SEPTEMBER 9, TUESDAY

IN PRAISE OF TECHNOLOGY

Today was Apple’s yearly announcement of the new electronic devices in what was a slickly produced show filled with hype. And I was ready at 11 for the for the show that began at 1, waiting with great anticipation. When the moment finally came I watched in on my Vision Pro Goggles on a large screen suspended in the air that covered one wall of the room I was in. I listened carefully all the way through for over an hour. And I wasn’t disappointed. The new Air Pods are improved in every way but the feature I most want to try is instant translation. When I am in Italy in a month ever sentence spoken to me in Italian will be translated through my AirPods instantly into English. It should make my experience richer because I will know what is being said around me. The new Apple Watch will be able to communicate by FaceTime and inform me if I have hypertension.

But what I most look forward to is the new iPhone 17 Pro Max which will have a camera with 48 MP in every lens, an increased 8x zoom, improved computational processing and a new system for dispersing heat.

I know, none of this impresses most everyone who reads this and when you unimpressed people hear the cost you will tune out immediately.

So why am I so excited about these advances in technology and why is it that so many other people are not only not excited but are moving into resistance mode?

A week ago I responded to an article on different ways that people find satisfaction in life: happiness, meaning and psychological richness. And in an odd way these three different perspectives help me, at least, to understand my response to rapidly changing technology.

What I have often wondered is why in a world in which technology opens up so many forms of experience do so many people both resist new technology and feel that the rapid changes brought about by technology are a threat? Can’t they see that we are entering a new marvelous world in which our experiences will be much richer?

For me the answer to my disagreement with others is the different ways we find satisfaction in life, with some forms of satisfaction being threatened by technological change and other people’s, mine, being enhanced by technological change.

If your significance comes through being happy then happiness likely comes through security and not being dislocated in any way. These days rapid technological change dislocates everything. It dislocates ways of making a living, it dislocates the values which give people identity, it dislocates politics. People who want happiness above all have nostalgia for the way things were in the past, for traditional American values. This is particularly true for rural people whose small town values and ways of being connected with each other and working are being threatened by the computer and the internet and the forms of technology this technology supports.

People who who find their significance in making a better world through institutions such as schools or health care or politics measure new technology by the way it improves the lives of people and helps them to get along with each other. Rapid change both accelerates the good and accelerates the threats to people. People who find meaning in making the world better are often suspicious of the possible effects of technology such as the Internet or artificial intelligence and how then can polarize people.

So, of course, people motivated in either of these ways are not enthusiastic about rapidly changing technology and weren’t sitting there transfixed by Tim Cook’s hyperbole, as I was.

The third way of finding significance is through psychological richness. And here changes in technology open up for me all kinds of rich experiences. These posts are a search for stimulating experience and a response to stimulating experience. One example is how technology in my lifetime has made travel easier and easier and cheaper and cheaper through cheap airfare and airbnbs and Google maps. Even at the age of 88 travel is easy and safe and cheap.

But what I have learned while traveling with only a carry on bag and a knapsack for a month or two is that I can take with me everything I need to live a psychologically rich life. Thanks to Bookbnb I have maybe 1000 inexpensive ebooks, some not so great but many that I really want to read and am stimulated by. I can take them with me. Digital cameras have gotten smaller and smaller and better and better and cheaper and cheaper. Photography is one way that I open up and respond to the world around me. It is one way for me of feeling very alive. All through the history of photography the equipment for taking photographs and processing them was cumbersome. Now all I need is an iPhone and and iPad for processing. The iPad also allows me to write anywhere, to listen to streaming concerts anywhere in the world, to watch streaming movies anywhere, to look at collections of paintings anywhere. At 88 I prefer to look at the Louvre on line on my iPad than to spend hours walking through the Louvre. And now with my Apple Vision Pro I can experience virtually all kinds of experiences taking place in distant places.

Instead of feeling threatened by being dislocated by technology I am stimulated because I can see the world in new ways and the world is always fresh and different. The world may not be a more comfortable place or a better place but it is a more stimulating and interesting place full of more rich experiences.