Machine or man? Or maybe little bit of both. What if you can choose to replace your eyes for camera or eat a pill that will replace your all passwords. If you think this is far future, think again. It’s time to talk about technology that is already transforming the way humans are living and interacting with each other thus making us more then just humans. Look around you, there are chips, sensors and wearable gadgets everywhere. People are monitoring everything and anything in real time. We can optimize how we spend time, how we take care of our health and almost any other aspect of our lives. For many this is exciting, but for other scary. People are already obsessed with their devices, and I think humans don’t need a robot that will remind them constantly about their bad habits and choice of lifestyle. What I’m more interested about is technology that will help people expanding their experiences and possibilities in a positive way.
I think the technology is something that we discover and then find a way to put something to specific use and not just something we build up. We can see this in example of hydroelectric dam which is using the river energy for producing electricity, just as Facebook build their social platform around human tendencies and then channeled them in specific way. When we see smartphone we can perceive it not just as object but testament to the people who created it. Like many things in life, technology is almost like a double edged sword, involving both loss and gain demerit and merit. As much as it helped us to connect to the people who are far away from us, it is also distracting us from people that are close to us. But what’s really important to know is that the use of technology comes down to the choice of individual. People are using tech for their own purposes. Some as I already said, are monitoring their every more or heartbeat, while others are not so dependent on it.
I think the most important things is that technology is in much cases making us and our life better. That devices we see each day in the hands of teenagers across the street are enabling the smart child in Africa to have access to top professors in the world through coursers or met new people that are sharing similar interests, or even find some employment online. There are many new innovations and tech gadgets that are transforming the human experience. For example, Rob Spence is a person that had a shotgun accident when he was a kid, which left him totally blind on one eye. But, this didn’t stop him to find great replacement. He actually created camera with radio frequency inside his eye prosthesis, so he can record video everywhere he goes.
We already have bionic arms or legs helping people who had an accident and lost their limb. Jerry Jalava lost a part of finger. Jerry is software developed so he came up with interesting idea to incorporate USB of 2GB inside his prosthetic finger. So every time he wants to use it he just plugs in his left hand and plugs out when transfer is completed. In the end, technology is already transforming human lives on a big scale, and if it can continue in positive direction that’s the real value of it.
