The High Cost of Technology

Talk about climate change.  The planet is paying a price for our growing dependence on oil, as more and more people are acknowledging.  It doesn't require a lot of imagination to see how this dependence has insinuated itself into all of our lives.  It isn't like buying a car.

I live in a city in which owning a car is more of a nuisance than a necessity.  I did it for a while, then decided I wouldn't do it any more, not the least of my reasons being that I disapprove of America's dependence on the automobile. When my kids were young our weekend outings consisted of a subway ride to Grand Central then hopping on whatever train departed next to a destination less than 2 hours away in any direction.  We had some unforgettable adventures and became quite attached to some of those places.

But everything oil-generated and now everything tech is good for the economy and what is good for the economy, as we all know, is good for all of us.

But hang on a sec.  This technology works only if we allow its limitations to define our sensory experience.  (This is where I start to sound like Socrates, who feared that the printed word would take the place of thought.)

In fact technology relies on vision.  Vision is slower than hearing, by 200 times - it has been measured by James Hudspeth, you could look it up.  That means that relying on technology to train hearing is actually an oxymoron.  Nothing can train hearing except attentiveness to sound.