New possibilities and old fears
Clearly these new technologies are subject to public debates as well as academic research. The question is how new technologies (should) shape our living environment, how they change existing social and political systems and how they can be fruitfully integrated into them.
In the science fiction genre these issues have found their pop cultural expression, describing shining techno-utopias and terrifying techno-dystopias. I would argue, however, that dystopian visions are favored and rouse more public attention. Science fiction novels (Brave new world), movies (I Robot and Transcendence e.g.) and comic books illustrate dystopic futures with almighty machines tyrannizing humanity. They address various (but related) fears ranging from becoming dependent on these technologies to being monitored by them, including the loss of personal #privacy. This reflects a general rejection of new technologies we can observe in most parts of society.
However, research on media history has shown that society at large has always been suspicious towards new media. From today’s perspective it sounds unbelievable that the technological revolution of the printing press prompted a heated debate whether reading actually harms people, especially children and young adults. Gutenberg’s contemporaries were afraid that young people could lose themselves in the now widely available narrative worlds.
On the other hand, we can see that despite the initial rejection every groundbreaking technology has eventually become a vital part of society in such a way that it has become invisible to the everyday consciousness. It seems that, as soon as the feared technology enters the market, people get rapidly used to it. And soon after its introduction to the public it has become a matter of course. The turning point, the moment when rejection merges into absent-mindedness usage slips our attention. Fear gets converted into ordinariness. We actually endorse technology that is relatively new but not so new that we already take it for granted. As soon as we develop a feeling of how to handle it we accept it as a given. In reverse, we can assume that most of the technological novelties we fear today will be the most normal thing by tomorrow. #perception
In the science fiction genre these issues have found their pop cultural expression, describing shining techno-utopias and terrifying techno-dystopias. I would argue, however, that dystopian visions are favored and rouse more public attention. Science fiction novels (Brave new world), movies (I Robot and Transcendence e.g.) and comic books illustrate dystopic futures with almighty machines tyrannizing humanity. They address various (but related) fears ranging from becoming dependent on these technologies to being monitored by them, including the loss of personal #privacy. This reflects a general rejection of new technologies we can observe in most parts of society.
However, research on media history has shown that society at large has always been suspicious towards new media. From today’s perspective it sounds unbelievable that the technological revolution of the printing press prompted a heated debate whether reading actually harms people, especially children and young adults. Gutenberg’s contemporaries were afraid that young people could lose themselves in the now widely available narrative worlds.
On the other hand, we can see that despite the initial rejection every groundbreaking technology has eventually become a vital part of society in such a way that it has become invisible to the everyday consciousness. It seems that, as soon as the feared technology enters the market, people get rapidly used to it. And soon after its introduction to the public it has become a matter of course. The turning point, the moment when rejection merges into absent-mindedness usage slips our attention. Fear gets converted into ordinariness. We actually endorse technology that is relatively new but not so new that we already take it for granted. As soon as we develop a feeling of how to handle it we accept it as a given. In reverse, we can assume that most of the technological novelties we fear today will be the most normal thing by tomorrow. #perception
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