Blog Entry Two

Blog Two

Machine Stops Claim

In Bob Montello’s article he says “these days, we think technology is the culprit, but Forster was writing decades before TV started creating couch potatoes, almost a century before parents could complain about computer games turning kids into zombies.” This shows how the society blames everything on the new inventions and technology, without really knowing what is good or bad. Technology is a huge part of today’s society and we are so fast to judge or put the guilt on what has changed the society lately.

Mondello is saying how our society is almost to the point where we will not go out anymore and will not participate in public gatherings anymore because we will be able to do everything from our living room at home with our TVs, computers, webcam etc. His claim at the end goes “So to remind yourself of how you’re connected, you gather things around. And you cling to them, not so you wont lose them, or lose what makes you you, but so you wont lose the connections they represent. The fear is of emptiness – but of emptiness inside us, not of empty rooms.” In other words, you can’t blame your and societies problems on technology basically the only reason for your problem is yourself and your mistakes. If you choose to isolate yourself from the society and people, because you think you have it all in your living room, you are wrong. We are and will always be scared of losing what we love and what we care about. It is about finding a way using all this new communication to make things easier, not so you don’t have to be around people anymore. It is supposed to help you in daily life.

However the “The Machine Stops” was written in 1909 so people have been concerned with this idea for at least 100 years now.  At the end of “The Machine Stops,” says, “Oh, tomorrow - some fool will start the Machine again, tomorrow.  Never, said Kuno, never. Humanity has learnt its lesson.” This shows how people know when to stop. Even though we have everything we need to communicate with people with no face to face contact, we will still continue to go to social and public gatherings because we are naturally social creatures and need other human beings to comfort us as well. Mondello’s counter claim is “if it hasn’t already happened then it won’t happen,” As mentioned earlier we and our society will know when to stop and when things are going too far. Nowadays we are forced to going to social gatherings in some way. It would not be possible to live in complete isolation, today our society is all the time developing, maybe for the worse or maybe for the best. Somehow you need to meet face to face with people, if this is how it is always going to be we can’t know. The only thing we can do its just wait and see in what direction our society is developing.