Impact Of Technology On Society – Technology And Society

In the past when technology wasn’t in existence, human life was a bit restricted and this meant that there was a lot of manpower involved and at the same time the people of that time didn’t enjoy enough luxury as the ones of today do through technology. Today, technology and society go hand in hand in a way that one cannot be separated from the other. You will find that the society has a recurring co-dependence on technology. Most of the things we do in our daily lives surrounds on technology including our needs and demands for technology that is constantly rising up. You will find that the society uses technology in a number of ways like from travelling like air transport and so on, to learning like learning tools, online studies and so on, to communication like instant messaging, email, social media and so forth, to business like E-Commerce, E-Banking and so forth, to live comfortably and so much more. With all that said, you should also be aware that every good thing has a negative impact and so does technology. While using it, you will face some challenges caused by its poor application that has led to environmental pollution that has caused a grave threat to our lives and society. That is why we need to use technology very well so as to have it impact positively in our lives than negatively. Let’s look at some of the impacts of technology on the society below in two forms and that is positive and negative!

Positive impact of technology on society

1. Mechanized agriculture: in the world we live in today, we have greatly used technology to mechanize agriculture in a number of ways and this way we don’t require a lot of man power in the agricultural farm. This way a small number of people will be able to grow a large amount of food crops within a very short period of time while utilizing a lot less input. This will therefore lead to high yields and Return On Investments as well. The government is also able to provide financial support to some of their people especially the ones dealing in both small and medium sized farming allowing these farmers be able to acquire some of these machines like the ones used for sowing, harvesting, plough and even watering. In these modern times, through technology farmers are also able to manufacture genetic crops that do grow much quicker and are resistant to many diseases and pests and this helps minimize on food shortage especially with the world growing population. Through technology, farmers also now have easy availability to artificial fertilizers that is used to add value to the soil and then also boost the growth of crops which in the end will enable the production of high quality yields. Through the utilization of advanced watering pumps and sprinkles that are used to obtain water from the rivers to the farm, the farmers in dry areas are now able to also grow healthy crops and this procedure can be automated to save time. For instance, a desert country like Egypt that receives very little rain now makes use of the automated sprinklers so as to irrigate their farms. This water is obtained from the River Nile and waters the rice farms on a daily routine.
2. Improved the education and learning system: now it’s no news that education is the backbone of every economy and that is why technology has been used to fill in this gap through bettering the education and learning system. Through technology, most of the schools have begun integrating educational technologies in their schools with the main aim of improving the way their students learn. Some of these technologies include the smart whiteboards, iPads, internet, mobile phones, projectors and computers that are being utilized in the classrooms so as to enhance the moral of the students to learn. Today the best method of learning is through the visual education especially in subjects like physics, economics, mathematic, biology and so much more that is why it has become very popular. There are very many educational technologies invested in by the business community that can be used by tutors and students like iTunes that lets the students and tutors easily exchange academic information at any time allowing learning to be mobile.
3. Improved on transportation: transportation is another area in which technology has really greatly been impacted on the society today and it has highly benefited not only the society but the businesses as well through the improved transportation methods. Now we can easily move goods, services and even people from one part of the globe to the next easily. Some of the forms of transportation include the vehicles, roads, airplanes, information materials, trains, finance, people, time, energy, motorbikes and water transport. Now, all of these forms I have mentioned are interrelated to one another as they work hand in hand to move as well as relocate the people and the goods from location to location. The types of transportation are categorized under 4 types;

• Road transport: this is used by automobile that includes vehicles, trains and even people.
• Water transport: this is used by boats and ships
• Air transport: is used by the airplanes
• Space transport: this is used to go to the moon.

However, without any doubt, the most popularly used of all these four types of transportation is the road transportation that will easily make possible the movement of people and goods. It is for that reason why most of the already developed countries are providing funds to the developing countries so as to improve on their road transportation system especially in the rural areas.

4. Improved on communication: it is very true that technology has greatly impacted positively on society through an improved communication system. First of all we should know that communication is of very great importance and it is used for very many different purposes. This communication is used by both the businesses and the society to transfer information easily. We as humans have made a lot of use of technology to communicate with one another especially through the use of electronic Medias such as television, radios, social Medias and the internet. This has greatly improved the way that we can now communicate with one another whether we are in the same country or in different countries. Like for example let’s take an example of social media like Facebook in which we can easily find both new and old friends and then strengthen our relations through constantly keeping in touch. In many societies today, the televisions and radios are used a lot to help voice the concerns in that society and then people are allowed to engaged in those live forums so that they can contribute using communication devices like text service systems like tweeter, whatsapp or calling through mobile phones. Most of the small businesses also now utilize the mobile communication and internet technology to assist them be able to grow and even improve on their customer services.
5. Improved on life: I cannot ignore the fact that technology has greatly impacted on society positively through improving on the ways of living life. For example in the past, if you wanted to have a meal, you would have to either cook it or move out of home to buy already cooked food from a restaurant. But today, you can just sit wherever you are and make online orders or do call and the delivery agents will deliver the food or any other good to wherever you are especially if you are too busy to do the cooking. Another way it has improved life is through reducing on the queues in the banking institution like for example there is now online banking that clients can use to make financial services through using the phones and computers.  Most importantly it has improved on health through the organ transplants, genetic engineering and any other biotechnology leading to an increased fertility of people. There are also now 3-D printing technologies as well as artificial intelligence that have improved on individual self-government.

Negative impact of technology on society

• Increased population: don’t get me wrong, an increased population is not a bad thing but if the resources are not enough to match the population then that is a very big problem and a negative impact of technology on society. Now you must be wondering how technology has increased on population and the answer is through the improved health facilities that lets people you have a longer life span and also assist people have solutions for most of the health problems that are affecting humans today. Fortunately this is great news for developed countries and not for developing countries as they don’t have the access to some of these health care benefits that is introduced through technology. Through technology, there is now an advanced birth control method that is used to help control on the population in the developed countries letting then be able to have a balanced population.  This is how they have managed to balance the natural resources and other opportunities that come with a population that is planned. On the other hand, this is not the case in the developing countries because people are producing at a very high rate and therefore the food is now scarce while the health care service is very poor as in most cases it doesn’t match up to the increased population.
• Resource depletion: what we have failed to realize is that we are placing a lot of pressure on the natural resources of the earth through demanding for newer technologies and progressions of current technologies. As our population keeps growing it means that a lot of demand is also placed on technology as everyone wants to own some of these tools like mobile phones or computers in their offices or homes. Now this is music to the ears of the manufacturers like Samsung or Apple but not the same for the earth’s resources because they are the ones that do get exploited. You know once these resources have been extracted from the plates of the earth like for example aluminum, it is impossible to return them back because they usually mature after a very long period of time like a billion years. This resource depletion is a time bomb, because definitely at some point in life they will no longer be there and the future people will be the ones to pay for the mistakes of the current generation. Another example of resource depletion is through intensive farming leading to soil depletion as they contain chemicals that is very dangerous not only to the soil but human lives as well.
• Increased pollution: the thing about pollution is that it not only affects the land, but even the crops we grow, the air we breathe in and the water we drink as well. Due to the growing population, it means that there will also be an increased demand and therefore the growth of many manufacturing and processing factories to meet these demands. Although these factories might create job opportunities, they have a more dangerous effect of producing and even releasing these harmful chemicals and gasses into the environment. This has not only caused pollution but also lead to a lot of global warming in the form of climate changes. So it’s saddening that as we enjoy these new technologies, we are also harming our environment. In the recent years, many factories have been advised by experts to ‘Go Green’ as a way of minimizing this increased pollution. Nonetheless to a smaller extent, this has been achieved especially through the development of green technologies like the green computers and green cars. However there is still a lot that needs to be done in order to eliminate the pollution of both the air and the land that had accumulated over a very long period of time.

References:

• http://www.buzzle.com/articles/what-is-the-impact-of-technology-on-our-society.html
• http://www.useoftechnology.com/technology-society-impact-technology-society/