Technological Determinism

After reading through chapter two of Nancy Baym's Personal Connections in the Digital Age, there are two things she discusses. One is the technological deterministic view of the internet, and the social construction of technology theory. The deterministic view is decribed as "...especially when technologies are new, to view them as casual agents, enetering societies as active forces of change that humans have little power to resists." (Baym 24). The social construction theory is described as " people are the primary source of change in both thechnology and society" (Baym 24). I don't know if I agree so much with the deterministic view, because going back to the theory that we are the machine, and the machine is us, we obviously have the power to change both us and our technology.


I came across a very interesting quote, "Sodoku also stretched the working memory, as did keeping up with friends on Facebook, but the "instant" nature of texting, Twitter, and Youtube, was not healthy for the working memory."(Tracy Alloway). I found this interesting because I view Twitter and Facebook as basically doing the same thing, and providing the same service for us. It's a way to connect to friends and family, so I'm not really sure how Facebook can be good for your mind, and Twitter can't. They are both very instant, so this raises a question in my mind. Something that struck me was that Socrates "decried that the invention of the alphabet and writing was a threat to the oral tradition of Greece"(Baym 25) He made the point that no one will really be using their minds. They will just be reading and not having to remeber what they need to remeber. I think the same thing may be happening to us. We have become so dependant on learning things and looking at things on the internet that maybe we have forgotten how to learn and read, and have to work through some things before we get that instant gratification.


If technology really is so powerful that we have very little control over what it does to us, is there any way to stop that? There is a quote in the Baym reading, "If negative outcomes can be traced to technological causes, then they can be eliminated with better technology." (Baym 27). I think what this quote means is that if the theory of social determinism is true, we have to change our technology with more technology. Right now the only way to avoid the influence of technology is to avoid technoogy all together. How is that possible in such a technology heavy, and dependant world? It isn't. What we have to do is come up with technology that helps yes, yet doesn't hurt us.