Crazy People Work From Home…

There’s a pretty good argument to be made that the ills of the world are due to modern technology. The combustion engine, electric lighting, powered flight, mass produced products. These and many other such things have all resulted in depleting natural resources and causing pollution quite literally on an industrial scale.

When it comes to the fuel that powers these modern technologies there is an even more depressing legacy. Our energy source of choice is the burning of fossil fuel, in other words oil, coal and gas. However there is now rather less fuel left than has already been burned and what has already been burned has raised levels of atmospheric CO2 to record levels. We’re caught on the horns of a twin dilemma.

So it would seem that the good times are gone. Soon the barrel will run dry and we shall have to sober up with sore heads and a hazy memory of how we got here. The final touch might be a pandemic of biblical proportions with the contagion spread to all parts of the globe thanks, ironically, to our modern transportation networks.

But how likely is this scenario really and can the blame all be laid at the door of technology? The fact is that this is hardly a first offence - as a species we have a pretty poor record when it comes bad behaviour leading to unfortunate consequences. But every time we’ve somehow managed to survive and emerge stronger.

The fact is that you cannot separate people from technology. It’s what defines us. Go back however far you like into prehistory and wherever a few old bones are identified as being human in origin you will find evidence of technology.

Since forever we have been making and wearing clothes and decorations, fashioning tools and weapons, storing and cooking food, drawing pictures and playing music. We cannot help ourselves - we truly are a species that depends on its ability to create and use technology, just as others rely on their wings, or venom, or thick fur.

Whoever first painted animal shapes on a cave wall set us inexorably on the path to writing, printing, and now digital telecommunication. That first flint spear head was destined to lead eventually to nuclear armaments, just as Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony would not have been possible had someone not thought to hollow out a small animal bone to make a simple flute.

There has never once been a time when human technological evolution ceased in its quest to adapt and improve. Ironically this is often because the failings of an earlier technology become all too apparent. Our modern sewage systems and clean flushing toilets owe their origins to the success of the steam technology that drove the Industrial Revolution, thereby creating urban crowding and rampant disease from contaminated water supplies.

So if there is one thing we can be sure of it is this: technology almost certainly helped bring us to our present impasse, but it also once again represents our best hope of averting disaster. Salvation lies, not in reverting to some previous pre-tech era, but in moving forward to develop better “eco-technologies” - LED’s to replace incandescent lighting, solar energy in place of fossil fuel, and extend the opportunities offered by the internet.

These new eco-technologies are far less resource hungry and polluting and can help reduce the huge amount of travelling that goes on these days, while simultaneously actually improving the quality of life and offering increased choice. Doubtless we will some day discover that they too are flawed in some as yet unimagined way, but that’s alright, we know what to do about that.

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