The Great America Think-Off is an annual event held in New York Mills, MN, which bills itself as a philosophy debate for the common person. Each year, they release a question, and solicit essays to respond to that question. Then, the best essayists are chosen to come to New York Mills and debate the topic in person, with the audience voting to definitively decide the answer.

New York Mills, MN

In past years, they’ve decided such controversial topics as if humanity is inherently good or evil (we’re evil), if we reap what we sow (yes, we do), if the death penalty is ethical in a civilized society (it’s not), and if life has meaning (it does). This year’s question was “Does technology free us or trap us?”

Having recently started following the minimalism and simple living movements, and having struggled to balance technology consumption with my work as a Data Scientist in Silicon Valley (which necessarily uses a lot of technology), this question resonated with me. So, I made the trip to Otter Tail County, bought a $10 ticket to the event, and took a seat in the New York Mills high school performance center to watch the debate.

Won’t somebody think of the children?

As the “frees us” arguers pointed out, the instant question revolves around all technology and not just computers, smart watches, and the internet. So, we must consider all technology inventions since the dawn of time: reddit, computers, electricity, penicillin, vaccines, cars, indoor plumbing, germ theory, fire, etc.

Without the advent of these technologies infant mortality would still dominate our life expectancy, with around a third of babies dying before early childhood. As David Eckel pointed out, “what’s more trapping than dying by the age of four?”

Of course, with technology comes consequences: addiction to video games, pornography, and social media. Recently, one essayist came across a group of high school seniors having dinner before a formal dance. All of them were face-down, focused more on their phones than their company: “what kinds of memories are going to be created by that?” This concern for youth was shared among all of the participants, on both sides of the debate.

David Lappako rebutted this concern, sharing how his son had managed to turn a video game obsession into a career in computer science. While every advance in technology has it’s consequence, he argued that the net result of all technological innovation was more freeing than trapping:

Of course, technology is not without its perils. Critics claim adopting new technologies is a sort of Faustian bargain — a deal with the devil. In order to have that tractor, you must slave away to pay for it, and you must be prepared for it to break down, and to fix it. Some microwave users can’t cook anything that isn’t “prepared” — at best, such people are good at “warming.” As for computers, I think we all realize we can become a slave to our screens; for some, a smart phone is the electronic equivalent of heroin. Still, with respect to technology and freedom, we have to consider what freedom actually is. I would define it quite simply: to have options. If you ask rich people about the main virtue of money, they will often tell you it’s not that they can buy more things, but that financial wealth gives them more choices. So too with technology. One can become “trapped” by it, but technology opens up so many more possibilities that i can only be considered freeing compared to the alternative.

A gilded cage is still a cage

For all the advancements and luxuries technology has afforded us, they have not come without an added cost. As Marsh Muirhead argued, the list of damages from technology is only getting longer: Thalidomide, Chernobyl, Three-Mile Island, Love Canal, Bhopal, Erin Brockovich and PG&E, Minamata mercury poisoning, DDT and the bald eagle, and more (perhaps the next item for this list is fracking?). He aptly summarized his argument:

Since discovering fire and inventing the wheel, we have sought a hotter fire, a rounder wheel, burning and running over ourselves again and again, no happier, no more secure than when chased by the tiger, freezing in our cave.

Paul Terry, of StayWell, reinforced that whatever social gains we feel we’ve made from technology are mostly fleeting and not a substitute for real-life interactions:

Defenders of technology point to how twitter feeds spawned the Arab Uprising but they ignore sociologists who study how the speed behind digital activism only creates weak ties. Sustainable movements that free us depend on the hard work of personal connectivity. Slow organizing, the kind that builds relationships, is what it takes to gain consensus and, as one sociologist described it, to learn how to “navigate the minefields of political danger.”

As a side, I would counter: how can you say that these “weak-tie” connections won’t become the dominate force for social movements after the entire population lacks most real-world, strong-tie connections?

Nonetheless, one of the most compelling counterarguments involved a discussion of Caitlyn Jenner. Caitlyn recently came out as transgendered, and has cited the availability of technology (in the form of hormone replacement) as allowing her to be who she has always felt she is. So, can technology trap us when it’s also essential to making us feel free?

Paul reiterated throughout his arguments that, of course, technology did a lot of good: he even has a pebble watch and is currently working to convince his wife to let him upgrade to an Apple Watch. Just because technology provides options, freedoms, or improvements in quality of life does not mean it isn’t trapping. In his definition, something is a trap when we become reliant upon it or when an unknown consequence “sneaks” up on us. To drive this point home, he outlined a catastrophic scenario that we’ve set ourselves up for given our dependence on technology: if central points of the electric grid was destroyed, society would collapse within months.

As the speed of technological advancement has increased, our ability to innovate out of the consequences has not kept pace. This, argued Paul, is the epitome of a trap.

Taking sides

The arguments on both sides were compelling, but I ended up being more persuaded by Paul and voted that technology traps us. That’s not a bad thing: a gilded cage is still made of gold. That doesn’t mean we need to not use technology, but let’s not fool ourselves into believing we can quit whenever we want to.

My opinion that technology traps us was, somewhat surprisingly, shared by many in my demographic. Among the submitted essays, 55% argued that technology traps us. Men were more likely to feel trapped than woman; and 40% of essays arguing that technology traps us were submitted by people under 30. However, among the attendees, a quick hand-poll of who has a Facebook account revealed nearly half of the audience did not.

Needless to say, the audience did not share my opinion. Maybe it’s because a large number of attendees don’t use “modern” technology (i.e., Facebook), so how could they truly know what being trapped feels like? Maybe it’s because the attendees were put off by some of Paul’s more doomsday-esque hypotheticals. Or, maybe the attendees are just more optimistic than I am. Regardless, the greatest thinker was declared to be David Lappako, and technology was deemed to free, not trap us.

Trying to find a balance

Regardless of the outcome of the debate, it remains clear to me that technology is about finding a balance: being present in the moment, while allowing technology to work its magic. This is a lot harder than it seems.

Quantifying computer usage

I’ve been using RescueTime for a few years to passively track what I do on my computers. As I both work and play on the computer, this adds up to a lot of time — generally over 40 hours per week, with a few outlier weeks jumping to nearly 80 hours.

Total number of hours per week (smoothed to account for high variability)

A plurality of my time is spent on Reddit (2o hours per month), followed by Facebook, Hipchat, iTerm, Adium, and Gmail. Out of the top 5 programs or websites that I use, in only one of them (iTerm) am I actually creating or building something. The rest are used for chatting, gossiping, or mindlessly surfing.

Total hours per week by purpose of activity

This isn’t, itself, problematic. However, many of us (myself included) aren’t very good at regulating our time — which is why it’s so easy to fall into the wikipedia hole and spend hours mindlessly clicking and reading random articles. This is probably why Paul’s argument that technology is a trap appealed to me — we trap ourselves into thinking we need to know the answer to all our questions, and technology entices us into continuing to click well after all our questions are answered.

Just a quick look at Pearson correlations in my data can demonstrate this. My use of RStudio is correlated with visiting ncbi.nlm.nih.gov, stats.stackexchange.com, and stackoverflow.com. However, my use of Reddit is correlated with news.google.com, google.com, and Adium; and, my use of Facebook is correlated with Adium. A person at rest will stay at rest unless acted upon by an unbalanced force.

Physically unplugging

I tried an experiment earlier this year to get myself out of a technology rut. I unplugged the internet at home, and forced myself to only use the internet at work, the library, or a coffee shop. The results were staggering.

I physically unplugged my internet for one week

There were moments of confusion: I would instinctually go to Facebook and Reddit but the pages wouldn’t load. Questions would pop into my mind and, rather than look them up, I’d just wonder about them and let them pass. I had to find something else to do with my time, so I baked bread and cooked more elaborate meals, I picked up and played my harmonica, I read, and I went for walks around Sausalito, in the Marin Headlands, or in Muir Woods.

Quantitatively, I did indeed use the computer less — around 19% less than when my internet was plugged in at home.

Total computer use during unplugged week versus prior week

The most impressive part was how much I reduced my frivolous internet usage. While I still did log on to Reddit and Facebook, my usage of both dropped by around 55%.

Facebook and Reddit use

Since trying this experiment, my situation has changed dramatically. I spend most of my time working remotely, which means that I now rely on my internet connection for work and can’t simply unplug.

I wish I had a good conclusion for all of this: I canceled my home internet connection, I downgraded from a smartphone to a “dumb” phone, or I decided to move to the woods to live deliberately. However, I don’t. The experts successfully argued that technology frees us, and yet I still can’t figure out how to break away.