The Wall Street Journal had an interesting blog post exploring why some technologies cause moral outrage or panic and some don't.
Why is it that some technologies cause moral panic and others don’t? Why was the introduction of electricity seen as a terrible thing, while nobody cared much about the fountain pen?
It is a curious topic and working in technology in Libraries, I encounter some form of this panic on almost a daily basis. The other day I tweeted a link to Eric Hellman's piece on the changing needs of library data and one of the first comments I got was an accusation of wanting to remove all humans from the library process. I find I repeat some form of that conversation over and over again on almost a daily basis.
Given that experience I'm not sure I just have a niche culture that reacts different or if I disagree with the WSJ author as to what generates panic about technology.
More than our relation to space, time and people. I think it's more about how big a contrast something is to the script we've written for ourselves. Most people achieve a perspective on their life that ensures them what they do day to day is valuable and I think most go so far as to convince themselves of some form of moral "rightness" to not only what they do but how they do it. It make sense that we do that and it's a valuable tool for getting through any particular day and getting up the next morning.
I'd argue that it's the fundamental discomfort with changing not just a routine, but the thinking that has built up to make us accept that routine that ...
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