In today’s technological age, technology continues to insinuate itself more and more as an active element in our daily lives. From smartphones to the Internet, mankind as a whole continues to use it to do everything from learn more to communicate with others across the globe. However, we must discern what values we now have as a result of technology’s increased importance: does it affect our social interactions in a positive or negative way? Does it interfere with learning? Are our attention spans shorter as a result? When considering these values, it is important to understand that technology, in many ways, is value-neutral – its existence is not inherently good or bad, and so it is difficult to levy any real moral judgments on it that we would not otherwise make on ourselves. Any perceived problems that befalls society as a result of technology should be blamed on ourselves, rather than the technology itself; however, technology’s presence can permit these positive or negative attributes to become known. Though technology offers an outlet to express the good or bad values of others, technology itself is value-neutral, and should be considered as such when considering its role in society.
When it comes to communication, there are many good and bad values that technology can bring out. Online communication, when used in a positive way, can offer a greater exchange of information between many different kinds of people, facilitating greater understanding; however, this same communication is often a tool of harassment. Just as with any other tool, communications technology can be used to facilitate the plans and values of a person doing the communicating. Tully notes that people can exchange information on both intellectual and fact-based grounds, and technology allows the normal barriers of physical distance and culture to be overcome. This is a positive value, but technology just facilitates these values, rather than performing the communication itself. It is possible to argue that being able to access the entire spectrum of human information may expose people to hazardous ideas and dangerous modes of thought they would not otherwise have been exposed to; in this way, technology might be seen as being supportive of these heinous acts (Tully). However, as they are value-neutral, the blame cannot be on the technology.
The chief impact that technology has on us lies in the complete decentralization of information and content, allowing us to get information from anywhere and everywhere. This is particularly the case in social media, as its value-neutral nature leaves people to instill their own values on it. Social media (known also as Web 2.0) is often used for nefarious purposes, particularly by the corporations who control it (such as Facebook and Twitter) – those who fund the creation of these platforms basically fund web creation in order to help their own vested interests, such as raising awareness of their own products.
This same kind of content creation can be used in other ways as well, such as with GPS-related technologies like Google Maps (Griffis). This technology is also value-neutral, in that users who create custom map layers in Google Earth, for instance, are imposing their own values and priorities upon the technology, rather than the other way around. For example, someone who makes a map of the best restaurants in their city is making a positive change; however, people could also use this to point out homes and locations of targets for people to harass and assault, which is undoubtedly negative. The map system itself is not inherently preferential to one or the other, instead leaving it to the users to use it as they see fit.
Yet another type of technology that raises questions of morality and value-neutrality is video games. This is an industry that often uses its platform to espouse negative values of violence, sexual assault, and other dark subject matter. However, video games can be used to instill positive values, such as educational video games or ones with positive moral messages (Martins et al., 2009). For the most part, though, most video games existing in the industry as is have an inherently destructive trend of turning women into damsels in distress or sexual objects, serving little purpose but to be captured or invite player characters to view them sexually.
That being said, the question remains as to whether or not this is due to the video game technology itself, or the values that the developers of the game bring onto the work itself. The issue is not whether game technology can make better female characters, but whether the humans who create those games can do that. The same exact technology that creates such destructive stereotypes can also be used in reverse to make more strong women characters that girls playing video games can look up to. This places further emphasis on the idea that technology is value-neutral, and it is people that impose their values upon it.
If anything, the effects of technology on the brain are innately positive, as research has shown that motivation and concentration are helped when using technology in the classroom (Bester & Brand, 2013). Technology manages to capture and maintain learners’ attention when taking on lessons, as it makes the environment more interactive and encourages them to use multi-modal strategies for learning (Bester & Brand, 2013). To that end, people become learners in multiple ways, becoming encouraged to pay attention for longer and gain a better sense of concentration. In this way, the role of technology can be interpreted not as taking attention away from others (e.g. people paying more attention to their phones than the people around them), but simply making them more focused on a specific task away from direct social encounters.
The role of technology on our society, and whether it makes us more inattentive or less considerate to our fellow man, is no more important than the values we impose on it. If technology is allowing us to abuse and harass one another, that is because our society has decided to value those destructive tendencies. Technology, like so many other things, is a tool by which humans learn to assert their own values, being in and of itself value-neutral. The human beings who operate this technology use it to facilitate their own biases and motivations, whether it is using Web 2.0 to inform people or destroy their lives, using video games to demean or empower women, using custom map technology to share recommendations or point out targets, and more. The humans using this technology are the ones that must bear the burden of its positive and negative effects, rather than blaming it on the proliferation of technology itself.
Works Cited
Bester, G., and L. Brand. "The effect of technology on learner attention and achievement in the
classroom." South African Journal of Education 33.2 (2013): 1-15.
Tully, James. "Communication and Imperialism". 1000 Days of Theory. 2006.Kleiner, Dmytri & Brian Wyrick. "INFOENCLOSURE 2.0". OpenDemocracy. May 2011.
<https://www.opendemocracy.net/ourkingdom/dmytri-kleiner-brian-wyrick/infoenclosure-20>.
Griffis, Ryan. 3."For an art against the cartography of everyday life". 2010. <http://www.re-
public.gr/en/?p=176>.Martins, N., D. Williams, R. Ratan & K. Harrison. "A Content Analysis of Female Body Imagery in Video Games" Sex Roles. 61(11-12) p. 824-836.
