To begin by addressing the question-- whether or not technology is the answer and should always be viewed positively-- is admittedly not the focus of my argument. Yet, I will get it out of the way first to weigh both sides of the issue. Admittedly technology is the literally the bedrock of human society. It is the fusion of elements to expedite, manipulate, extract, synthesize, add, subtract, multiply, and inevitably elucidate the human mind to its own experience. It is in so many ways the opposite of nature, even if it can be designed to not affect it negatively.

At this point, we have pushed our society to the point where we need energy, and a lot of it. Thus the element of technology perhaps most needed is to extract. Extracting fossil fuels as fast as possible is what will likely carry us for a minimum of another 20 to 50 years. Certainly there is impetus and in some cases incentive now to move off fossil fuels and adopt more sustainable methods of transportation, raising livestock and farming, and fueling our buildings and homes, yet these are often expensive even when feasibly these methods should not be. Most worrisome is the model that developing countries with a greater number of people to carry out the lifestyle are following, which is the quick, cheap, and dirty method. Can we simply innovate and let technology lead us to the next century without frying up? Not likely. Quite simply the gains that technology claims to be ready to make soon are in many cases not so readily available, often theoretical, and truthfully no time can be spared emitting more considering that many of the effects of what we do now will not be felt for years to come.

The real issue concerns the mental ethic that arises from this trust in technology. "Knowing" that technology will innovate to save us means that we can always just plug something new into the system of our economic expansion. Not only is it likely that even with our endless innovation we will still exhaust the Earth's supply and ability to suck up degradation, but also plugging things into a system never change its trajectory by much. Thus, we are simply continuing to uphold our values of consuming and consuming to upkeep our false economy. There is not always a synthetic substitute for what the Earth can create, and we must realize the truth about our lifestyle.

What we will see in the future is the possibility to stabilize the destruction we are making through technology. However, should this be possible, we will have a world not beautiful in its natural splendor, we will have a synthetic system upheld in new systemic ways that nature had never intended. This is certainly acceptable to some, but in many ways it does seem to undermine the place nature has held in the human spirit, confirming us spiritually and creatively. Just waiting for technology to fix the problem we eschew our responsibility socially, politically, and personally to engage our roles in the environment.