GRE Issue Topic 85

Sample 1:

To presume that technological advancements should serve the desires of humans for leisure is, at the very least, self–serving. Greater efficiency should make it possible for humans to accomplish more in a given period of time, However, advances in technology should improve not only the lives of humans in a variety of ways but also other life forms and the Earth itself. If any aspect of daily life on the planet is ignored by improvements in technology, some other aspect will suffer.

The advent of mechanization in the nineteenth century undoubtedly improved the efficiency of human activity. The cotton gin and the McCormack reaper changed agriculture forever by replacing backbreaking human labor with machine power. These advances enabled farmers to plant more crops and accomplish more work in less time. The steam engine enabled people to travel more quickly along the length of America's great rivers and across the country by train. Because more goods could move more efficiently, new factories arose and the demand for raw materials increased. Rather than creating more leisure time, mechanization created more jobs and a boost to the economies in countries that adopted it. In the twentieth century, mechanization entered the home, making it possible for housewives to complete household chores with greater efficiency. The vacuum cleaner eliminated the need to beat rugs hanging on a line in the backyard. The automatic washing machine replaced washboards and hand wringing of wet clothes. Eventually, the dishwasher and microwave would make short shrift of other kitchen chores. The upshot of these advances in technology had an effect contrary to creating more leisure time. Instead, women were able to enter the workforce. Greater efficiency in the home made possible the foray of housewives into the world of education, medicine, and business. Efficiency created by technological advances created time to complete more tasks rather than creating more leisure time.

Leisure time is not important when other aspects of life have not been improved by technological advances. The ability to spend leisure time traveling, for example, would have fewer benefits if all forms of travel had not been made safer. The frequency with which airliners crash and scores of people are killed has greatly diminished despite the fact that more planes and people take to the air every day. Going on vacation in the family car is safer because of air bags that make it more likely for passengers to survive a crash. Thanks to advances in communication technology, families can spend their leisure time enjoying any type of entertainment on their high– definition televisions.

More leisure time would be meaningless if technology had not made it possible to live longer, healthier lives. Implantable pacemakers and defibrillators enable people with heart disease to pursue active lifestyles. Those who previously were affected by debilitating osteoarthritis can have damaged joints replaced and enjoy their leisure time pain free. More children live to become healthy adults as a result of advances in vaccinations and treatment of childhood cancers.

Advances in technology have allowed scientists to monitor the climate conditions on Earth. We know that human activity has contributed to the depletion of natural resources that affect the environment. The hole in the ozone layer caused by greenhouse gases has created an alarming increase in the incidence of skin cancer. Deforestation in the rain forests has led to the extinction of important plant and animal species. Climate change is melting the ice caps, imperiling the existence of polar bears and causing water levels to rise in coastal areas. Technological advances must address these conditions, or human leisure time will become meaningless.

Sample 2:

Starting from the Stone Age, man has been exploring different ways and means to make his life comfortable. There have been numerous technological discoveries and developments which have aided in making the world what it is today. The modern man has access to various technological gadgets which have made his life much more comfortable as compared to the life led by his forefathers. Moreover, man has become more efficient as he now has the assistance of technology to carry out his routine work. There is no doubt that the primary goal of technological advancement should be to increase people’s efficiency, but creating more leisure time cannot be related to either the technological developments or the increased efficiency of man.

The advent of technology has definitely made life better by improving various aspects like communicating and traveling across the globe. People can now access information on any subject from the internet at the click of a button rather than having to search through books and libraries. Has the time that has been saved, utilized by the internet surfer for leisure? On the contrary, he would be busy searching for other information on the internet which perhaps is not all that important for him. Moreover, he may start looking for some opportunity on the net to work part-time and earn some money in the additional time that he now has. This indicates that the technological development in the form of internet services has made people more efficient, but this increased efficiency of people has not led to the creation of leisure time for them.

People can fly to any part of the modern world in a matter of hours. Compare this with the people in the past who took several weeks or months to sail from one country to the other. Have these technological advancements created more leisure time for people in the present world? On the contrary, people are much busier than their ancestors were in the past. People can fly to their destinations easily and this has led to an increase in the number of conferences and corporate meetings that are held in some other part of the country and employees are expected to do extensive traveling to meet the company’s requirements. People spend hours traveling to their offices due to the traffic congestion on roads because of the numerous vehicles which are a result of technological advancements. Therefore, it can be seen that technological development has made man efficient, but its goal could never be to provide leisure time as that would lead to the dilution of the standards of the technology being developed.

If technology had been developed with the aim of giving leisure time to people, then we could not have reached where we are today. People would have leisure time if they could not travel to distant places easily and so the companies would be restricted to carrying out their conferences locally, thus giving their employees leisure time which they would have otherwise spent in traveling. If there were no internet, people would not have been hooked on to the internet till late in the night. They would have utilized the time thus spent for relaxing or going out with their family. In other words, people would have got leisure time only if these technological advancements were either non-existent or they were of a lesser magnitude. If we wish to see man more efficient in the future as compared to what he is today, then the technological developments will have to be planned keeping in mind the efficiency of man with total disregard to his leisure time.