Being Modern

When you listen to technologists talk, you often end up confused about their use of the term modern. The same people can easily use the term modern in both pejorative and exalting manner. I've heard technologists urge modernizing "backwards" countries, yet, almost in the same breath, romanticize "good old times" of "lo-tech".

Technology was the very symbol of modernism, and technolust is a remnant of the modernist thinking. When technologists talk about being "modern", they're usually talking about this strange technofetish in which progress is measured by the ubiquity and novelty of technology, and in which national prosperity refers to the degree of technobloat in that nation.

When dealing with technologists, be suspicious of the term modern, because it is often identified with technology and mistaken as an indicator of quality of human life.