The Automobile: Reflections and Questions
Themes for the automobile:
- mass production
- the assembly line--and its impact on
workers
- the limits of mass production
- the participation of the working class in
consumer
culture after Ford's $5 day.
- the match between the automobile and
American values
- people seee the looks of an automobile as a
reflection of themselves
- automobiles are used as a measure of status
- independence, freedom
- reliability, want a sense of being in control
- privacy
- consequences--both predictable and
unpredictable
Little Conoco on the
Prairie,
Brighton, Colorado
Thinking about the impact of technology
- divide between intended and unintended
consequences
- divide between first order consequences
(essential
needs, such as more gasoline) and second order consequences (new
possibilities that arise, such as the development of motels and fast
food restaurants)
- the automobile shows the importance of
effects
of scale--people couldn't predict some impacts, such as pollution,
because
it was hard to imagine that there would be so many automobiles and that
trivial
effects would be important because of the numbers
- consider the outside influences on
consequences,
such as the military goals of the interstate highway system.
Predicting the future growth and impact of
technology:
Bad predictions cost us in wasted investment and
careers. If we look at the pattern of bad predictions we can
perhaps see how to do
better. (source: Herb Brody, "Great
Expectations: Why
Technological Predictions Go Awry" Albert H. Teich, Technology and
the
Future, sixth edition (New York: St. Martin's Press, 1993).)
mid-size
family car of 2010, according to Ford
compare Toyoto Prius
- The people who are hoping to profit from a
new technology often make the most misleading predictions. They
necessarily want to
promote what they are doing, but repeatedly claiming a breakthrough
when
the problems of commercialization are not yet solved is probably
harmful even
for them in the long run. Eg. high-temperature superconductors,
nuclear
fusion.
- Even if the technology works (eg. robots)
people
may not want to buy it. Who do you ask--the vendors?
Obviously
biassed. But consumers, even businesses buying factory equipment,
may
be biassed too because they don't realize how attitudes towards the
technology
will shift (eg. fax machine).
- it also depends on how you use the
technology--in
1991 Brody is writing about cd-roms vs. bigger hard disks, but the
cd-rom
finally has taken off in areas with a great emphasis on graphics.
- can existing technologies improve to compete
with
new technologies?--eg. cameras that store images in digital form vs.
improvements in silver-halide film.
- consumers are unwilling to spend money on
small
improvements, particularly if they seem inconvenient. You also
need
the whole system, such as stores to rent videotapes or videodisks.
- truly innovative technologies often take 10
to
25 years to enter widespread use.
Brody's 1991 list of popular predictions:
neural-network computers, shirt-pocket telephones, hypermedia,
computer-generated virtual realities, intelligent
highway systems .
Smart Road
Smart Roads:
- when you widen roads then more people move further out of
the
city--amount of traffic increases to fill the roads
- what can you do?
- increase the cost: raise gas taxes, road pricing
- computer controlled cars on the road
Other issues:
This page written and copyright ©
Pamela E. Mack
History
122
last updated 11/18/05
