Can the human mind cope with technology, or will it die in the trap of technology?
A few years ago, we began to use the computer for typing out letters, replacing the legendary typewriter that dominated 20th-century business offices. In offices, one after the other, computers replaced typewriters as a better option for typing and storing documents. Comfort for corrections and storing were highly desirable benefits.
Later, we saw how technology controls humans. Now its dominance has further expanded. The advent of mobile phones and other electronic gadgets changed the scenario and junked all expensive electronic office equipment. The spectrum broadened the scope of mobile phones, with feature phones bringing the entire world within the reach of our fingers. The generation of spectrum changed rapidly, making communication an amazing experience.
Gradually, we became addicted to technology. This is what we are witnessing now. We cannot imagine living a day without technology. We have lost wisdom. We can’t take a step without artificial technological support. Experts say that one day robots will rule us. But we are not aware that technology has already invaded us. Technology has grown to keep complete control of us—say, every moment of us.
Today, for everything, we need internet data connectivity. Without mobile phones, we can’t spend time anywhere. A hotel without an internet connection is no one’s choice. We can survive without water for a few hours, but we cannot live without net connectivity even for an hour. We are unable to move from place to place without a net connection.
A few years ago, we were unfamiliar with computers, mobile phones, and the internet. I feel our lives were better in those days, as we could use our brains for solving puzzles and we had enough time to spend with our families and friends. Our kids cannot imagine such a period and may not believe that we had a better life without the internet, mobile devices, and computers.
Now there are drastic changes in the human mind and relationships. Interestingly, we can see that the human mind does not keep up with technology. We struggle to walk with it. Mental illness has become common. We may need to go to the forest to see the aboriginals living a real human life. They live a life in communion with nature, letting no technology interfere in their life or disturb them.
A life overly dependent on technology is riddled with too many problems. It was after the invasion of technology that parents began to worry about their children who were irreversibly addicted to mobile phones. Kids have set their world within the device, keeping them disconnected from their parents and aloof from their inevitable routine work. Ultra-modern feature phones transform the otherwise nature-driven human mind into life with unnatural instincts. Mobile phones steal away the majority of our time. There is no escape from it. When our attention is stuck on mobile phones, even a call from dear ones irritates us. Every act of domestic violence has its roots in such irritation and suspicion of calls. Hapless parents eventually look for counselling for their kids.
Technology is good if it eases our physical strain until it invades us. But when technology works as a proxy for our brains by assigning all the brain’s works to the technology, we do nothing but either freeze our brains forever or throw it in the junkyard to gather rust. Humans without brains are worse than any animal. A brain cut to the size of a mobile phone can be more dangerous if humans are to live in a world of civilisation with inseparable social relations. Technology cannot do what civilisation means and what nature orders. The human brain is a gift of nature. Surrendering the same to ultra-modern technology, which is the brain work of only a handful of privileged ones, is no less than discarding the special privilege rendered by nature to humans.
The impending ultra-tech wonders, like the luxury of walking through shopping malls while being on our sleeping cot, may further expand our comforts. But that may correspondingly cut down our human-to-human relations and the values of social relations. Meeting newer requirements precisely after reading what is going to be the next demand is called “innovation.” The innovation will continue as everything in the world is increasingly commercialised. Through technological innovation, we have commercialised human relations and comforts, which are unnecessary or avoidable. The trouble with innovation is that almost all avoidable comforts over a period make people adopt and use them. Once people begin to use that avoidable system, it becomes part and parcel of life and, hence, unavoidable subsequently. Here, the principle of addiction works effectively.
Now we cannot predict what will happen next. But one thing is sure: human troubles are going to rise as artificial intelligence is set to rule the human world. A human mind cannot overlook the dangers of technology so long as the same renders remarkable comforts. Moreover, an average human brain cannot work on a vast algorithm and the quantum theory that artificial intelligence works on.
Technology has opened new spaces for crimes as highly intelligent people find new opportunities to defraud common people. Ultramodern technologies lead to ultramodern crimes. Cops are often unable to trace cyber crimes even if the cops have a system to track mobile devices. One thing is sure: fast-changing technology poses many challenges. It can threaten the very existence of humans as it can guide and control everything on land, sea, and air, including human brains and nuclear weapon sites.