My daughter pointed out to me that in virtually all books written before the Industrial Revolution that imagine future time-travel, none of them imagine technological improvement. Rather they look at future human behaviour.
PICTURE: Ales Nesetril/Unsplash.
Technological improvements were inconceivable before the industrial revolution, now they are the focus of almost all future discussion. And behaviour is ignored.
We are enamoured with technology, so much so that technological change is considered morally good. No-one cautions against technological advancement.
But recent reports on social media show that technology is affecting us, changing us and our behaviour – often in destructive ways.
Have we taken our eyes off what is more important – how we treat one another?
Technology isn’t morally benign – it has brought so much good but has that made us blind to the bad?
Paul Clark’s musings can be heard on radio across Australia and at atthetop.org.au.
