技术对社会和环境的影响
Technology has affected society and its surroundings in a number of ways. In many societies, technology has helped develop more advanced economies (including today’s global economy) and has allowed the rise of a leisure class. Many technological processes produce unwanted by-products, known as pollution, and deplete natural resources, to the detriment of the earth and its environment. Various implementations of technology influence the values of a society and new technology often raises new ethical questions. Examples include the rise of the notion of efficiency in terms of human productivity, a term originally applied only to machines, and the challenge of traditional norms.
技术革命的重要性及其对社会的九大影响
Imagine what will happen when the cost of a long distance telephone call becomes as low as the cost of a local call? Or, when you can get a driving license at a time and place of your own choosing? Or, when you can bank from the comfort of your own living room? In some countries, ICT is already making these happen. Many believe that the current technological revolution may in time exceed the Industrial Revolution in terms of social significance.
New technologies transform our lives by inventing new, undreamed of things and making them in new, undreamed of ways. The introduction of new technologies can have the following effects on society:
1. Initial productivity slowdown and delayed productivity payoff from the new technologies
2. Destruction of human capital (as many old skills are no longer wanted)
3. Technological unemployment (temporary but serious)
4. Widening disparities in the distribution of income, which tends to be temporary until the supply of labor catches up to the new mix of skill requirements
5. Big changes in regional patterns of industrial location (globalization)
6. Big changes in required education
7. Big changes in infrastructure (e.g., the information highway)
8. Big changes in rules and regulations (intellectual property, antimonopoly, etc.)
9. Big changes in the way we live and interact with each other
技术的自我发展
In one line of thought, technology develops autonomously, in other words, technology seems to feed on itself, moving forward with a force irresistible to humans. To these individuals, technology is “inherently dynamic and self-augmenting”. Jacques Ellul is one proponent of the irresistibleness of technology to humans. He espouses the idea that humanity cannot resist the temptation of expanding our knowledge and our technological abilities. However, he does not believe that this seeming autonomy of technology is inherent, but the perceived autonomy is due to the fact that humans do not adequately consider the responsibility that is inherent in technological processes.
Another proponent of these ideas is Langdon Winner who believes that technological evolution is essentially beyond the control of individuals or society.
技术提高了人类生存条件还是恶化了人类生存条件
Philosophical debates have arisen over the present and future use of technology in society, with disagreements over whether technology improves the human condition or worsens it. Neo-Luddism, anarcho-primitivism, and similar movements criticize the pervasiveness of technology in the modern world, claiming that it harms the environment and alienates people; proponents of ideologies such as transhumanism and techno-progressivism view continued technological progress as beneficial to society and the human condition. Indeed, until recently, it was believed that the development of technology was restricted only to human beings, but recent scientific studies indicate that other primates and certain dolphin communities have developed simple tools and learned to pass their knowledge to other generations.