just-a-tool

A topic of perennial interest in technology studies is how technology shapes the way people think.  It is clear that the way people think affects technology, as in the example of how gender is encoded in architecture, recently noted in this blog.

It is less obvious that influence goes the other way too.  People tend to think that they have fixed or solid set of ideas and preferences and, then, design technology to conform to them.  This view is represented in the expression that technology is "just a tool."

Dr. Rahul Parikh has written an interesting piece on the "Uberization" of medicine.  By this expression, Dr. Parikh refers to app services that some start-ups have created to allow doctors to perform freelance medical consultations over the Internet.