An Upside to Technology?

ELIZABETH JOSEPH
Maurischa January

Technology refers to tools and machines that may be used to solve real-world problems. It exists in many categories such as construction, bio-related things or transportation to name a few. As a student of Duneside High School as well as a junior editor for The Dune's Paper, who uses technology on a daily basis, I’ve come across quite a few malicious acts. These acts range from bullying on social media, terrorists spreading their messages of hate to people and children turning into narcissists from their Smartphone cameras. These downsides make you contemplate whether the benefits of technology have a stronger and better effect on us than the disadvantages do. Does technology better our health, is it capable of giving scientist the answers they so deeply long for, does it have the ability of making our jobs easier or can it improve our learning abilities we possess today? These are questions that linger in the majority of our minds on a daily basis. I personally have done a few interviews on both learners and teachers of Duneside High to provide them with a platform where they can answer some of these questions.

I asked Anthony Palmer if technology can improve our learning abilities and he replied by saying "No. I personally think that technology or specifically social media might deflect our attention from our school work which can lead to procrastination." As Anthony made us aware of a valid negative effect, Mr. Doro shed some light on the same question; "There are many ways that technology can help us with our learning abilities especially for the learners. The internet can assist them with projects as well as essays in the different classes." From my perspective I believe that this application of scientific knowledge can too help us advance our learning abilities, though it does have its defaults. Learners should practice to use the internet as a reference and not to depend on it to do the work for them.

Since I myself have science related subjects, I wondered if the scientists of the world were helped by technology or the internet to complete some sort of experiment or to find an equation for something. Therefore I asked a few teachers if can if the World Wide Web can give scientists the answers they long for? Majority of their answers were based on the same points. They all agreed that scientist don’t rely on the internet to give their information for them because they've studied quite a few years so that they can do what they do today. They also mentioned that because the internet isn’t the only form of technology in the world, they depend on modern day technology such as microscopes or calorimeters to simply assist them in their daily experiments or jobs.

We can use technology to help us prolong our lives, the lives of those around us and all living things. I asked a grade ten learner that would like to remain anonymous, if technology can boost our health. The learner responded by stating; "Technology can be wearable. There is a variety of smart devices that we can wear to track numerous health markers such as our sleep patterns, heart rate, body temperature or even our stress level." The internet, another form of technology, contains many applications that give us ways to better our lifestyles. They include diet plans and exercising methods that you can follow to help you with your health. Although technology may help us with our health, it can also cause many problems. By being overly connected we can develop phycological issues such as distraction or becoming victims of narcissism.

By doing research on the advantages and disadvantages on technology as well as interview my peers and teachers to give their opinions, I realized that technology was created solely to assist us with our daily tasks, yet the rate at which we are moving technology will be doing most of the work for us. Learners are becoming too dependent on technology and not doing tasks themselves. If we continue like we do to today, we will become dependent on technology. That will lead to people not being able to do anything themselves.

Is an ideal world really a place where machines do our work for us while we sit back and watch the world pass by? Think about it.