Technology: Is it Corrupting The Balance of Life?
Everything has an opportunity cost, even technology. As evolution evolved so did technology, the 20th century was the beginning of the new technological era; Computers, video games, mobile phones, appliances seem to manifest throughout society. Technology follows a sovereign development, a progression that we can slow down or accelerate depending on our decisions and efforts. This brings us to the big question: To what extent can electronics be advanced without becoming too inhumane? No doubts that technology advancement has brought numerous profound advantages, for example in economy, trade, and communication. As much as we want technology to operate immaculately, the drawbacks to technology is inevitable. Some argue that the rapid growth of technology may cause destruction upon Earth. This essay will represent my arguments and analyze the merits and demerits of technology before a reasonable conclusion can be drawn.

As I was writing this essay, I thought about my own addiction to cyber world. My smartphone is always with me 24/7 and it also sleeps next to my bed. First thing I do when I wake up is to check my phone. It becomes a habit through time, and I tend to get distracted by my iPhone easily. I can’t even last half a day without it. Youngsters these days live by the phrase, as Turkle said it “Alone Together”. However, I’m questioning myself after the research I conducted before beginning this essay. Why do we check our smartphones hundred times a day? Do we even know what the word “social” means in this modernized era? The word Social, according to dictionary.com means seeking or enjoying the companionship of others; this firmly implies face-to-face interaction. Nevertheless, this definition conflicts with today's perception of social networking, in which we interact mainly with screens rather than with people. Technology can be very beneficial and be made productive, however excessive Internet use can interfere with daily life, work, and relationships. But how much is too much? Some of you might rely heavily on computer and internet because of work, school projects, keeping in touch with your family, you name it. Spending too much time on the internet only becomes a problem when you start to neglect and procrastinate your priorities (school/work) and other important things in your life. It’s a problem if you prefer to socialize through the internet instead of meeting other people in real life. It’s a problem if you spend almost 24 hours of your day in front of your computer.

An article on CNN.com addresses a topic on internet addiction. Van Cleave, an accomplished writer and college professor lapsed in the case of internet addiction which leads to him losing his friends, and was barely able to save his marriage. "A beer a day becomes a case a day," Van Cleave says as he likens his addiction to alcoholism. "You can't stop, no matter how much you want to,” he adds. This brings us back to the question, why do people spend so much time on their computers and avoid socializing in real life? First, that frightened feeling of missing something cool. Of course, everyone, adolescents to be specific, will always want to be updated with the news happening around them. They don’t want to feel left out; they just can’t help thinking “is there something cooler around me that’s happening?”. Secondly, in this contemporary society, it has become socially acceptable to keep on checking your phones because everyone is also doing the same thing. That is why everyone does it even more. In most cases, when someone is at a party, they interact more with their smartphones rather than communicating verbally with the people around them. It is used as a safety hazard or a safety place for them to avoid awkward conversations with people around them. Sherry Turkle, director of MIT’s Initiative on Technology and Self and author of Alone Together, has spent years studying the psychological effects of texting on teens. “Kids have told me that they almost don’t know what they are feeling until they put it in a text.” Indeed, putting down your feelings in words may be easier and more descriptive and detailed which is why there are a lot of people who blogs instead of vlogs (video-blogs). Yes, blogging can result in good skills of non-verbal communication. However, we must not abandon the importance of verbal communication as real life = accept no substitutes. There are various reasons why we’ve become digital slave in which it will take days to list them down.

Sometimes it seems that we all exist in a virtual world where knowledge is conducted in pixels and gigabytes, music is not played but streamed, and the only games we play include crushing candies and contentious birds. Technology is a marvelous thing, unfortunately it comes with a great deal of disadvantage. These advanced developments made a huge impact on communication in real life. Nowadays, many people prefer a virtual communication instead of having a one-to-one conversation. Families, they sit together in the same area but they’re not wholly there. Their minds are wandering elsewhere, somewhere in their own little bubbles of conversation, somewhere in their virtualized world. They’re trying to have the so-called “quality time” but not really maximizing that time to actually gain the value of it. They’re supposed to pay full and undivided attention to the family members but instead they decided to be in their plugged-in lives. As the title of Turkle’s piece “The Tethered Self” suggests that someone is chained to something, a fixed object, which limits the range of movement. Everyone is becoming so attached to their mobile devices that they cannot even leave it alone for a few hours and substitute it for a more beneficial activity. So, is technology the new stage of language evolution?

Have you ever seen prestigious companies make huge deals just by communicating through the internet? Communicating verbally plays a vital role in our daily lives; the ability to socialize with people, to express oneself can make you a better person and leads you to a more successful path in life. Communication is one of the most important aspects in business, especially in the marketing and sales department. Its the most influential and important department as it is where the companies make money, revenue and profit. Good communication means effective speaking. Effective speaking will always lead you to a good outcome, it reflects who you really are. For instance, if a person is shy, it may be reflected by hesitancy in the voice, however a person with a high self-esteem will more likely have a clarity of speech. Effective speaking can be established by practicing more and more everyday. So, if you engage with your screens more rather than with people, seemingly, effective speaking cannot be carved into your character. Frankly, effective verbal communication enables you to speak in public with confidence and clarity and at the same time reflects your personality.

On the contrary, as Steve Jobs quotes it, all these technological developments, they push the human race forward, they can help people see things differently, make them a genius. These advancements make life so much easier. Let’s take E-mail as an example. Electronic mail or e-mail is the most common and popular way of communicating in these past few years. It gives us the opportunity to communicate briefly or in detail yet it saves time, money, and effort. It gives us the ability to send out informations to a number of recipients with just one simple click. The positives of email also include the speed of delivery and the cost saved for not having to use paper to convey your message to a number of people. In other words, e-mail is a cost and time saving feature of technology that has made communication much more efficient and the globe even smaller. However, poor-written email can lead to misinterpretation or miscommunication compared to clarification in a face to face conversation.

Technology has definitely become a major influence in the education sector. Most people utilize technology to the extent of its ability for educational purposes. Technology has helped institutions to improve teaching efficiency and enhance the learning process. A real life example of it would be my business class on Friday. It has been switched to an online class in which we can learn and communicate with the professor through our screen. Hence, I don’t have to walk 45 mins to the bus stop and I can save 2 bucks for not having to take the bus. Moreover, in my other classes, they use advanced technologies like projectors and wide screens to conduct the lesson. Let’s take a trip down the memory lane 10 years ago. The teacher had to use blackboard and chalk to disclose the lesson and we had to handwrite all of the notes given. But look at where we are now, where technology has led us, a whole new vision. However, many people who grew up in the outmoded age are concern that the use of computers will take the emotion and heart out of the classroom. Wehrle (1998) states “the pre-computer age generation envisions designing computer technologies that still take into account the emotional needs of the students” (p.5)

Summing up, it can be said that technology brings us wonderful benefits and has spawned the growth of modern society. Although it is true, but we have to face the impending disadvantages that outweigh the advantages if used by the wrong people. In other words, the disadvantages, as real as it is, epitomizes more of what’s wrong with us than mankind’s creations. We are the ones who create these advanced developments yet we’re the one who are too foolish to use it wisely. We have turned useful cellphones into a public nuisance which makes us socially isolated yet we blame technology for it. We have turned machines into weapons, we are a self-destructive human being. To conclude, the real problem here is not whether technology makes life more complicated or not, everything comes back to us. Even so, ultimately real-world interaction will always win the day. Human beings are social creatures and our brains are hardwired to interact with, to rely on each other, living in groups with each other. These technologies can be beneficial as long as it does not hinder the process of improving our social skills and build positive meaningful relationships. We just have to know our limitations. We have to be able to bridge the gap between our online and unplugged lives. Like I said, technology is a wonderful thing, it should not be used as a tool for us to escape from the world, in fact it should be used as a tool to engage more with it. Let’s put Turkle’s note of encouragement into practice, “Look up, look at one another, and let’s start the conversation.”

I hope we have said it yet. They are the accelerators, which give new possibilities to those people, who have the access to them and others fall behind (it is a really big problem!). They are a powerful tool that could become either a miraculous medicine or a vicious weapon. It depends only on us, what way we will choose. We all have the responsibility for the future. When we want our followers to be better than us, we have to give them not only technology and good teachers, but we have to be good examples ourselves [Schweitzer].