Hello and welcome back to the English with Neil podcast.
Today's topic is, is technology making us lazy?
Now I remember when I was a little boy.
I spent a lot of time at my grandmother's house, and my grandmother had a TV where you had to turn a knob in order to change the channel.
So if you wanted to change the channel, you had to physically stand up, walk over to the TV and turn the knob to change the channel.
Sometimes the picture wasn't always clear.
So on the top of the TV There was something called an antenna, and this antenna you had to move from left to right or front to back in order to get a clear picture.
And sometimes the picture wasn't even clear.
Sometimes you had to hit the side of the TV a couple times just so you can get a clear picture on the TV.
But now that's totally obsolete.
Those kinds of TVs are not made anymore because of the advancement technology.
So now I'm in my mid-thirties and now we have smart TVs.
So with a smart TV you can watch pretty much anything instantly.
You can use different apps, you can watch movies, you You can play games.
You can use the internet all from your television.
And what's more amazing is that you don't have to stand up to change the channel.
You don't have to stand up to adjust the volume. like you did 30 years ago.
Now they make TV remotes where you can speak into the remote and the artificial intelligence will control the TV for you.
So now you can Instead of standing up, you can control the TV with your voice.
So that's amazing.
Let's talk about cars a little bit.
I remember when I was about three or four years old, driving in my father's car, he had something called a tape player.
Now they don't make tapes anymore, but tapes were used back then to listen to music.
And even before my time, my father used to listen to something called 8-tracks, which I've never seen before.
But there was a tape player in there.
And so if you wanted to listen to a song, you had to put the tape inside of the tape player.
If you wanted to skip the song, you had to use your hand to fast forward the song to the next song.
If you wanted to listen to a song again, you had to rewind the tape.
So everything was very manual.
You had to do a lot of things by hand.
You had to roll up the windows on your own.
You had to lock the doors, unlock the doors on your own.
You had to adjust the windows on your own.
But now Everything is automated.
Now we make cars.
You sit in the car and pretty much you can control everything at the touch of a button.
So technology is great.
Technology is amazing.
One of the best things that I like about technology is that it allows us to find information instantly.
If we have a question, we can simply go to our computers or phones, type in the question and get an answer pretty much immediately.
But I think there is a downside.
Sometimes, I think, technology tricks our brains into thinking that anything we want can be acquired immediately.
Like learning a new language, learning a new skill, developing a new habit.
Sometimes we try these things and we don't get immediate results.
When you're learning a new language, it takes time.
If you wanna be fluent in a language, it takes time.
If you wanna learn a new skill, it takes time.
If you wanna develop a new habit, it takes time.
And when I talk about time, I'm not talking about days or weeks.
I'm talking about months and years.
So, like I said, I think technology is great, but at the same time In our society now we get things so quickly.
They give up quickly.
I think people now are giving up too soon because they are not seeing immediate results.
I can't blame everything on technology, but I think technology has something to do with it.
If you go to trade shows.
Trade shows are where you can go to see the new products that companies are releasing.
You pretty much see that you don't have to do anything really now in the time that we live in.
I can't imagine what the world is going to look like in the next 5 or 10 years.
Because now they have robots.
They have technology that can cook food for you.
They have self-driving cars.
There's technology where you can clean your teeth by laser.
I mean, these things were unheard of 20 years ago.
And although I think these things are great, I think they do serve a purpose.
But I also think that they're making us as humans just a little lazy.
So I'd like to propose something.
How can we solve this problem?
How can we live in today's world without totally relying on technology to do everything for us?
Well I think you have to find a balance.
Use technology when you can't do things on your own.
But if you have the abilities to do things by yourself, do the work.
Humans can do a lot of things.
Humans are builders thinkers designers educators, and we have an array of skills that are probably being underused.
And honestly, it feels good to do the work on your own.
It feels good to do something on your own and see the results.
I think it's much more rewarding when you do the work on your own, because it gives you a sense of pride when everything is complete.
So those are my thoughts. on the question, is technology making us lazy?
What do you think?
Do you think technology is making us lazy?
Leave me a comment.
Let's talk about it.
All right, everyone.
Thank you for listening to the English with Neil podcast.
I look forward to speaking with you in the next episode.
Take care, everyone, and talk to you soon.
Peace.
