Technologial threat?
In the 21st century, our life is centred around various communication mediums. To date, I'm sure most of us are familiar with programs like MSN messanger, Facebook, Youtube etc. Being a netizen has never brought us so many opportunities to interact with one another, but have you wondered how dependant you are on technology?How much control does it have over your life?
Life has become more hectic with the emergence of newer communication technologies. What happened to the good old days when you could just laze in bed on Sundays and not bother about work? With Blackberry's to tie you down, one can almost hear their Boss's voice nagging through the email.Techonology has become so embedded in our society that most people will feel crippled if they have their mobile phone taken away from them. One might wonder if this is truely the direction we wish to head in.
Much of our privacy has been lost in this age too. When looking at online networking platforms like Friendster and Facebook, we see people putting personal information like their age, where they stay, which school they study in etc. This is enough for any Tom, Dick or Harry to press a few keys and run a google search on you. You never know if there is a virtual stalker leering at your picture.
Wait, there's more. How often do we receive junk mail or spam in the form of SMS's through unknown advertisers? When we visit a certain webpage you never know who is secretly collecting data about your preferences and selectively sending you advertisements that might perk your interest (most of the time they don't) This form of virtual harassment is probably happening every second despite the layers of firewalls that supposedly protects us.
The bottom line? The world is not what it was 20 years before. Technology has become part and parcel of our lives and it is up to us to discern how we should deal with it. Should we integrate ourselves with it fully or set up perimeters to safeguard against potential threats? What are your views? Let's hear them!
Life has become more hectic with the emergence of newer communication technologies. What happened to the good old days when you could just laze in bed on Sundays and not bother about work? With Blackberry's to tie you down, one can almost hear their Boss's voice nagging through the email.Techonology has become so embedded in our society that most people will feel crippled if they have their mobile phone taken away from them. One might wonder if this is truely the direction we wish to head in.
Much of our privacy has been lost in this age too. When looking at online networking platforms like Friendster and Facebook, we see people putting personal information like their age, where they stay, which school they study in etc. This is enough for any Tom, Dick or Harry to press a few keys and run a google search on you. You never know if there is a virtual stalker leering at your picture.
Wait, there's more. How often do we receive junk mail or spam in the form of SMS's through unknown advertisers? When we visit a certain webpage you never know who is secretly collecting data about your preferences and selectively sending you advertisements that might perk your interest (most of the time they don't) This form of virtual harassment is probably happening every second despite the layers of firewalls that supposedly protects us.
The bottom line? The world is not what it was 20 years before. Technology has become part and parcel of our lives and it is up to us to discern how we should deal with it. Should we integrate ourselves with it fully or set up perimeters to safeguard against potential threats? What are your views? Let's hear them!
posted by Matthew at
7:02 PM
13 Comments:
Technology has not become a part and parcel of life but an essential and vital tool for the world today.
Much do we know that not only do we run of lives by the hand of technologies and the different gadgets that have become increasingly engulfing.
it's not only us that run on technologies, even companies run their business on a network. what is the world without technologies? simply we have grown so dependent on these technologies that most of us cannot function when a system or network is down.
Sometimes technology has also become such an indispensable tool that we sometimes think what the world was like 50 years ago when technology was never so advanced.
it is true that nowadays the technology has also evolved into a scary mean where anyone is accessible to any personal data and all through facebook, myspace and friendster etc. users should use their own discretion to filter what they have to put up to protect themselves against all those internet lerkies who are in corners preying on innocent young pretty hot girls! hahha!
technology has played such an important role in the development of many countries. for example, who uses phonebooks to record phone number these days? well, not many. however i feel we should not be overly reliant on technology.
As much as technology is concern, I don't consider it as a threat. The world is constantly changing with people moving and attempting to it. So now, unlike the 17th or 18th century, everything is centralized around technology. Though we can't change this fact, we can, however, choose the way we want to use or handle it. If you think posting information or photos online might attract stalkers, then don't do it. I don't think anyone should blame technology for what they did on their own accord.
I believe that technology has been so intrinsically woven into our lives that we now regard it as a basic necessity. Just look at the success of the IT exhibition recently - we are going through the beginnings of a recession that has the potential to be as terrible as that after WW2, yet we do not see a decline in shoppers at the IT fair at Suntec. As such, I believe that technology definitely has its advantages in order to justify our dependence on it. For one, because of technology like the phone and internet (msn Facebook) etc, we become easily contactable. Long lost friends meet again over Facebook and even though it isn’t face to face, still it provides a platform for people to meet that would otherwise be left to the hands of fate.
However, easy contact can be a double edged sword. Because we are constantly reachable by phone email etc, we no longer have personal time for ourselves and become internet addicts instead. I heard recently that there is a form of technology that allows people to highlight the words on paper and it automatically gets transferred to the computer in soft copy. People in future will never need to learn how to write with a pen. And the development of a life-like robot in Japan that looks not only human, but a PRETTY human at that, makes me believe that in future, we don’t even need humans on Earth anymore. Just that few who knows how to invent, and soon they will be able to invent a robot that can invent as well, and then these humans can die and wipe out the human race along with them.
I read in a study recently, that because of technology, the amount of time we spent interacting with people face-to-face have fallen so dramatically that our health is at stake. Apparently, we have been interacting so little for such a long period of time that our DNA is starting to change to suit our lifestyle. Very soon, our DNA will be altered to the point that we will not be able to interact with people anymore. Mental health will definitely deteriorate then and god knows what we will become. These are some of the scary possibilities that lie ahead of us should our dependence on technology continue at the current rate. Even though it is a future very, very, very far from us, it is still threatening. And ironic.
Despite the impending doom that reliance on technology can bring to us, it’s not stopping me from spending time doing this over the internet, so I wonder, is it even possible to safeguard ourselves from technology now, what with the whole world being so reliant on it???
As technology advances, there is no way to safe guard against it such as online socializing. All these require the efforts of an individual and assertion to post personal data online.
The heavy reliance on technology in this world today grows by the minute as we speak. Why?
Simple. What makes a man's life easier, he will adopt it for sure.
Technology definitely has become and inalienable part of our modern living. In fact one can even call it the forth dimension of our human existence. You don't really exist until you're on facebook.
However with this new forth dimension being added to our life, many adjustments has to be made, many new social ills will appear (e.g. online bullying, stalking) and many new socially responsible initiatives. I personally feel uncomfortable with the amount of information people share about themselves online, both with the concept of people being needy of attention and also out of genuine concern for them.(The reason is because I have a friend who online stalks many females he never spoke in real life, and he constantly shares about his fantasies of them with me).
I don't advocate that people be overly cautious when sharing about their life online, I just feel that sometimes we should be more aware of the threats we put ourselves, both financially and personally into. While learning to enjoy all the new found freedom we have.
Technology has it's pro and cons, however i reckon technology is a crucial part of my life. It's amazing at how technology can actually bring you closer to family members, friends and work.
With these communicating programmes (Skype, MSN and GoogleTalk), have indeed been able to bring people who are abroad closer back home through video calling. Online streaming of programmes have also been made possible due to the internet.
Although the internet is able to bring us closer to our family and friends, but it will also lead a string of problems, thus I reckon that we should actually take precaution on things that we share on the internet so as to protect ourselves.
Technology is a double-edged sword and might be a threat if not properly used or monitored.
While it has brought along much convenience to our race, we should not forget the purpose of using it in the first place.
An example will be using Facebook for more social interaction. The usage of FB allows a wider social circle but let us not forget that the meaning of friends and their significant in our daily life. Perhaps the definition of friends has changed from a more physical one to a more virtual one. But one thing will not change. It is the need for physical social interaction to enrich our well-being. Furthermore, virtual interaction is only approaching but not yet totally able to replace physical interaction.
It will be difficult for us to guess what will happen in the future, but what we can do is to closely monitor our technological development while pushing them to extreme limits.
Returning to stone age is impossible, thus let us live with technology while closely monitoring and limiting its possible detrimental effects over the human race.
Some say we are living in the age of technology.. indeed we are dependent on internet nowadays, and our lives are all closely interwoven with technology such that it can actually be hard to tear ourselves away from it. But despite facebook being kinda pervasive(we get to look at what our friends are doing all the time), at least we can adjust our privacy settings to protect ourselves. And hey, we get to reconnect with our old, long lost friends.. so why not!
All these technological tools are at our beck and call, but the effectiveness of them all are dependent on the way we use them.
Should we integrate ourselves with it fully or set up perimeters to safeguard against potential threats?
Like it or not, we all advance with time and with technology. Our parents grew up on typewriters and bicycles, but now use computers, keep in touch with the latest of celphones, drive nice big cars, know how to use the latest of things; they have facebook accounts, they watch youtube videos..
In actuality, our parents are really just us in adult bodies.
So with that said, is it really possible to just ignore technology and live in your own little coup? Impossible. Offices now use emails, text messages, powerpoint presentations, its hardly possible at all to live like they did 40 years ago.
Good question though (:
hahaha, hmm, my comments on youtube. ;)
ok serious, I agree that the fast paced technological advancement is really scary and threatening our future world. your bottom line couldn't be any truer - "The world is not what it was 20 years before. Technology has become part and parcel of our lives and it is up to us to discern how we should deal with it."
we should start making plans to counter what ever dangerous situations we might come across in the future, start now or its too late.
now imagine, I didn't type those above out and really posted it on youtube, would anyone go onto it to view it? :s
Personally I think technology pulled the world closer and removed physical boundaries as we're able to keep in touch with our family and friends who are overseas via webcam, skype etc.
Similarly on the contrast, it does pulled hearts apart as it lost some "personal touch" to it.
Technology is created by men and how should it be is eventually up to our own usage and definition. A double-edged sword i would say. But nevertheless I'm thankful for it.
Technology has definitely increased the pace of lives and I believe it has its pros and cons. And yes, I must say that I'm very dependent on technology. Without my mobile phone, for instance, I will not be able to check for messages, call someone, check the time, use it as an alarm clock, use it as a calendar or calculator, so on and so forth. But since technology is already introduced into the world, we have no choice but to accept it, and make good use of it since it helps us work more efficiently. I feel that even though technology is increasing the pace of lives, we will still be able to adapt to it well with the help of technology. (irony haha..)
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