Does technology have value based on user intent and social context, not value in and of itself?

Technology is not value-neutral in and of itself; its value is determined by user intent and social context. To determine whether a technology is right or wrong, a comprehensive evaluation is needed that takes into account the purpose of the technology developer and its social impact.

 

Technology has been a part of human history for a long time. It started with simple campfires, moved on to the invention of the steam engine to power trains, and has now expanded to include IT technologies such as smartphones and optical communications. As the scope of science and technology has expanded, so has our attitude toward it. For example, the world once pledged to unite against the development of nuclear weapons, which could lead to the destruction of humanity. This means that there needs to be criteria for judging which technologies are acceptable and which are not.
In general, technology seems to make humanity more convenient and beneficial. Paradoxically, however, many technologies have been developed to kill or harass humans rather than to benefit them. Many of these technologies were developed to gain an advantage in armed conflict with foreign adversaries, and strategic weapons such as guns, cannons, and missiles are the result. At first glance, technologies like strategic weapons seem to have a negative value to humans in and of themselves. On the other hand, technologies like the steam engine seem to have a positive value. However, the value-neutrality debate is about whether it is appropriate to argue about the rightness or wrongness of a technology in and of itself, regardless of the context in which it was developed.
The fundamental reason why technology is generally considered to be value-neutral is that its value is determined by the people who use it. It is through the users of a technology that it begins to reveal its value, and the value of a technology depends on the interests and morals of its users. Therefore, the value of a technology cannot be determined by the technology itself, but rather by how it is applied in practice and the intentions with which it was developed. For example, even strategic weapons, which are generally considered a bad technology, can be considered a positive technology if they are used as a deterrent to keep the peace.
In the case of nuclear weapons, can we say that the technology is not valuable because of the fear that it could wipe out humanity if “misused”? Furthermore, is it right to stop developing nuclear weapons because of this risk? It seems relatively easy to answer yes to this question, so let’s go back to the example of the steam engine. The steam engine sparked the Industrial Revolution in Britain and changed the country’s international standing. The power of the steam engine gave Britain a significant advantage in the colonial struggle during the imperialist era. Was the invention of the steam engine a good thing for other European powers, who were slow to adopt the technology? At least for the colonized African and Asian nations at the time, it was probably a terrible technology, not much different from a strategic weapon. In this case, what is the value of the steam engine? Ultimately, the value of a technology will vary dramatically between its owner and its competitors.
It is a natural fact that technologies provide relative advantages to their owners, and this is not enough to show that the value of the technology itself cannot be judged. Therefore, to determine whether a technology is truly value-neutral, we need to look at it in terms of “right” and “wrong” rather than “good” and “bad. Whether a technology is right or wrong can be judged by whether it is beneficial to humanity in the long run when it is universally used by humanity as a whole, regardless of the economic benefits it may bring to individuals. For example, Bill Gates made a fortune by democratizing the personal computer, but computers have greatly benefited human life by being used in countless fields of work outside of personal profit. So, is the technology itself the right technology for humans? I don’t think so. If we look at a few more examples of the use of computer technology, we can see that fighter jets and weapons of war have utilized the powerful computational capabilities of computers to make warfare more destructive and effective. Also, before the introduction of computers, many workers earned their living by doing computational labor, but now a single computer can do their work for them. Therefore, we can’t easily conclude that computer technology is right. As with all technologies, there are benefits and harms that coexist as we consider their impact on society, and there are limitations to weighing them and finally deciding whether they are right or wrong.
As such, the value of a technology cannot be determined by itself, but only when combined with the intentions of individual technology users. The question of whether or not a technology is value-neutral can ultimately lead to the question of whether or not third parties who have no intention of contributing to the research of a particular technology should be able to block it from being researched. If it is determined that a technology is wrong from the start, then it would be in the best interest of humanity as a whole to not develop it. Alternatively, if technologies are not value-neutral and have individual values, then it is possible to prioritize research on technologies that benefit human progress. According to the logic above, technology is value-neutral, so it’s not really up to the developer of the technology to decide whether or not to develop it. Similarly, it doesn’t make sense to prevent technology from being developed. However, it’s worth considering the warnings of the value-neutrality debate.
In the modern world, technology has an enormous impact on society, and it’s essential that researchers studying technology try to anticipate the ways in which their work will be used in the world. Unlike in the past, technology is invested in by the entities that want to develop it, rather than by accidental discovery, so developers can predict the value of their technology based on the nature of their organization and the goals of the technology they’re working on. The value of the intended development of the technology, rather than the value-neutrality of the technology itself, should then be assessed independently. It’s not hard to agree that we should discourage the development of technologies that are expected to have a significant negative social impact.
However, it is not always easy for technology developers to understand the intentions of the organizations to which they belong, and their own moral or ethical judgment of value may not be perfect. This is because a single technology developer may belong to a country, have a particular religion, and have his or her own set of morals. In such cases, the solution should not be found in the technology itself, but rather in the humanities and sociology. The question of what is right and wrong, and what makes a human being human, is a philosophical one, and its interpretation is bound to vary from person to person. Therefore, it is best to let knowledgeable experts make judgments on these issues, predict the impact, and decide whether or not to allow it.
There is no such thing as good or bad technology. Technology itself is value-neutral, as its value cannot be argued, but rather depends on where and how it is used. However, the value-neutrality of a technology is not enough to decide whether or not to proceed with a research project. Therefore, it is better to understand the background and purpose of the subject of the technology research as a whole, and then decide whether or not to proceed with the research through social consensus. In other words, the logic that technology is value-neutral and therefore any technology is acceptable is not appropriate, and research should not be blocked solely because of the potential for a technology to be abused. Similarly, when a technology is deemed to have a negative impact on human society, the criticism should be directed at the technologists who developed it, not at the technology itself.
This is not to say that all technologies are value-neutral, but it does highlight the dangers of making value judgments without considering the intent or context of the technology itself. In the end, it’s worth reminding ourselves that the value of a technology is only determined by the entities that develop and use it. The debate about whether or not a technology can appear value-neutral to everyone, and in what cases it may not, will continue, and that debate will have important implications for the future direction of technology development.