Notion of Gap Year.

Every 2 Days We Create As Much Information As We Did Up To 2003. We are in a time where technology is growing faster than ever and we seem to become more and more dependent on these technological advancements. For some, these technological advancements may be a threat to our humanity. Their argument is that some discoveries or technological breakthroughs might change us, they might dehumanize us. Nowadays, we are able to modify embryos to avoid any kind of disease or even for cosmetic reasons but for some this is a horrible thing to do because it is not natural. Sure, it is not natural but that does not mean it is a bad thing. Humans have played and bended nature to our will since the beginnings of society. We may think that we should ban the genetically modification of our crops or animals but we have been doing it for centuries but that has already been done for thousands of years. For example, there are no wild counterpart for most of the fruits or vegetables we eat. Wild apples look nor taste like human grown apples and there are certainly no wild seedless watermelons. As Neil deGrasse Tyson says: “You can make a list of all the fruits and vegetables we eat and ask yourself if there is a wild counterpart: If there is, it will not be as big, as sweet or will not look even similar”. Progress has been present in human history as not only we adapt ourselves to the world but we also adapt it to fulfill our needs.

 Sure, there is a desensitization of society that could be linked to technological progress. However that does not mean we become less human. Then we have to ask ourselves what is humanity.  The definition of humanity is vague because it evolves through time.  Maybe we can think that this light desensitization can be just another step on the history of humanity.

Progress is not dehumanizing because humanity rely so heavily on progress, humans are in a constant search to improve their quality of life. Trans humanists, for example, believe that technology will let man escape any physical limitation to reach a constant state of happiness. This may be an overstatement because even if we have progressed so much since the cavemen we are definitely not in a constant state of euphoria. That is because of what is known as the hedonic treadmill, in which humans return to a relatively stable level of happiness despite major positive or negative events or life changes. So even if we progress and we are able to cure all diseases and world hunger or become immortal head in jars we will always not be emotionally affected by it on the long term.

It is ridiculous to think that progress could make us lose our humanity because progress is in fact a key element of humanity. Curiosity, the search of knowledge and the initiative to build a better future are some of the qualities that led humans to be the dominant species. As long as we control technology and it doesn’t control us we should be fine.

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