The "You can't stop technology" mantra, and one issue we never seem to address. [View all]

[Zalatix]

"Your scientists were so preoccupied with whether or not they could, they didn't stop to think if they should." - Jeff Goldblum, Jurassic Park

I think we can come up with some valid examples of where this lesson has been poorly learned. Monsato is a good one. Automated vote counting machines is another.

We let the mantra of "you can't stop technology" so completely take over our society that we never even question the DIRECTION of said progress. Progress must go on, no matter what path it takes, no matter what it steps on in the process. It's progress, thus it must be good.

It doesn't matter if it intrudes on your privacy without your consent, we make excuses for it. "If you've got nothing to hide" or "they're not interested in you" or all the other infamous delusions or even outright canards.

Technology is like a car, you drive it recklessly and there will be accidents and lives lost. Just ask Union Carbide about that, or better yet their surviving victims in Bhopal, India. There have to be controls, and yes, also restrictions.

If we don't put the brakes on technology in some areas, we eventually come to this.