Technology and Blogs

I do not like technology interfering where it does not belong. Don't get me wrong, technology is great and has done great things for people; especially in the medical field and expediency within information transfer. I use a computer as much as anyone else and I would be quite upset if all my music download forums disappeared. Using microsoft word is much easier then hand writing everything.

However, technology sometimes oversteps its boundary. Take for instance, cell phones. Now that people text message everything, there is no need for any real human interaction, nor communication which helps build healthy relationships with others. Its this lack of communication which divides us as a society. Most do not see a connection between people helping others on the street and cell phone use. I do. By communicating face to face there are levels of non-verbal communication that make sub-conscious impressions on those involved in the conversation. Though to a much lesser extent, there are also subliminal imprints made on peoples minds when they talk via telephone due to voice intonation, etc. Even writing a hand written letter to some one has a level of personalization that cannot be matched (this is of course due to the time, thought, and effort that goes into writing and mailing a letter to someone.)

"Texting" does not take any effort to send or receive. Therefore, it does not have the inter-personal connection which writing letters does. Nor does it involve any body language, therefore lacking the non-verbal aspect so important to good communication. Nor does it involve any speaking, therefore lacking in voice modulation and any real life emotion which is essential to truly interpreting correctly. Rather, what you are left with is a superficial SOS of "Omg, u r so rite" which lacks any depth within the scope of true human interaction. People that communicate like this on a daily basis fall into a trap of "non-personal communication." This type of correspondence leads to a lack of communication between members of a society as a whole. This is one of the reasons why people no longer know how to be friendly and helpful to strangers. It stems from a lack of real intimate human interaction.

For example, it is much easier to ignore starving children in Africa, then it is to ignore starving children living in ones own town. One of the reasons is the "reality" behind the poverty. Both can equally be imagined, but actually seeing it in someones own town adds an intimate human aspect to the problem. It is this real human level of connectedness that brings prospective to the people. This real perspective causes people to develop emotions for the children they see while others overseas do not get the same level of emotion.

Like the people who never experience poverty first hand, sending a text message does not allow for the human level of interaction to flourish. The people that actually speak to each other in conversation, or write letters, retain that real human connection which brings them closer to other humans in society. Communicating via "texting" does not give a real human feel to communication. The inherently superficial nature of texting keeps people isolated from each other, and subsequently isolated from the human species. This is the reason that so many people go about there daily lives lacking genuine friendliness and a sense of unity among other humans. Just walk around in a big city like New York, Philadelphia or Chicago, watch as everyone from big executives to high school teenagers walk past homeless people sleeping on the sidewalks as they text message their co-workers or friends. The people that stop to help have come to realize that we cannot live in isolation and cannot function as a society, or species, if we only send superficial messages to each other and never develop the skill of real intimate communication and contact.

What does this have to do with blogs? Well, blogs are a technology of the 21st century, much like cell phones. I am defending the claim that I am not hypocritical for using a blog. Blogs are not superficial. Blogs are more like writing letters then texting. Blogs are also not used as a conversation tool, merely as a tool in expressing an opinion for the outside world to digest. I will stick to my guns and remain a person who sends hand written letters, someone without a myspace, someone who does not actively use facebook, and someone who has never sent a text message.

I will, however, begin to communicate my ideas and opinions to the outside world through this blog, but at the same time I will always remember the famous words of Stephen Hawking: "all we need to do is make sure we keep talking."

-tg