For a Balance between Technology and Life
    Technology, broadly defined as the use of tools, has a longhistory. Ever since Erg the caveman first conked an animal witha rock, people have been using technology. For thousands ofyears, the use of tools allowed people to move ever closertogether. Because fields could be cultivated and the technologyto store food existed, people would live in cities rather than in small nomadic tribes. However, in thepast centuries, both the development of technological tools and the uses to which humanity hasput them have created modern civilizations in which loneliness is ever increasing.
    First, the Industrial Revolution deprived people to a large extent of the pleasure of communicationduring work. It is true that the revolution introduced and spread technologies that mechanizedmany tasks and saved people much labor, but as a result of the drive toward more efficientproduction and distribution, people began to act as cogs in the technological machine. Clothingwas no longer produced by groups of women sewing and gossiping together, but by down-trodden automation's operating machinery in grim factories.
    Secondly, the new technology of today, computers and the Internet, pushed people further tothe abyss of loneliness. Truly, they have made work ever more efficient and knit the worldtogether in a web of information and phone lines. The world has been made into one in which Ergneed not check in to his office; he can just dial in from home. He won't need to go to a bar to pickup women because there are all those chat rooms. Hungry? Erg orders his groceries from anonline delivery service. Bored? Download a new game. And yet……However, many people, myselfincluded, are a little queasy about that vision. Erg may be doing work, but is it real work? Are hisonline friends real friends? Can he really enjoy this solitude?
    Actually, since the Industrial Revolution, we have been haunted by the prospect that we areturning into our machines: efficient, productive, and soulless. The newest technologies, we fear, aremaking us flat as our screens, turning us into streams of bits of interchangeable data. We mayknow a lot of people, but we have few real friends. We have a lot of things to do, but no reason todo them. In short, the new technology emphasizes a spiritual crisis that has been building for quitesome time.
    While I am certainly not a Luddite, I do believe we need to look for a bit more balance betweentechnology and life. We have to tear ourselves away from the fatal distractions and go out into theworld. Technology has given us long lives and endless supplies of information. Now we need toapply that information, use the time we're not spending conking our dinner with a club, and findour reasons for living.