From: J. R. Molloy (jr@shasta.com)
Date: Thu Oct 05 2000 - 14:42:04 MDT
Greg Burch has forwarded,
> >Attitudes to protect you against the one-sided information onslaught:
>
> >1. Since most of what we are told about new technology comes from its
> >proponents, be deeply skeptical of all claims.
Yeah, that's really a good attitude to protect you from polio, one of the things
that technology (and one man's heroic genius) helped to eradicate.
> >2. Assume all technology "guilty until proven innocent."
Right, especially the technology that allows this message to be disseminated on
the Net.
> >3. Eschew the idea that technology is neutral or "value free." Every
> >technology has inherent and identifiable social, political, and environmental
> >consequences.
As does every anti-technology political position.
> >4. The fact that technology has a natural flash and appeal is meaningless.
> >Negative attributes are slow to emerge.
In contrast, knee-jerk reactions based on out-dated political rhetoric are quick
to emerge.
> >5. Never judge a technology by the way it benefits you personally. Seek a
> >holistic view of its impacts. The operative question is not whether it
> >benefits
> >you, but who benefits most? And to what end?
Oh yeah, it's much more important to consider who benefits. Not! Just wait until
anti-technologist Jerry Mander needs some high-tech solution to emergent medical
problems. Then he'll use technology to continue waging his vendetta against
technology.
> >6. Keep in mind that an individual technology is only one piece of a larger
> >web of technologies, "megatechnology." The operative question here is how the
> >individual technology fits the larger one.
The operative question here is how anyone can take such a ludicrous statement
seriously. We're not supposed to be against technology per se, but rather
"megatech." Likewise, I don't oppose anti-technologists... I just oppose
mega-anti-technologists.
> >7. Make distinctions between technologies that primarily serve the
> >individual or the small community (e.g., solar energy) and those that
> >operate on a scale
> >outside of community control (e.g., nuclear energy). The latter kind is
> >the major
> >problem of the day.
Sounds like an argument against the nationalization of technology. I'll drink to
that.
> >8. When it is argued that the benefits of the technological lifeway are
> >worthwhile despite harmful outcomes, recall that Lewis Mumford referred to
> >these
> >alleged benefits as "bribery." Cite the figures about crime, suicide,
> >alienation,
> >drug abuse, as well as environmental and cultural degredation.
The obvious inherent dishonesty of this statement makes rebuttal unnecessary.
> >9. Do not accept the homily that "once the genie is out of the bottle you
> >cannot put it back," or that rejecting a technology is impossible. Such
> >attitudes
> >induce passivity and confirm victimization.
How does an unbottled genie confirm victimization? Apparently Jerry feels
victimized by developments that can help people more than he can brainwash them.
> >10. In thinking about technology within the present climate of technological
> >worship, emphasize the negative. This brings balance. Negativity is positive.
Would you like a bandage for your foot that you just shot, Jerry?
--J. R.
"History is the most dangerous of all the products of the chemical laboratory of
our mind. It stimulates dreaming, it intoxicates nations, it generates in them
false memories, exaggerates their reflexes, irritates their old wounds, deprives
them of peace and infects them with megalomania or mania of persecution." Paul
Valery
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