This is the fifth post from The Nooner, a (very short) daily newsletter slash podcast that has its very own section within Dispatches from Inner Space.
To see the first post, which doubles as an explainer, click here.
New technology is always dangerous…
…to people who can’t or won’t learn how to use it.
Study history. There are no exceptions.
What can we do?
Do we have to learn how to use every technology? If so, too bad, because it’s impossible. There are too many. More every day.
I resist pure techno-optimism because, inevitably, people get hurt by new technologies. This is just how it works.
Still, a lot of people worship technology on principle, but this sort of sucks, because it’s a bad god that indiscriminately hurts people.
Technology doesn’t deserve to be worshiped, but it also doesn’t deserve to be feared as a bad one.
Because a tool is just a tool. There is nothing intrinsically “good” or “bad” about a tool. We know this. You can use a hammer to build a house, or you can use it to murder your neighbor and take his house instead.
Even bad tools (like thumbscrews) are just neutral technologies engineered specifically for bad things (like torturing people).
Sure, if you’re an artist who’s afraid of AI, or a banker who’s afraid of crypto, it probably behooves you to learn more about the technology that’s directly threatening your livelihood.
But it might be more useful to think about technology sort of like the weather. Work with it when you can, do your best to survive it when you can’t.
