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A Human-Centred Approach to Technology

This presentation explores the impact of technology on society and emphasizes the importance of considering the human perspective in technological advancements. It discusses the dangers of a narrow understanding of technology and the need for a human-centred approach. The presentation also addresses specific concerns regarding ICTs and the effects of technology on identity and purpose. It concludes by highlighting the transformative potential of technology in education and the responsibility that comes with it.

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A Human-Centred Approach to Technology

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  1. A Human Centred Approach to TechnologyBrisbane April 2007 eamonn.conway@mic.ul.ie http://cctv.mic.ul.ie

  2. Structure of Presentation • Introductory Remarks • Technology • What we are talking about • Twofold Concerns • A Human- Centred Approach • Technology as Gift • Education for Freedom • The “Human or Digital Divide” • Concluding Remarks • Discussion

  3. Introductory Remarks • A fortunate typo! • What we are after here: critical discernment

  4. What is Technology? • From the Greek technē • The modification of the natural world to suit our purposes… • Extending our abilities to satisfy our wants and needs

  5. A Narrow Understanding of Technology • Privileging one particular kind of human creativity • highly functional and purposeful engagement with tools or machinery

  6. Heidegger and Tillich on the separation of: • the Ontological from the Technical; • The Technological from the Arts.

  7. Thus… • Danger of Technology as end in itself… • Blind to issues of ultimate concern • Blinding us to issues of ultimate concern • Altering our Values System

  8. Two Broad Concerns • A Pervasive Technological Attitude

  9. Technology… is a culturally formative power that defines the shape of the world we live in and conditions our way of perceiving the world… • Harvey Cox

  10. Two Broad Concerns • A Pervasive Technological Attitude • Particular Concerns regarding ICTs

  11. A Pervasive Technological Attitude • People/Objects lose their intrinsic value • We are disposed to see life as Self-Invention not Self-Discovery • Meaning and Purpose are separated

  12. Purposefulness • Grasping, Directing ,Taking Control, Pursuing, Setting about, Planning, Organising, Determining etc… • A Purpose is something we Set out to Achieve

  13. Meaning • Meaning discloses or reveals itself • “Letting Go” rather than being “In Control”

  14. A Pervasive Technological Attitude • People/Objects lose their intrinsic value • We are disposed to see life as Self-Invention not Self-Discovery • Meaning and Purpose are separated • An Instrumental Rationality Predominates

  15. Specific ICT Concerns • Experimentation with Identity/Identities

  16. Identities Issues Multiple Identities: • For a time, virtuality can spread a fog of virtual confusion and blur the shape of things and events with glamour and triviality. • We can lead a life (or perhaps lives) of multiplicity and flexibility that is unattainable in real life… Borgmann • Colluding in the avoidance of being fixed

  17. The Internet • Experimentation with Identity/Identities • Anonymity • Filtering of self-expression • Surrogate “social” interaction • What are we not doing when on-line…

  18. See www.secondlife.com “ Where else can you help create a new world and have the time of your life doing it?” www.secondlife.com • “It seems misleading to call what he does playing. He spends his time constructing a life that is more expansive than the one one he lives in physical reality” • Shirley Turkle, Life on the Screen: Identity in the Age of the Internet

  19. Technology can collude in avoidance of depth Is it possible that despite our discoveries and advances, despite our culture, religion and science, we have remained on the surface of life? Rainer Maria Rilke

  20. The Era of Choice • In a few hundred years, when the history of our time is written from a long-term perspective, it is likely that the most important event historians will see is not technology, not the Internet, not e-commerce. It is an unprecedented change in the human condition. For the first time – literally – substantial and rapidly growing numbers of people have choices. For the first time, they will have to manage themselves. Peter Drucker

  21. IT Impact Specifically in the School • Transforms concept of Curriculum • Affects concept of Curriculum • Assists Personalisation/Customisation • Liberates us spatio-temporally • Liberates us from “one size fits all” • Transforms Curriculum • Most of what is being done [with technology in education ] consists of new ways of teaching the same content. The real power of the new technologies is to permit deep change in the content – changing what is learned as well as how (Seymour Papert, MIT)

  22. “The fundamental aim is not mastering empowering technologies to improve pupil performance, but the evolution of our values in a new world” Odile de Chalendar

  23. Responsibility • The Net offers us a chance to take control of our own lives and to redefine our role as citizens of local communities and of a global society. It also hands us the responsibility to govern ourselves, to educate our children, to do business honestly, and to work with fellow citizens to design rules we want to live by. • Esther Dyson, Release 2.0: A design for living in the Digital Age

  24. A Human-Centred Approach • Technology as Gift • Education for Genuine Freedom

  25. Freedom • is measured not by the extent of our independence but by the quality of our commitment ... D Harrington • is not the ability to change constantly but the ability to “get it all together”... J Sachs

  26. Overcoming the Digital or Human Divide • “Today, when 20 percent of the world consumes 80 percent of its resources, when a quarter of us have an acceptable standard of living and three quarters don’t, how can this divide possibly come together? While the politicians struggle with the baggage of history, a new generation is emerging from the digital landscape free of many of the old prejudices. These kids are released from the limitation of geographical proximity as the sole basis of friendship, collaboration, play and neighborhood. Digital technology can be a natural force drawing people into greater world harmony.” • Nicholas Negroponte, Being Digital • BUT @mic.ul.ie is not @harvard.edu !

  27. A Technology of the West for the West • “Technology has certainly increased the divide between the haves and the have-nots. Internet technology was invented by the West for the West… It is the duty of richer countries to help the third world get up to speed” • Tim Berners-Lee, Inventor of the WWW

  28. Overcoming the Digital or Human Divide • Geography is no longer destiny • We can escape the accident of proximity • We can despatialise interaction • We can create global communities

  29. The Digital or Human Divide • Exclusion from the Self • Will we challenging or merely reinforce exclusions? • Wonderful Possibilities • A few projects: • www.gesci.org • www.camara.ie

  30. Concluding Remarks

  31. eamonn.conway@mic.ul.ie

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