook to your phone. Another perk about it is it makes communications easier. Also, it can help make learning simpler like the computer program, Rosetta Stone does.
In some ways I believe technology is destroying human behavior, but in others it’s giving the human race advantages. People shouldn’t depend on technology, and if you do, maybe you should consider going on a digital diet. Technology makes social interaction harder, takes face-to-face socializing away, and you may become socially detached. One advantage is it makes life easier, but then again it can also make life harder. I think if we keep progressing the way we are with technology, we will start to depend on it for everything.
A few days ago I was reading an article my teacher, Mr.Voley, gave to me from The Washington Post. It was about the man who committed the heinous crimes in Newtown, Connecticut. It has provoked me into thinking about the negative ways technology has affected us: mentally and physically. Adam Lanza, the shooter in the Sandy Hook Elementary massacre, found community among gamers. He avoided interactions with people as much as he possibly could, spending most of his time in his room playing violent video games. Instead of socially interacting with humans, he did so with virtual ones on a screen. “It was an illusion of companionship without the demands of friendship,” one lady told Michael Rosenwald of The Washington Post. This is a clear example of how technology can hurt you mentally.
A couple of weeks ago I was watching Savannah Gutherie’s Dateline story about being too digitally attached to your electronics. She gave evidence by challenging four Californian college girls to go without all of their electronics for two weeks. One of the ladies believed that after eight hours of living without her Smartphone, she was experiencing anxiety, headaches, the feeling that she was possibly about to puke, and even having withdrawals. I believe, some of the quotes from them, show just how much people are mentally attached to their technology like, “No phone, no life,” and “I feel like I abandoned my phone.” They even said not being online is like having a digital death.
A few of the ladies didn’t know what to do without tweeting, texting, hash tagging, and all the other social networking they’re a part of. They improvised and bought magazines on the latest celebrity drama. While driving somewhere they had to use the old school way of finding their destination: a map. They weren’t able to decipher it so they had to stop and ask a person where to go. Not being able to text and drive, like one of them usually does, caused one lady to scrawl out her to-do list on a notebook.
An additional comment one of the women made was she believes some things you just can’t say to another in person. It makes it easier to communicate sometimes if you just text them. People should feel like they are able to say anything aloud to each other.
Technology also has benefits. For example: it makes financing more manageable. You can now swipe and pay for items with your credit card using a machine that you can hook to your phone. Another perk about it is it makes communications easier. Also, it can help make learning simpler like the computer program, Rosetta Stone does.
In some ways I believe technology is destroying human behavior, but in others it’s giving the human race advantages. People shouldn’t depend on technology, and if you do, maybe you should consider going on a digital diet. Technology makes social interaction harder, takes face-to-face socializing away, and you may become socially detached. One advantage is it makes life easier, but then again it can also make life harder. I think if we keep progressing the way we are with technology, we will start to depend on it for everything.
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