Is it possible that through the use of a door the deterioration of autonomous individuals today in the world can be observed? Simply by watching the way people walk in and out of a magnetically activated door in a hostel in London our increasing lack of everyday problem solving skills, observation and ultimate independency can be seen.
The door in question is the main entrance into the hostel bed rooms and hence requires a security key card. Any person if even only here for a one night stay would therefore go through the door at least four or five times during their stay. From just those speculative statistics it is reasonable to assume that its simple operation would be promptly learnt, but it appears this is not so.
Despite moving through the door more than a couple of times, each person will scan their card and still pull the door straight away not allowing it time to unlock. This may evidence our fear of missing the period it’s unlocked for resulting in the dauntingly challenging and more importantly publicly embarrassingly task of the person scanning their card again. It may also show our lack of patience and need for instant gratification but inevitably it displays the deterioration of human’s daily problem solving skills. The rapid advancement of technology along with specialisation in a particular job has led us to deepen our learning so much on one subject that we end up knowing a lot about nothing resulting in a world full of inflexible computer-wired humans.
Yes technology has and still is developing rapidly, but sit down and talk to your grandparents and for the most part you will find within them a deep-seeded autonomy. From the stories of when they used to walk to school every day since they were eight-years old to repairing their first car themselves the loss of independency, problem solving and observation in the modern day person start to become apparent.
Let us then disagree with the above argument and state that the reason people can’t open this door is not because of a lack of problem solving, but instead an absence of observance. The lack of observance consists of two parts.
Firstly, that the modern-day person doesn’t particularly pay attention to their own actions. This again can be credited to the numbing of our emotive senses through a growing use of technology traded in for more interpersonal activities; our brains are less active than previous as we spend more time in ‘space,’ using the computer or gaming console for example instead of talking to parents or partners.
Secondly, a lessening observation of those around us is becoming more consistent. In relation to the opening of the door, every person who was sitting nearby and went up to go through still pulled the door immediately. Some allowance must be given though as they were all engrossed in their computers of course.
All this being right or wrong, would these traits be a bad by-product given the advances we’ve made technologically? Twenty plus years ago before we had key-card activated doors a security guard would have been required to watch the multiple doors into the hostel which does allow for a more common human failure. In fact the hostel did have a security guard asking for key-cards just outside the main entrance, but he hardly asked us for evidence as he too was too engrossed in his own telephone.
Inevitably, the opening of a door is only a device through which advancing technology is proving to make us less autonomous. The door is not responsible but merely a stage on which our increasing lack of problem-solving and observance are being shown. That our interaction with computers and robots is seeing us become less in touch with ourselves and the people around us is a bad thing as this is a sign of us losing touch with the basic necessities of life. One thing that is undoubtedly good about the door though is the few hours laughter it gave me, a definite part of everyday life that shouldn’t be lost.
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