Technology is going too far

In some areas I do agree that technology needs to step several miles back. Such technology that puts people out of work is too much. However, some technology, like computers, tablets and smart phones have helped people do their jobs quicker and in some ways easier. Gaming system technology has greatly improved video games far beyond what I thought would be possible in the 1980s and 1990s. I love that. That is my opinion and I am sticking to it.

I really think people romanticise the past to a huge degree and tend to see 'technology' as the demon that destroyed some bucolic idyll.

For the most part, human history was pretty labour intensive. Lives were short and grim and full of physical pain and illness. A lot of the historical giants that people mention on these forums died very young of eminently curable disease.

I imagine if you could zip back in time and offer to swap our First World existence, with its myriad niggly problems, with the life of a medieval peasant with its injustices, starvation, sickness and back-breaking effort, I'd say the peasant would take your hand off.

It's akin to looking at the most under-developed and disease-stricken parts of 21st Century earth and getting all misty-eyed about their simple, rustic existence. Without technology, life for most people is a very short stint in a very nasty hellhole.

I am a minimalist by nature. Of course I am using technology, but I don't feel that it needs to permeate all aspects of my existence. My refrigerator makes things cold: that's it. My air conditioner does the same. I feel no need to have updates from either appliance sent to my phone every hour.

I like spending time in the woods with nothing around me but trees and nature. It's good to get away from it all from time to time and just do nothing but look at nature. Yes, sometimes (most times actually) I fantasize about walking off into the wilderness and living like my ancestors. I long to wash the stink of civilization off me. But then I realize that having a grocery store and a hospital nearby is a nice thing. So poof goes the fantasy.

I do think we can live simply and use technology sparingly. Finding that balance is the conundrum.

Thanks for the responses. I love the low tech lifestyle. I've never owned a cell phone or even credit or atm card and am a bit angered that society is making these things "neccessities". (My wife has them so don't ask how I book a hotel). All this talk of an all-digital economy is something I find especially troubling. Kids being born today might have every penny they spend their whole life recorded in an eternal cloud. I doubt they will care. Today's youth put every thought and emotion they have on their devices so why not everything they buy? When you mention privacy to them, they look at you like you have an extra eye on your forehead and say "you shouldn't need privacy if you aren't doing anything illegal". They respond the same way when I mention that I don't want a smart TV that has a camera on it that is looking at me. Then of course they start to explain the benefits of technology, as if I didn't know them.
The bottom line is that for every technological advancement, comes a negative. A sword is a great thing to defend yourself with but you can also get killed by one. Nuclear energy can power the world but nuclear bombs can destroy it. A car gets you around but we all know a lot of people who have died because of them (not the fault of the car....just like technology itself isn't to blame).
Sure, technology has helped us....A LOT. But no caveman ever developed a bomb or a germ that could kill us all...and no medieval scientist ever discovered a way to wage a cyberwar that would turn us into Mad Max.
Oh well, at least I'll have a sword if I run out of ammo...and thankfully it is not a smart sword.
My grandmother had a quote she often used. I should have asked her if it came out after the first nuclear weapons were used but I'll never know where she got it...
We're so smart, we're stupid.

That's pretty funny. Even I am not concerned enough to think that tennis rackets or swords will get microchips but who knows. There was a point where nobody envisioned electricity. There was a time when nobody envisioned an electric refrigerator. There was a time when nobody envisioned cameras in electric refrigerators. I'm not envisioning smart tennis rackets or swords but I've also learned to never underestimate what humans can do with technology. 
When we start putting chips in people (it's actually already begun) are we going to call them smart? If you refuse the chip you will certainly be called dumb. I don't think the government will force people to get chipped in my lifetime but it will happen eventually. Of course it will start out with good intentions, to monitor criminals or dementia patients. If you have a chip in your dog for protection why wouldn't you want one in your kids? 

And the chips will offer all type of cool gizmos to attract willing (and paying) participants.

It's perfectly possible--and I think laudable--to be both a minimalist that enjoys human basics on everyday and mundane things, and yet be a science nerd who loves the cutting edge. In fact a couple decades ago, I and a few colleagues coined the term "TeLu," or "technophile luddite," for it.

The kind of person who eschews the latest home shopping network kitchen gadget or mostly redundant smartphone app for what can be done old school--but is excited about actual researchers developing quantum computers or deep sea or solar system exploration or unraveling genetics and epigenetics.

In fact, part of how the term got coined, we might wonder whether humanity has wasted a lot of money, resources and attention on commercializing ultimately trivial advances to sell everywhere, when instead we'd often be better off with most of us enjoying the woods in a tent a lot more... looking up and knowing that we're simultaneously farther out among the stars.

In the same boat as you really, I have a Reddit account because you can find interesting things on there and WhatsApp to keep in touch with my sister abroad but that's it. I just never really cared about any of it. Not a lot of friends outside of work and most of my family gets together multiple times a year so Ill talk to them then. I just really get annoyed sometimes with the hyper-capitalist and consumerist nature of technology even thought I fall for the honey trap sometimes.

Quick question since some here have a science background. I don't have any real trepidation about an "over teched" society, if you will allow that kind of phrasing, but I often wonder about sustainability since so much tech requires rare and precious metals. Is that something to worry about down the line or just needless fear-mongering?