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[Itnetlolor]

I wouldn't mind technological progress. Just as long as my life is still private, and there's no chance to mind-control me or a way to end my life remotely if I don't agree with any form of politics. Plus, I am a bit on the religiously scared side of technologoical progress where the book of Revelations is concerned. Until the events of that pass, and I see less potential corrupt use of more advanced tech in those regards (like RFID chips for example), then will I feel a little more comfortable about it.

But I'll still willingly hold myself back tech-wise for nostalgia, and the thrill of manually doing things. Or at least, doing them the classic way. Sure, more difficult, but more satisfying to do.

Spoiler: Lordbucket's questions: (click to show/hide)

 * Will you be comfortable having brain implants to allow you "telepathic" communcation with the devices in your home?
If I can control technology with my head, then what are the chances I could be hacked? What about if Skynet were to happen, or Cybermen come into existence (and potentially convert me into one remotely, against my will)? Fuck that.

 * Will you be comfortable when primitive things like email and cellphones have been replaced with real-time global telepathy?
If there's an emulator, I'll be using it. Like I stated, not wanting forced telepathy, out of fear of potential corrupt uses.

 * Will you be comfortable when your son or daughter wants to marry an alien? Or a robot? Or a non-human genetic construct?
If they're anything like me; especially with the odds of getting a relationship of any sort... Hell, I'd even cave into the pressure of being Xenophilic. Hell, I wouldn't mind hooking up with an alien, compared to the kinds of women I've been around over the course of my life.

 * Will you be comfortable having friends invite you to neighboring solar systems for lunch?
Provided we master space/inter-dimensional travel, and not attract certain *happy campers* in the process, then I'm cool with it. I'd like to add to the experience of hyper-/quasi-/trans-dimensional travel by getting high, and tripping out first.

 * Will you be comfortable having your physical body destroyed and your consciousness uploaded into a machine? Will you be comfortable interacting with others who have done so?
As long as I am properly fire-walled, and I have capabilities similar to Ghost in the Shell (even uploading myself into a tank), then hell yes. Just as long as I can still technically die of "old age". I don't feel like being immortal and somehow turned into someone's cell phone eons later. Especially if sexting still exists, and I don't have a pleasant sight to be stuck seeing for the time. Hopefully, I would be able to soul-jump; kinda why I still want death as an option.

 * Will you be comfortable having sex with people who were the opposite gender of a different species a few hours ago and simply had a new body constructed to wear for the night.
If I interpreted that correctly; being male, they're female, but a different species. Are we talking about Farscape, LEXX, Star trek-level rubber forehead species; or Starcon, Master of Orion, and Farscape full-blown other species? Personally, I would like the process as streamline as possible. Put simply, I'd like to keep it Syreen stays a Syreen or Elerian stays Elerian (they're already humanoid; just blue (and psychic for the latter)), rather than hooking up with an Trilarian, Klackon, Ur-Quan, or Ilwrath turned humanoid. I mean, yikes.

EDIT:
Personally, the future I would like to see is a melting pot of anachronism. Typewriters and record players will never die; even if we're telepathically sharing music over a crystal network in a medieval-style castle on a neo-futuristic floating island which was a decommisioned weapon battery.

Oddly enough, that exactly describes a location I once thought up for a story. A massive floating island, with an infrastructure of a decommisoned ancient megaweapon, on the surface are castles and mosques and such, and such structures even pepper across the underbelly of the island, there are calssic dirigibles (like blimps) and similar with boats hanging underneath, and in aerodromes around the island are also airships as you'd see in Final fantasy, and modified warships from our era to be able to fly docked within them. Technology, by standard norm, is so advanced, it's easily mistaken for magic, but even psychokinetics have been researched to the extent that spiritualism actually can influence elements sans-technology as well (technically, actually being magic; since the soul is in control, not technology). And like also mentioned, there are vinyl records, steam technology, and even today's computers still in use on the island as well. It's like if Land of the Lost was it's own nation, except floating in the sky and FAA certified.

For those uncomfortable with progress, there's always an emulator for that. Especially if something is doomed to obscurity.

[kaijyuu]

Given some of the responses in this thread, I definitely see history repeating itself.


At my job, I upgraded how we keep track of employee commission work to use a spreadsheet on a computer instead of doing it all by hand with pen and paper. What took 4-5 hours now takes 30 minutes. As soon as I leave, I've been explicitly told that the company is going straight back to pen and paper. Why? Because of similar excuses as shown by people here: Pen and paper is "more satisfying," they "like to hold it in their hands." Stuff like that.


We don't know where technology is headed, but I'm pretty confident in saying it's going to be more and more abstract. A computer screen is a wacky concept to someone used to working with 3 dimensional, physical objects. Whatever we upgrade to past that is going to hit a lot of resistance from folk much like the people here, who are used to their computer screens.

[mainiac]

I think that these things come and go.  I think that the current generation of under 30 people in the US will be quite technolophilic when the time comes (that list of stuff just ain't gonna happen though, sorry).  But at some point in the future there's gonna be a generation of technophiles.

You only have the perspective of one lifetime so for you it's natural to think that young people are openminded and old people are phobic.  But that hasn't always been the case.  There have been times in the past where racism or xenopbobia or homophobia or sexism have solidified and times in the past where they have receded.  What that shows is that a generation can be more or less openminded then the one before or after it.

[King DZA]

If there's something I'm interested in doing, and there's a piece of technology that will allow me to do it, then I will use said technology. If there's a piece of technology is developed for something I don't care for, I probably won't bother with it.

[Dutchling]

If there's a piece of technology is developed for something I don't care for, I probably won't bother with it.

for me, facebook and the like.

Ugh. People putting pics of their stillborn children on Facebook was almost enough reason to quit Facebook for me today.
Seriously, what the hell is wrong with some people?

[Guardian G.I.]

I don't think that technophobia will be such a serious problem in the future, because I don't think that there will be any rapid technological progress in the future (outside of entertainment industry and useless expensive gadget industry, etc.).

[Aklyon]

rapid technological progress

entertainment industry

You haven't been paying much attention to the entertainment industry, have you. the major people in that keep trying to choke new techs to death for no apparent reason (piracy is not a valid reason in this case, its going to happen anyway)

useless expensive gadget industry

You're right here, though.

[Urist_McDrowner]

 * Will you be comfortable having brain implants to allow you "telepathic" communcation with the devices in your home?
Sure.
 * Will you be comfortable when primitive things like email and cellphones have been replaced with real-time global telepathy?
As long as there was an absolute lock tight no way to break into the thoughts I don't want broadcast, yeah.
 * Will you be comfortable when your son or daughter wants to marry an alien? Or a robot? Or a non-human genetic construct?
Dunno. I'm sure God will say something. Robot, definitely not.
 * Will you be comfortable having friends invite you to neighboring solar systems for lunch?
Sure.
 * Will you be comfortable having your physical body destroyed and your consciousness uploaded into a machine? Will you be comfortable interacting with others who have done so?
When I'm old, perhaps. Right now I have a a slim shot at making it into the Olympics for shooting sports, so not until I give up on that.
 * Will you be comfortable having sex with people who were the opposite gender of a different species a few hours ago and simply had a new body constructed to wear for the night?
No, because I'm uncomfortable with and detest all intercourse outside of marriage. So I'd have to be married to them first, and that would require God ok, see answer one.

[Guardian G.I.]

rapid technological progress

entertainment industry

You haven't been paying much attention to the entertainment industry, have you. the major people in that keep trying to choke new techs to death for no apparent reason (piracy is not a valid reason in this case, its going to happen anyway)

By technological advancement in the entertainment industry, I mean such things as and more and more powerful graphic cards and gaming consoles, various new film-related gimmicks (such as 3D cinema, for example), etc.

[Aklyon]

That they do have, though i would've just put that with the rest of the gradual upgrading stuff.

[Loud Whispers]

* Will you be comfortable when your son or daughter wants to marry an alien? Or a robot? Or a non-human genetic construct?
Dunno. I'm sure God will say something. Robot, definitely not.

But it clearly says in the New World Order Bible that marriage is between a human and a xenomorph!

[Guardian G.I.]

Spoiler: I've just noticed Lordbucket's questions. (click to show/hide)

* Will you be comfortable having brain implants to allow you "telepathic" communcation with the devices in your home?
No, fingers are better - they can't malfunction.
If such implants become available, many Americans will probably use them, because of severe obesity and laziness! (provided that America will exist by that point in the future)
* Will you be comfortable when primitive things like email and cellphones have been replaced with real-time global telepathy?
Hell no. Such technology provides opportunities for mass surveillance and general spam.
Lots of people will probably use it for the purpose of chatting, because it is more convenient. Meanwhile, advertising companies will collect information from the brains of users and the US government agencies... No, there will not spy on populace with it. How can the government of the most free and democratic country in the world (according to the annual Freedom House report of 2086!) spy on its own people? Only horrible totalitarian countries such as North Korea or China or Russia or the Eurasian Union (consisting of North Korea, Russia and China) would probably do it, that's for sure!
* Will you be comfortable when your son or daughter wants to marry an alien? Or a robot? Or a non-human genetic construct?
No. I'm sure that's probably not going to happen in my country or in my lifetime.
Also I'm sure the Americans will be absolutely positive about it, because the people who say "no" would be fed to the genetically modified three headed fire-breathing sea lions in the SuperColosseum. Along with Christians (just like in the old Roman Empire).
* Will you be comfortable having friends invite you to neighboring solar systems for lunch?
Yep. That's not going to be in my lifetime, though.
Why would anyone in the capitalist West spend astronomical amounts of money on colonizing space? It's not profitable short-term!
Selling Chinese-manufactured IPhones and IPads is more like it!
* Will you be comfortable having your physical body destroyed and your consciousness uploaded into a machine? Will you be comfortable interacting with others who have done so?
No. However, it severely depends on numerous circumstances.
There's a way to continue your meaningless existence, to continue watching television shows, watching action movies, playing vidya games, buying useless shit, having cybersex, etc. No one in America will refuse it, because those who would probably refuse would be already fed to the genetically modified three headed fire-breathing sea lions in the SuperColosseum (along with Christians) long time ago.
* Will you be comfortable having sex with people who were the opposite gender of a different species a few hours ago and simply had a new body constructed to wear for the night?
No. Monsieur Lordbucket, you are an expert in making up sexual perversions.
I'm sure that one day, you guys will accidentally bring Slaanesh into the world (provided that you won't be wiped out by the economical collapse/barbarian onslaught/World War III/meteor colliding with Earth/[insert disaster name here] beforehand)

[i2amroy]

(After a large amount of talking to my grandmother, a little bit with my great-grandmother before she died, and my father) I've come to the conclusion that the real problem with technology and older people isn't so much the fact that they are against it, it is really two other things:

1)Change. As people grow older they tend to become more "set in their ways". After somebody has lived in the same house for 40 years and hasn't even changed the furniture, they tend to grow very resistant to change. Just a few months ago I was helping my grandma get an 8 year old printer to work with her computer because she wasn't comfortable buying a new one (even though it was nigh-identical except in black instead of grey), despite the fact that her printer was so old that if her computer was brand new it probably wouldn't even support a printer that old. She just wasn't comfortable changing so she preferred to remain with the older equipment. When you have been able to control every part of your environment, most people don't like to change when they can stay the same, it's also one of the reasons why a lot of older people don't like moving into old folks homes, because they don't want to change.

2)Speed of information transfer. My great-grandmother lived in a time where for most of her life the only way to send messages was to send a letter, then wait weeks or even months to reply. Being able to send a message via telegram to the next city over, then receive a message back maybe in an hour or so was amazing for her. My grandmother lived in a time where the radio became commonplace, allowing for faster transmission of information, but to quote her "the ability to pick up a telephone and talk to somebody elsewhere in the U.S. still amazes me sometimes". For my dad he grew up with the telephone, but he was really surprised when he learned that it wasn't uncommon for me and my brother to be playing an online game like DotA with somebody from Russia, Korea, and Europe all at the same time in a real-time game. As you can see with each generation the speed of information spread increases, and so does the speed at which the culture reacts. Where older people are used to it taking months for new nifty pieces of information to spread around throughout the country, the modern culture and technology goes through that process in the matter of days (that's what a meme is, a new phrase or piece of info that becomes commonplace by spreading through word of mouth). As such their brains are simply not used to dealing with information that changes that quickly, making them completely incapable of keeping up with the "latest" or even the "newer" pieces of technology without significant retraining of their brain. (Not to say that this can't be a good thing at times, this is the reason why parents have difficulty with chat speak and why those "50 text abbreviations parents should know" lists are so hilarious. The people who write them don't understand that within a week of them writing some of their definitions will be obsolete, and in fact some of them will change specifically because the parents now have them figured out. )

Spoiler: As for the questions: (click to show/hide)

* Will you be comfortable having brain implants to allow you "telepathic" communcation with the devices in your home?
Sure thing, though I would hope that we would have at least reached the point where my house would anticipate my arrival and already start up dinner for me.

* Will you be comfortable when primitive things like email and cellphones have been replaced with real-time global telepathy?
It would certainly make getting hold of somebody easier when they can never lose their cell phone.

* Will you be comfortable when your son or daughter wants to marry an alien? Or a robot? Or a non-human genetic construct?
As long as the alien/robot/construct and I got along, sure.

* Will you be comfortable having friends invite you to neighboring solar systems for lunch?
This would be sweet, though until we reach the point of having wormholes or something to bend the laws of physics enough to bypass the speed of light there might be some problems with getting their and back fast enough.

* Will you be comfortable having your physical body destroyed and your consciousness uploaded into a machine? Will you be comfortable interacting with others who have done so?
I'd probably be one of the first people lines up to be uploaded, though I would prefer a method that maintained consciousness throughout the transition. The "copy and destroy" method has always freaked me out a little as I'm technically committing suicide and then creating a perfect copy, thus meaning the real me would die.

* Will you be comfortable having sex with people who were the opposite gender of a different species a few hours ago and simply had a new body constructed to wear for the night?
Assuming that body swapping was possible, I'd probably try this at least once, just to know what it's like on the other end. After all, who hasn't wondered exactly what it feels like to be on the other end?

[Criptfeind]

No, fingers are better - they can't malfunction.

I laughed so hard my (real) teeth fell out. I am friends with a man who had a stroke. His brain works well, but every action he takes with his body is a struggle.

Teeeeechnophobe.

[DrPoo]

I wont fear any future technology, i will embrace it with open arms, especially if it grants immortality.