Tecnology in the eyes of the beholderBy Jesús Eduardo Cabrera

It’s amazing how much our world has changed since the creation of the WWW in 1992... Really, think about it.

Always more and more…

We complain every single day about how our phones don’t have enough strength, or curse when our WiFi laptop has an incredibly slow internet at home! The amount of pressure we put on technology is unbelievable! We have absolutely EVERYTHING we could possibly want, yet here we are, always wanting more. Tell me, wasn’t it hard to have to go to labraries and read encyclopedias for informations we didn’t quite understand?

Is technology the most significant in our life?Oh Technology… It’s fair to spell it with a capital letter. Why? Because it’s a noun. And it’s not just any noun, it’s the most important noun of our whole life. We are surrounded, daily, by the unlimited creations that revolve around us, regarding the inmense infinity of the internet and technology. Where would we be now without those aspects?

At its finest, technology has definitely helped contribute to the progress of all nations throughout the world, all in a very short amount of time. It has… evolved countries, cities, countless nations, states, achieving a greater progress throughout the years, because technology always moves on forwards. It’s the work of innovations that we are able to solve many problem areas of mankind, such as transportation, gathering food, shelter from a rough climate, creating factories that makes labors easier for people.

Aside the fact that technology is widely used in the forms of cellphones, iPads, laptops, and other mass-communication devices, it is also used in E-learning and in classrooms.

• It is no surprise that the benefits of technology in the classrooms, and schools in general, have opened up a whole new learning environment. Knowledge can be easily procured with the help of Internet technology now, and it is easier to help

children with special needs as well. Here are some more benefits of assistive technology that the educational sector has witnessed.

Personalized learning has come to the fore. Students can pick their own curriculum with ease, and set their own personal targets.

Distance learning has become much easier, and this has led to a rise in the number of people who receive education.

E-learning and online education has made it very simple and systematic for an individual to receive personal attention, so that all his specific needs are

fulfilled.Immediate response to queries and tests have made the whole education

process a lot faster.The use of computers and technology in classrooms has opened up a whole new

method of teaching and effective learning.

And how beautiful is it to be able to speak to a loved one that lives far away??The speed of talking to one another is instantaneous and the mode of talking has become more personalized and can be done from just about anywhere. Thus, this creates a smaller world, because now NOBODY is far to reach!

The clarity of communication has also improved with improvements in audio quality and video quality, making video-calls much more realistic.

A big BUT… It’s fair to say technology is lovely and very welcome. However, in certain aspects, it has become a big problem in society. “The most important and urgent problems of the technology of today are no longer the satisfactions of the primary needs or of archetypal wishes, but the reparation of the evils and damages by the technology of yesterday.” ~Dennis Gabor,

“This is perhaps the most beautiful time in human history; it is really pregnant with all kinds of creative possibilities made possible by science and technology which now constitute the slave of man - if man is not enslaved by it.” ~Jonas Salk

We’ve reached a time in which technology has become so important, that we forget about our essential needs as human beings: being able to interact with one another personally, showing emotions through actions, expressions, rather than with emoticons typed on SMS and text messages.

Isn’t it frequent how many people in a dinner table, for example, are enjoying a fine conversation through their cellphones, rather than pay attention to their real life surroundings? One is easily distracted from the world around them…

May I say that, in all due respect, people have become less wiser and skillfulled using technology, because now we don’t need to THINK as much!

It’s become a mean cycle, a vice; an atrocious addiction that unfocuses humans from the mere simplicity of Life itself… The existance of SO many complicated things, regarding the amount of informations and accesability that these new devices have to offer.

• Ever wonder how so many great scientists existed hundreds of years ago? Of course, they were all smart, intelligent, brilliant… Why? Simple. It’s because they had no machines that would do the work for them. Their only machine consisted of a mind, a brain, something some people of this century are definitely lacking.

• The primary problem of technology is that we are NEVER satisfied. We always want more, even more than we can actually handle. There’s a beautiful iPhone 5 that recently came out, but it still lacks certain “needs” (if that’s the proper word) to make it downright perfect. Truth is, folks, for us, nothing is ever going to be perfect…

< < < < must we alwayshave the fastest internet connection on our latest smartphone devices?

• We must stop the avaricious behaviour that haunts us all with the means of technology. We musn’t let it become the center of our attention, of our life. Do not let it get you away from your family members, friends, loved ones. PREVENT it from taking you out of nature, birds, trees, the beautiful rivers and lakes, the green high hills, outdoor activities planned by you and not by some GPS device that guides you.

Control the technology, before you ultimately let it control you. You’re the

pilot of your own life, therefore you must make a rational use of all the technology that’s at our

feet. Learn to use it wisely…