Technopoly Part 1

Technopoly by Neil Postman is an interesting book on the effect technology has on the world. My first reaction was this book is almost as old as I am, and while reading it, I had to remember that this book came before all the technological advances I have seen in the past twenty years. Even though Neil Postman wrote this book in 1992 he has the right idea, "Technology, in sum, is both friend and enemy." I think the same thought is still correct for the technology we have encountered in the 18 years after he wrote this book. In the first chapter he divides people into two categories, the Technophiles, people who see only the good technology is going to do, and the people who see only the harm in what technology is going to do and do not think it will be of any benefit. I think that most people fall in between these two categories, because I think there are both pros and cons to new technology. I liked the story he tells about Thamus, where Theuth invents writing and Thamus thinks that it will destroy people's memory and wisdom. I had honestly never thought about this, but the technology of writing does alter the way people think especially when you can use writing as a crutch for memory
Postman goes on to describe the three different types of cultures that exist in the world, tool-using cultures, technocracies and technopolies. Tool-using cultures have some technology but it does not dominate the culture, technocracies have and use technology and it competes with the current culture, and technopolies are where technology dominates the culture. Again, this book was written almost twenty years ago, at which time Postman says that America is the only technopoly in existence. I think at this time though, there are many places that have technopolies, and its becoming harder and harder to find tool-using cultures. Technology has dominated the world, even children in Africa are getting laptops to use, which opens up a whole new world for them. It seems to me, as if the entire world is now a technopoly because, with the invention of web 2.0 and cellphones, we are connected to each other in ways we never have been able to connect.
I think so far, this book is trying to tell us that technology can be a dangerous thing, because it results in an information overload. With this immense amount of information, we are apt to believe things that we may not have believed centuries ago. Postman says, "In the Middle Ages, people believed in the authority of their religion, no matter what. Today we believe in the authority of our science, no matter what." pg.58 When you really think about it, you are inclined to believe lots of things with the technological age we live in, because there is so much that is possible and so much we don't understand even with the information that we blindly believe. To give an example, my father who is in his fifties just got a GPS for his car this past Christmas. He has NO idea how this little thing can tell him where to go, or help him when he makes a wrong turn but he does not question it's directions in the slightest. He blindly believes in this thing that he can not understand how it works. This mentality leads to a world of possibilities in people's minds today. It's almost as if we believe that anything is possible. Centuries ago, when these vast technologies were not available, people did not believe things that they did not understand, for example, it took a long time for people to realize the world was not flat. Unlike us today though, when they heard this idea of the world being a sphere they thought it was blasphemous and would not hear anything of the sort. This technology and information has really changed our culture and how we all think about the world. I still think there are pros and cons to the technology but I accept it and as many others are, I embrace it.