issue114

雨&彩虹UID: 132532

114"Humanity has made little real progress over the past century or so. Technological innovations have taken place, but the overall condition of humanity is no better. War, violence, and poverty are still with us. Technology cannot change the condition of humanity."

The speaker asserts that humanity has made little progress over the past century. By comparing its logjam condition with the fast-moving pace with technological innovation, he claims that technology cannot change the condition of humanity. The speaker’s argument has some merit considering he does not overemphasis the role of technology in changing the condition of humanity, but his claim has severe drawbacks since he fail to realizing the progress that human beings has make in humanity during the past century and make false connection between the technological advancement and humanity progress.

The speaker declare that in spite of the technological innovations that have taken place, humanity still suffer stand in still water accompanying with war, violence and poverty. I find this claim to be problematic since he tends to overlook the great achievements that has been obtained by mankind over the last century. For one thing, it is true that we still under the constant tortures of war, violence and poverty, but it is a matter of human nature that cannot totally be eradicated. Ever since the existence of human society, we engage in war, suffer from hunger and lacking of shelter, but if we look to the rooted causes under these phenomenon, it is apparent that these problems are not born out of the deterioration of humanity marked by our unwillingness to tackle these problems but rather out of the irresistibility of human nature. In my point of view, only if the human race still prosper on this planet, wars, violence and poverty cannot be thoroughly got rid of and those who use their existence as signs of the regress of humanity is naïve and injudicious.

Even if wars, violence and poverty would be the in certain degree the indicators of deterioration of humanity as the speaker claims, we have to admit that during the last century, we have witness great progress in humanity. Nations cooperate to deal with the most crucial global problems is marching forward in the areas such as assistance to undeveloped countries by providing food, medical care and so forth, solving environmental problems that threaten the human race such as green-house effect, ozone depletion, protecting children and women from unfair treatment and abuses, all of which contribute to the improvement of humanity in stead of the contrary.

The speaker has some merits since he did not overemphasis the part play by technology in changing humanity. In my observation, technology can only assist people in changing some aspects of peoples’ life such as improving people’s living condition, increasing of efficiency, etc but humanity itself carries a much broader meaning that deserve peoples’ consciousnesses and endeavor. Technology itself is incapable in determining the condition of humanity, but it can work as efficient tool in assisting mankind to solve crucial problems such as finding new technology to increase the output of food supply to ease the poverty problem, or using e-commerce as a valuable tool to strengthen the connection among nations to build more common-shared economic benefits. These are all what technology can contribute positively to our human beings. But there is one thing we should be aware of, that is the negative influence carrying out by technology. Cloning and genetic formation challenge our basic conception about the morality of human, atomic energy threaten the well-being and security of human race. Technology itself is a neutral power, although it is not a determining power in the development of humanity, it can exert certain influence in this process.

To sum up, I agree with the speaker insofar as the influence of technology in humanity is considered. But I am strongly against his claim that humanity has achieved little over the past centuries with all the empirical evidence I observed. We should bear in mind that technology is a neutral power, but proper use of it can assist the well-being of human beings and thus engender people more space to pander over the most crucial problems in humanity that are waiting for them to solve.

[ 本帖最后由 pippo1983 于 2007-6-27 11:09 编辑 ]

paisleyUID: 64183

真好。又见你了：）

雨&彩虹UID: 132532

我也很想你.这么多天的状态都不好, 这几天还可以,所以趁着这几天多写点.

paisleyUID: 64183

那就努力KEEP ON哦:))

xbdebbUID: 142129

你的文章, 我考前打印了10篇,仔细看了.真好!
你一定考的很好的!

imongUID: 140258

用词上有一些零散的不足之处，仅就一个例子说明，Ever since the existence of human society，这里如果用since的话后面用existence恐怕不太恰当。

当然，总体来说语言平和顺畅，论述清晰，值得借鉴。