Luddite and anti-progressive positions that oppose scientific and technological progress, while quite unpopular, still exist, creating a myth about the enslavement of people by technology. These positions blame technology specifically for the fact that people are rapidly losing their freedom and happy lives. For example, with its help, governments gain more power and the ability to manipulate people, meaning that scientific and technological progress, starting from the moment of the industrialization of society, is an evil that must be eradicated. Of course, many would consider such argumentation extremely absurd without further explanation, but let us nevertheless look at what is wrong with it.
The point is that technologies themselves do not lead to any enslavement of humans. This is primarily caused by violence as a method of solving problems and achieving certain goals, including when used by those same governments. All of them rely on the threat of applying certain “legitimate” and “legal” force measures against any ordinary person if they do not follow a specific order. Technologies in this case only make such a threat more effective in its execution and help strengthen the power of already existing governments.
But think about it—even with the simplest tool, such as a hammer, it is much easier to intimidate, subdue, or even maim a person than with bare fists. However, a hammer is created to drive nails, and the problem lies within the person who is capable of committing violence using any available tools, not in the hammer itself. The exact same situation applies to weapons—the problem is not with the weapon, but with the tiny percentage of people willing to use it to commit violent attacks.
It is the problem of violence and the fact that some people strive for the forceful subjugation of others that needs a solution. As soon as this problem is solved and violent hierarchies of dominance disappear from society, technologies will cease to contribute to the enslavement of people in any way. It is necessary to fight violence and the tiny percentage of violent offenders in society, not technologies, which, by the way, are the only thing that could save people from endless hunger, disease, child mortality, and other terrible phenomena of the past, and will also allow humanity to survive and continue its existence in the long term.
