Fear of old tech and embracing new tech.
My incredible great-grandmother Gertrude lived a colorful life, growing to the age of 105.
I love thinking back to her story. She migrated to New Zealand from Ireland in the early 1900s on a steamboat, and rode in a carriage. Her family churned their own butter and grew their own crops. In her lifetime, she saw plenty of new inventions, from planes and cars to televisions and phones.
Today, we have driverless cars. Can you imagine telling a young Gertrude who rode in a horse-drawn carriage that cars will drive themselves in the future?
The point here is that people have always been dismissive of future technology, saying things like “the metaverse is dead” or that prolonging life expectancy is flat-out impossible.
The truth is that the only constant in life is change, and with change comes opportunity. We are looking to colonize Mars, AI will soon be as smart as human beings, and we are growing organs in labs. We would be delusional to think that the future of society won’t look vastly different than what it does now.
The way I see it, we either embrace new technology, or get left behind.
Fear of change should not prevent us from being involved in shaping future technology. By actively getting involved, we can advocate for fairness, transparency, and ethical considerations to mitigate biases and promote technologies that are built with us in mind.
