The technology that surrounds us has given us incredible power, yet it so often leaves us personally unfulfilled. Our impersonal devices and their robotic efficiency may increase our impact on the world, but they can leave us feeling like robots ourselves and can hinder us from forming deep community. Is there hope for our personal relationships in our modern world?
Andy Crouch tackles this tough topic in The Life We’re Looking For, a book about reclaiming relationships in a technological world.
‘Robots have arrived, and I am no more fulfilled.'
Crouch argues that genuine, human interaction is critical for a fulfilling life. Our God-given personhood is best expressed through our relationships with other people. ‘Every human person is a heart-soul-mind-strength complex designed for love’, writes Crouch (33). All these aspects of personhood must be recognized for a fulfilling life, but they will never be fully replicated or appreciated by technology.
Further, technology isolates us from one another because convenience and immediacy often require the elimination of people from a process. Lives surrounded by technology become increasingly efficient but impersonal and lonely. In our sinfulness, it is often simply easier to deal with a robot than with a real person who has a history, difficulties, and feelings. By embracing efficiency-enhancing technology, we are building a society where we lose genuine human relationships.
Effortless power
Crouch’s techno-pessimism hangs on the argument that we, as fallen people, desire effortless power: the ability that only God possesses to control everything and anything without personal exertion. Technology gives us a taste of this power. We can fly with aeroplanes, lift huge weights with forklifts and look across the universe with telescopes. Crouch personifies this desire as Mammon, the power which Jesus warns his disciples about with the words ‘Ye cannot serve God and Mammon.’ (Matthew 6:24b KJV).
But while powerful, technology doesn’t enhance our human experience. Often, the moments of highest efficiency – traveling in an aeroplane or driving on a highway – are the most unfulfilling.
‘[Technology] begins with initial excitement, ends in a terminal state of boredom or at least indifference, and along the way delivers a healthy dose of unintended consequences.’ (93)
Instruments and devices
Despite his pessimism about technology in general, Crouch takes a positive attitude to machines which enhance people and their abilities (which he calls ‘instruments’) rather than technology which replaces people (which he calls ‘devices’).
Good technology is used by humans ‘to focus and unleash genuine human power’ (137). This type of technology improves lives over time and ‘expand[s] the capacity of human beings without shrinking other parts of us at the same time’ (142).
Finally, Crouch presents a future that is focused on true community. He stresses the importance of households - communities formed around the people we regularly interact with - as a cornerstone to human flourishing. These are relationships built on trust and humility – not the effortless power offered by technology.
Additionally, Crouch calls Christians to reject our society’s desire to maximize efficiency from people, which leads us to treat people like robots, and rather accept all people into community, not just those who are economically useful.
Is this is really the life we're looking for?
The Life We’re Looking For clearly explains the negative impact technology has had on personal relationships and presents a compelling vision of a community-based future. It is certainly important to recognize the downside of technology and our own sinful desires that cause us to embrace the impersonal over real relationships. It raised many good questions and so I would recommend it for both those developing technology and those entrenched in our tech-obsessed world.
However, there are two aspects of this book which prevent a whole-hearted recommendation.
First, Crouch seems to glamorize a society without technology. Certainly, some elements of life would be better without advanced technology, but it seems naïve to assume that we would all be experiencing emotionally fulfilling, personal relationships if only we rejected any technology which doesn’t clearly enhance every aspect of personhood.
Even those technologies which Crouch explicitly highlights as having aspects which are not personally fulfilling – such as airplanes, highways, and iPods – bring huge benefits to our society. Real technology rarely fits nicely into the clear categories he presents of personhood-affirming or personhood-destroying.
The difficulty of real technology is that it often provides value to its users that is inseparably linked to its negative aspects. It is easy to say we should reject technology which doesn’t build community, but it’s much more difficult to find an alternative source of this genuine value with no negative consequences attached.
Second, Crouch does not provide any concrete steps for how to improve our current situation. Crouch presents a binary choice between accepting and using a technology, or rejecting it outright and embracing community. There is no discussion of how we might improve technology.
I think we can all get behind the idea of a future where all technology serves to enhance our relationships and personal dignity without any drawbacks. However, technology is rarely perfected on the first attempt. The book largely ignores the nuanced process of research and development where issues are solved slowly through iteration.
Towards better technologies
Perhaps this is simply my natural techno-optimism, but I do believe that technology which may currently be detrimental to our personal relationships can be improved with time. As both a personal user of technology and as an engineer designing technology, I left this book without a realistic way forward. Simply rejecting technology rather than trying to improve it seems doomed to fail. It is possible that some individuals may successfully imitate the Amish and remove from their lives any technology which doesn’t actively enhance personal relationships, but this does not seem like a realistic way forward for the church or society as a whole.
In the final chapter, Crouch summarizes the goal of this book as a call ‘to truly restore the conditions of personhood, to dethrone devices and revive instruments, to shun isolation and rebuild households, and above all to recognize the persons who have no usefulness to Mammon and its regime’ (198). It is a cause I can fully support.
Despite my two points of concern, the book provides good insight into the negative impact of technology on our personal relationships and the importance of personhood-affirming community. It is a thought-provoking book that was worth the time to read.
The Life We're Looking For: Reclaiming Relationship in a Technological World is available to buy on Amazon.
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