Douthwaite claims that technology is necessary to solve social problems, but if only for time, yet he has a positive look on the subject. While Douwaithe is positive, both Johnston and Huesemann find technological advances to negatively affect humans. Johnston agrees with Douwaithe in saying that technology works as a short term fix for social problems, but Johnston calls technology a ‘“band aid’ solution.’ However Huesemann believes technology simply a negativity having not only irreversible but also unavoidable consequences.
Technological fixes have social and environmental repercussions because of two main reasons. The first being that they are simply fixes, hey do not address the long term effects. Like Johnston brought up, a “band aid” solution is what technological fixes are because they focus of the immediate problems and do not attempt to fix the underlying causes that seem to perpetuate the problem. And the second problem is social to begin with. The reason a technological problem is unable to fix social problems is because humans are hard to predict and Douthwaite said it best in his commentary that “In the social sciences, however, one knows very little for certain” he said this because humans cannot be understood in quantifiable ways. With this being said it is easier to understand why trying to use a quantifiable method, such as science on an unquantifiable human can have negative repercussions. Although this is so I do not believe it should stop the technological search for solutions to problems, I believe that the search should continue, but should be expanded to find the underlying problems instead of the surface problems.
I’m not sure if they see all technological advancements or just technological fixes as bad for humans. There are many technological advancements that are not fixes for underlying problems. For example the invention of vaccines don’t solve a problem we created ourselves, it protects us from viruses we don’t have much control over. I can see where you are coming from as the Huesemanns talks a lot about how technology can be dangerous for the environment, but I don’t think they take it as far as saying that technology is bad for humans. If I missed something and they really do believe that tech is dangerous, I very much disagree with them, Lots of tech that we have created has been incredibly beneficial to us, and makes our lives much easier. A lot of it needs to be greatly improved in terms of cleanliness, but as global warming is becoming increasingly dangerous we are seeing a lot of technology begin to clean up. For example, while electric cars are still a fairly fresh concept, we are seeing them become more mainstream.
I like how you included the term “band aid solution” when describing Johnson’s views on the technological fix. It perfectly captures his thoughts and view on the subject. I strongly agree with your views on calling the techno fix as temporary, and only addressing the immediate problem instead of focusing the long term effects. I also agree that although there could be consequences it shouldn’t scare us into not trying at all. There should be a balance between solving things through technology, and letting nature sort it out. There definitely should be a search for solutions to the underlying problem, getting right to the source should be priority. Good points and great post.