“Quality of life” is an elusive idea. Many equate it with having money, but it does not address everything we want in our lives such as our physical and mental health. By providing us with ways to control the uncertainties of Mother Nature, technology has certainly allowed us to increase the quality of our lives in terms of survival in the practical sense of the term (subsistence). But, beyond that, what has technology done for us? (Dyske Suematsu of dyske.com)
That was a legitimate observation.
Who would have thought that you could call anyone, anywhere in the world? have an internet access in the remotest part of the globe? have the information you need available at the simple gesture of your finger? set-up a permanent laboratory on the moon?
The limitless imaginations and trail-blazing spirits of a few have made these possible. Technology is advancing at a pace that sometimes it is hard for many of us to cope. The younger generations could not appreciate where we begun. That before the iPod, there was the walkman; that before the xBox, there was the 'game and watch'; before DVD, there was VHS or Betamax; before the tablet there was that huge desktop pc, before Satellite Digital TV, there were those aluminum aerial antennas. For us baby boomers, we are simply in awe as we look back at those (now) archaic technologies.What does this means for us?
Technology has immediate and lasting effects in our lives in a positive or negative way. While it provided us comfort, convenience, and has increase the quality of our lives (positive), in some instances it has rob us of the essential elements of normal living.
We have now a plethora of high-tech communication devices and systems available at our disposal, and yet we hardly improve the quality of our relationships. For example, divorce rates continue to rise, which as a result has taken apart many families; there are now available cure for virtually any type of disease and cancer, but the same technology is being used to develop bio-chemical weapons that can kill others; and so on. Ironic huh.
I can go on with a very long list of ironies here, but suffice it to say that technology is here and we are responsible to harness it to improve our way of living by connecting it with the basics of existence.
So, am I making sense?