The Veldt, The Pedestrian, By Ray Bradbury

Technology turns into something new everyday. From computers to smartphones, technology comes in all shapes and sizes. Most people hope to receive new advancements from technology to do more activities for them. This is not in the best interest for mankind. In Ray Bradbury’s three short stories The Veldt, The Pedestrian, and August 2026, Bradbury describes three different worlds, where he shows the possible outcome of the world if technology advances too far. Each story leads to negative effects on humans and the worlds that they live in. Technology does not have all of the solutions to present day solutions.

Granted, in the present day world, information is easily available to anyone who wants it. Smart phones and computers are able to search through infinite sources to find what they are programed to do. Information is available at people’s fingertips to know the latest news in the world. Although information can be retrieved quickly and plentifully by technology, this information is not always accurate. Technology is unable to be programmed to find truthful sources, or find facts that have any truth at all. Technology looks for any and all information that is

placed on the internet to see, it does not have the capability to organize information by its reliable content. People have to go through information by themselves to figure out what information is needed, or if the facts are true. Unfortunately, some people assume everything on the internet is true, and they do not check their sources. This can lead to misinformed people, who might use the false facts for something they need.

Technology also does not have the capacity to be creative.

Computers are not able to think outside of the box to generate a solution to a failure in their job. Programs are written to tell technology what to do and when. Computers run through the program and follow the orders that they are given. Computers do not stray away from their jobs, or change their own programming to be more efficient. In Ray Bradbury’s The Veldt, the children have to come up with the ideas for their nursery, the nursery does not come up with ideas of its own. Bradbury says, “….” Technology is also not able to combine different ideas together. They cannot take multiple programs and fuse them together, a person has to manually do this. A human has to think of the ideas first in order to made a computer run smoother or

faster.

Distraction is also a negative aspect of technology. People waste time that could be used productively. Smart phones constantly beep and buzz with new notifications that people check almost instantly. Instead of concentrating on the task at hand, people try to take breaks on their phones. This causes time to be wasted, as these times of rest last longer than they should, removing people’s attention from what they were doing. Then addition time is spent trying to refocus on the task that was being completing. In Ray Bradbury’s The Pedestrian, the general population spent all of their time watching television screens. Bradbury says, “.....” These characters do not do anything productive in their lives, when they could be doing something productive with all of their time that they spend in front of the television screen.