Has Technology Been a Positive or Negative Impact on Society? Steven Johnson’s article Social Connections was published in the New York Times on November 28, 2006. He wrote the article as a response to Thomas Friedman’s article about why technology is causing humanity to become antisocial. Johnson argues that technology has allowed people to connect all over the world, bus has made it harder to have conversation in real life. He even feels that talking over the internet is better, as you hear the person’s ideas without hearing vocal changes or facial expressions. Johnson’s article successfully uses the rhetorical appeals, pathos and ethos, in his article, but still uses fallacies that fail to make his argument stronger Johnson’s thesis state …show more content…
He seems to be using scare tactics as he starts off the paragraph with the word “threat.” That was an intense word choice, and it seemed he wanted to get the reader’s attention by making it sound like you need to listen to his thoughts on this whole thing, because what he has to say is really important. (424) On the same page, Johnson uses the fallacy ad hominem, by attacking Friedman with the remark of “Still there’s…appropriate for someone who writes so powerfully about globalization…” That comment was not needed, Friedman was fearing that people have become too reliant on interaction through a screen that people may forget how to have face-to-face interactions. (424) Johnson was able to talk about how technology is getting rid of face-to-face interaction, but ends it on that note, instead of elaborating the effect that might have on our society. It seems that he was stacking the deck and only wanting to talk about his side instead of being able to strengthen his argument by being in-depth with his counter argument and trying to rebuttal them.
Staples figures there is not anything he can do to solve this issue and his conclusion was to change the way he acts around people so they are no longer afraid. This shows that society fears him and do not want anything to do with him. The ones around him try to get away from him as quick as possible that shows that they think of him as a threat and want to keep their distance. This helps readers understand the text by showing them that they fear him because they run away and keep their distance because they see him as a nuisance and someone to
“How do we come to grips with the fact that this thing has gotten way too real, out of control like some huge snowball running down a hill, threatening to smash and kill all in it’s path, including those who originally fashioned it? Time is of the essence, and every thinking person with a stake in life-especially those involved in the fighting-should put forth an effort, something more concrete than a “media truce,” to deal with this tragedy. The children deserve to have a descent childhood where they live. They shouldn’t have to be uprooted to the suburbs to experience peace. We cannot contaminate them with our feuds of madness, which are predicated on factors over which we have no control.”
attempt to evoke an emotional response from the reader. He does make some good points
In 2012, there were an estimated 14,827 murders and non-negligent manslaughter crimes reported by all agencies in the United States according to the Uniform Crime Report at the Federal Bureau of Investigation. Murder and non-negligent manslaughter are defined “as the willful (nonnegligent) killing of one human being by another.” A 1.1 percent increase occurred from 2011 to 2012. But it should be noted, this is a 9.9 percent drop from the figure for 2008 and a 10.3 percent decrease from the number of murders recorded in 2003. Of the murders that occurred in 2012, it is estimated that 43.6 percent were reported in the south, 21.0 percent were from the Midwest, 21.0 percent were accounted from the west, and 14.2 percent were from the northeast of the United States. There were 4.7 murders for every 100,000 people in 2012. The murder rate went up 0.4 percent from 2011 to 2012. It went down in 2008 by 12.8 percent and dropped 16.9 percent from 2003. The majority of offenders were over the age of eighteen and they accounted for 9,096 of offenders in 2012. According to the Uniform Crime Report, the number of offenders who murdered in 2012 totaled 14,581. The majority of these offenders were male, totaling 9,425. Female offenders totaled 1,098, and 4,058 were unknown offenders. Black males topped the list as far as race was concerned with 5,531 committing murder. White males followed with 4,582 offenders. There were 4,228 classified as race unknown regarding offenders who murdered in 2012. The victim data reported was 9,917 male victims and 2,834 female victims. Of those victims, 11,549 were over the age of eighteen.
He shows that fear clouds the mind, thus making it absolutely imperative to maintain reason and logic throughout life. Fear will always end in a fate worse than death for those who survive it.
This adds to the pathos in the speech because he includes his own emotions in the general emotions of the public. Near the middle of his speech Johnson enhance his argument through the audiences
In Sherry Turkle’s, New York Times article, she appeals to ethos, logos and pathos to help highlight on the importance of having conversations. Through these rhetorical devices she expresses that despite the fact that we live in a society that is filled with communication we have managed to drift away from “face to face” conversations for online connection. Turkle supports her claims by first focusing on ethos as she points out her own experiences and data she has collected. She studied the mobile connection of technologies for 15 years as well as talked to several individuals about their lives and how technology has affected them. Sherry Turkle also shows sympathy towards readers by saying “I’ve learned that the little devices most of us carry
In the world today, people are constantly surrounded by technology. At any given moment, we can connect to others around the world through our phones, computers, tablets, and even our watches. With so many connections to the outside world, one would think we have gained more insight into having better relationships with the people that matter the most. Despite these connections, people are more distant to one another than ever. In the article, “Stop Googling. Let’s Talk," author Sherry Turkle details her findings on how people have stopped having real conversations and argues the loss of empathy and solitude are due to today’s technology. Turkle details compelling discoveries on how technology has changed relationships in “Stop Googling. Let’s Talk,” and her credibility is apparent through years of research and the persuasive evidence that supports her claims.
Sherry Turkle’s article in The New York Times “The Flight From Conversation”, she disputes that we need to put down the technology and rehabilitate our ability to converse with other human beings because we are replacing deep relationships with actual people for casual encounters on technology. Turkle tries to convince young and middle age individuals who are so enthralled by the technology that they are losing the ability to communicate in a public setting. Sherry Turkle unsuccessfully persuades her audience to put down the technology and engage with others in public through her strong logos appeal that overpowers her weak logos and doesn’t reliably represent herself and her research.
Have you ever made any friends via Facebook, Twitter, or Snapchat that you have never met before? I know I have through Twitter due to having the same interests. Some may say those friends are not really your friends, but virtual ones instead. In the article, “The Limits of Friendships,” by Maria Konnikova, she talks about friendships that are made virtually and in reality. The author argues that the use of social media has hindered friendships and face to face connections within one’s social circle, however, she does not address that they have met their closest support group through social media. Face to face connections help identify who one’s true friends are and they are more realistically made when it is in person rather than over social media, but there Konnikova fails to address the fact that social media has allowed many to connect
People have the fundamental desire to maintain strong connections with others. Through logic and reasoning, Sherry states, “But what do we have, now that we have what we say we want, now that we have what technology makes easy?”(Turkle). Face to face conversations are now mundane because of the accessibility to interact at our fingertips, at free will through text, phone calls and social media. Belonging, the very essence of a relationship has now become trivial.
In the narrative The Flight from Conversation by Sherry Turkle, she says in this age of mobile devices and Facebook people have sacrificed conversation with connection. People are always on their phones and struggle to maintain eye contact, and when they’re texting in classrooms and even in dates when you are supposed to connect to someone physically and emotionally and instead people act like robots and text even on dates and probably other social occasions. All this meant to show how people have become less social due to their phones always sending texts or emails and shopping online when they should be focused on where they are who they’re speaking to and what time it is. And this is a reasonable conclusion in our modern society people,
Over the last century, information technology, such as the Internet, has brought our society forward and helps us get through life more efficiently and conveniently. In addition, it helps making global communication easier and faster as compared to hand-written mails that may take days if not weeks to reach its intended recipient. However, with such luxury and convenience, there is a debate whether the way we currently interact with fellow human beings with the help of technology is good or bad to our personal relationships. The Internet has increased the amount of communication globally, yet ironically the very technology that helps us increase our communication hinders our ability to socialize effectively in real life and create a healthy interpersonal relationship.
In Sherry Turkle’s article “The Flight from Conversation,” she emphasizes that technology has given us the chance to be comfortable with not having any real-life connections and allowing our devices to change society’s interactions with each other. Turkle believes that our devices have allowed us to be comfortable with being alone together and neglecting real life connections. She opens her article up with “We live in a technological universe in which we are always communicating. And yet we have sacrificed conversation for mere connection.” (Turkle, 2012. Page 1). Turkle is trying to say that we have given up on socializing with each face-to-face and forgot all about connections. In the article, Turkle continues to provide examples of how we let our devices take over and
Consider a situation where a family is sitting at the dining table, the son pull out his iPhone, connects to Wi-Fi, and starts chatting with his friends on “Facebook”. The father has a Samsung Galaxy S4 in his hands and he is reading the newspaper online and using “Whatsapp” messenger while having his meal. The mother is busy texting her friends. They are all “socializing” but none of them has spoken as much as a single word to each other. This situation can be commonly seen nowadays. Technology has brought us closer and squeezed the distances but in reality, it has taken us away from each other. The rapid growth of technology has brought about significant changes in human lives, especially in their relationships. The latest technologies have turned this world into a “global village” but the way humans interact with each other, the types of relations and their importance has changed a lot. The advancement in technology has brought us close but has also taken us apart.