-- As people rely more and more on technology to solve problems, the ability of humans to think for themselves will surely deteriorate. Discuss the extent to which you agree or disagree with the statement and explain your reasoning for the position you take. In developing and supporting your position, you should consider ways in which the statement might or might not hold true and explain how these considerations shape your position.
Response:
It is clear that technology today is absolutely essential in everyone's life. In fact, people do rely more and more on technology in order to solve personal problems, research for academic matters, and they also rely on the fact that technology makes life more practical. In other words, the world became dependent of technology and its new trends and, today, many are absolutely incapable of living without their Smartphones, tablets, IPods in public transportation because they do not want to listen to anybody else who must be having a conversation nearby, and so on. The list of reasons why people rely more and more on technology today is extremely long, but the matter is: does technology really make the ability of humans to think for themselves deteriorate?
A few examples can support the thesis that technology is harmful for human critical thinking and I can highlight some of the ones that intrigue me the most. First, people today do not necessarily have to know how to spell words because their Smartphones and laptops have a tool that, when set up, automatically corrects any misspelled word and sometimes it also corrects most of grammar and syntax of a sentence. Why is that critical? Because it makes people's life much more practical since they will not have to waste time trying to proofread their writing for so long, but eventually those people will become dependent of such tool and unable to develop their writing for themselves. Another example is that internet instantaneously stimulates reading. However, the problem is usually the content of the reading. Teenagers and young adults mostly use internet for social network and the content almost does not provide the users with insightful readings. Finally, why is it important to discuss all of that? Because the matter is not that technology will surely deteriorate human thinking; in fact, technology amplifies human thinking for one simple reason: the more complex technology becomes, the more critical thinking and knowledge it demands from people to solve certain problem and continue improving what exists today.
Thus, I do not agree with the statement. I believe that humans are still very far from reaching their full intellectual capacity, but they are certainly on the path to achieving the goal. The quality of their critical thinking, the ability to think for themselves, and how intellectual they want to be only depends on their choice of living. In other words, they are the ones who will decide if they will spend 12 hours a day check Facebook friends' updates or researching insightful texts that explain why we are here, what is the main human purpose, what life really is, if there life after death, and so on. The distance between being a human being whom is not able to think for himself or being the new Einstein of the 21st century is only at a click away.
