Losing Our Humanity

I am becoming more and more convinced that technology is sucking the humanity out of us. Specifically, I've been thinking about how communication technology is causing us to communicate less and less in real, human ways, as we opt for cold, technological communication methods that fit our increasingly short attention spans and the overload of information that we face.

Now, don’t get me wrong, I am not a technological isolationist advocating that  we stomp on our smart phones and tablets, and run off to live free of technology in some remote mountain valley, although that doesn't sound half bad. And the irony does not escape me that I am writing this on a computer and will post it on a blog on the Internet where it will be read by many people on their smart phones and tablets.

Probably I should be writing it on lambskin parchment with a quill pen. But then, no one would ever read it. Besides, I might spill the ink and make a really yucky mess on my carpet. So please excuse my seeming hypocrisy here and humor me a bit.

Today’s communication technology IS a wonderful thing. The ability to communicate instantly with someone in almost any part of the world is fantastic. I’m sure my parents would have loved to have had the Internet and smart-phone technology when I was a young lad away from home for the first time, serving in the navy thousands of miles away on a remote little island called Guam.

I, however, am glad that they were not able to know too much about what I was doing over there. There are some things a mother should never know about what her son is up to (and in my case there were a LOT of things).

And VoIP communication technology like Skype and Vonage make it possible for me to keep in touch with my daughters, who live in different countries, as well as with friends back in the USSA. When you have such a physical distance, this ability to actually talk to someone lessens the effect of that distance and helps maintain the relationship.  It's a good, and human, thing.

But like most wonderful things, our advanced communication technology has its dark side. The technology, especially our handheld devices, is addictive, and too many of us spend too much time with our fascinating toys to the exclusion of too much of real life. In this addiction, we fail to see how our face-to-face, human communications suffer. And many of us become alarmingly rude in our personal and public interactions, and either don’t realize it or just don’t care. Like all addictions, we live in denial of the fact that we just can’t put the damn things down. And also like all addictions, it starts to rob us of our humanity.

I got to thinking about this recently after a strange incident last week. After a long time of waiting for an appropriate opportunity, I had a chance to talk with a woman who I like and have wanted to get together with to talk and catch up, perhaps over dinner or something. We hadn't done that since before New Year. But when I asked when she might have time to get together, she suggested chatting on Skype. 

Skype?

I was a bit stunned by that. I mean, there we were, standing face-to-face, and she suggested communicating online! I had intentionally avoided using an electronic medium to initiate anything, because I still believe that between two people there is no substitute for real, personal communication that employs nothing more than mouths and ears.

Either it was a techno-age brush-off (which is certainly possible), or she is too wrapped up in virtual communication for my taste. Either way, it was disappointing.

Where is the humanity?

Another incident that points out how self-centered and rude people can be with their personal electronic devices happened about two weeks ago. I went to a concert by a fantastic pianist, Keiko Matsui. People were asked to turn off their mobile phones, which I had done before the announcement. But most people just turned their ringers to mute, and an amazing number of them continued to use these devices during the concert.

There was a constant distraction of bright little screens in front of me during the show as people were sending and receiving SMS messages, surfing the Internet, and otherwise playing with their precious little toys.  And a couple of times, I heard ringers going off on phones that hadn't even been switched to mute. It was an unwelcome and, in my view, rude lack of respect for the performer and for those who were there to enjoy the performance. 

And, really, it doesn't even make sense. Why would anyone pay good money for a fine musical performance and then waste that money by paying more attention to their mobile phones? Musical concerts, theatrical performances and the like should be respites from all the busy stuff that intrudes into our lives.  We should be able to relax, let the music carry us away, and not think about the rest of the world for a couple of hours.

To be constantly fixed to a mobile device during such a performance is something I just can’t understand. And to distract others and lessen their enjoyment of the performance is something I can’t easily tolerate.

Where is the humanity?

But, we see this kind of addictive rudeness all the time. The problem of overly loud phone talkers in public has been going on for so long that complaining about it has become passé… and fruitless.  We all complain about the ignorant lout who has to raise his speaking level a few hundred decibels on the bus or in a restaurant, or the mindless bimbo who apparently thinks that everyone in the café should hear about her private affairs. But we don’t seem to have the same level of concern when we are the ones doing it.  Where is the humanity?

Also passé these days is the argument against using mobile phones while driving. Sure, many jurisdictions have enacted laws against it, but these are only softly enforced, if at all. The worst are the people who send SMS messages while driving. I cringe when I get in a taxi here and see the driver trying to send an SMS while navigating the crazy Kharkiv traffic.

I saw a news report recently where they asked adults in New York if they text while driving, and an unsettling number of them said that they did. “It just takes me a moment,” one woman said. “I figure that when I stop at a red light, I have time to tap out a message,” said a man, “but sometimes I have to start moving before I can finish it.”  Morons all – lacking basic humanity.

It seems cliché, but it’s really true that you can see people meet in cafes and such to “get together,” and while they’re there, they spend more of their time on their tablets or phones than actually talking with each other. Probably they are texting each other from across the table. Hey, it beats actually talking.

And how many dates have gone sour because one – or both – of the people spent too much time with his or her mobile device.  Why would you want to stare at a stupid little screen when you could be getting lost in someone’s beautiful eyes?

I've noticed too that young guys on local buses and metro trains use their devices as a way to avoid eye contact with people to whom they should offer their seats, like old people or women with children. They sit transfixed on whatever stupid video game has their fancy or pounding out SMS messages, while ignoring everyone else around them.

Where is the humanity in any of this?

Isaac Asimov once said, “The saddest aspect of life right now is that science gathers knowledge faster than society gathers wisdom.”  As a corollary, one might say that the saddest aspect of life now is that our communication technology has advanced faster than our ability to use it wisely. Through our lack of wisdom, we seem to be allowing this technology to break down, rather than enhance, our socialization.

Humans are supposed to be social creatures. But real socializing is a personal thing. It includes hearing the unfiltered sound of another voice, the look in another’s eyes, the subtle signals of body language, the touch of a hand or of lips, or even the light smell of a nice fragrance.

Technology seems to be changing us in ways that are not really social. Why do so many of us today seem to prefer the cold text or lame “emoticons” of Skype or a text message?  Why do we use technology to avoid interacting with others in real ways?

Where is the humanity in that?