Having a utopia is impossible hard, and those issues you want to solve are literally the same fundamental problems that have existed since the dawn of civilisation, they are not caused by technology, and destroying computers in the office and insisting on only using rubber stamps and fax machines is not going to help in any way.
It's not possible to truly know the counterfactual. However it is clear that technological progress could have been directed toward the utopia. Instead, social inequality in big parts of the Western world is on the rise, with many people getting poorer.
Technology holds the promise of solving fundamental problems, right? And I think it's good to have high expectations for technological progress.
And yes there is at least a hint of technological solutions exacerbating the fundamental problem arising from the human condition. Social media for one seems to be a radically different form or quantity of communication. I find it easy to see that things have gone a little haywire.
> Technology holds the promise of solving fundamental problems, right?
I don't think so, I think it only amplifies the human condition, in a neutral way.
Non-profit organisations are benefitting from technology just the same as profit driven ones.
The free software movement has quite literally put the means of production in the hands of the workers, and it didn't lead to a communist utopia this time either.
The internet can be seen as evil in china because it's used for censorship and propaganda, and good in the west because it's used for freedom and democracy.
Sure, moving to Europe sounds like a pretty reasonable approach if you want to have more socialism, as opposed to revolting against computers.
Europe is not less efficient and they are not against computers, it's just a different type of redistribution politics, technology is entirely neutral in these matters.
The problem is that the size of both your home and your paycheck will be cut in half, it's always a tradeoff.
Americans like to believe that social democratic countries just conjure up more stuff for everyone by means of politics, so they can have more benefits, or that they actually take it from the rich.
In reality it's a really tough compromise where it's the working middle class that pays the price for the equality, and then people are not so interested anymore for some reason..
