Technology in Today's Society Research Paper Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1750 words

Technology in Today's Society - Research Paper Example Moreover, the potential of technology to promote social changes is examined. The various effects of technology on society are also evaluated. It is concluded that the relationship between technology and society is quite close leading to their mutual dependency. As for the drawbacks of the above relationship, these seem to be limited – at the level that they cannot lead to irreversible damages on either the society or the technology. In order to identify and evaluate the effects of technology on society, it would be necessary to refer primarily to the features of technology, as identified through observing the use of technology in various human activities. Through these features the context of technology – priorities, rules and benefits – is made clear; in this way, the potentials of technology to intervene in society influencing its ethics and ideas, can be understood. One of the key characteristics of technology seems to be its trend to change; in fact, it could be noted that change is the primary feature of technology (Aswathappa 256). The term ‘change’ as used for describing technology has two different aspects: it refers to the continuous update of technology – in order to meet the increasing human needs; moreover, the above term is used to reflect the alteration of human relations, as members of society. At this point, in order to evaluate the effectiveness of technology it would be necessary to check the level at which ‘people are prepared for it’ (Aswathappa 256). In other words, technology can be related to the society influencing the behavior of humans within a particular social group. Its ability to be expanded rapidly is another feature of technology. Indeed, when entering a particular society, technology is likely to widespread ensuring that all people within the specific social group are reached – meaning that those people become aware of the above technology and its benefits/ characteris tics (Aswathappa 256). Furthermore, technology can expand across the society with no support from the members of the society; this phenomenon can be characterized as a ‘self-reinforcing ability’ (Aswathappa 256). It is because of the above characteristics that the effects of technology on the society can be significant. Having the potentials to expand rapidly – with no external support – across the society, technology can influence the behavior of the members of the society; however, the level of its power within each society cannot be precisely estimated in advance being depended on the local culture and traditions but also the buying power of consumers – which will define their ability to access the particular technology. The potentials of technology to intervene in society seem to be primarily related to the following characteristic of technology: its content; in accordance with Aswathappa (256) the technology can be described as ‘a complet e set of knowledge, ideas and methods’ (Aswathappa 256). It is at this point that technology can highly influence society – which is based on specific ethics, ideas and traditions. It is assumed that the ability of technology to i