Blog Entry #2

To further help my understanding of the word ‘technology’, I asked my dad to tell me what he thought the word meant. My dad has a degree in computer engineering, so he would have a lot of experience with what most people call technology. He defined technology as, “The means to accomplishing a task using specialized methods, processes, or products”. This goes along a lot with my original idea of doing something, or accomplishing a task, but I focused mainly on the products side of it. I think my dad brought up a good point with methods and processes. Technology does not necessarily have to be an object, or something tangible you can buy at a store, it can be an idea, or a way to do something. I thought my idea of technology was very broad, but looking at what my dad said, mine now seems too narrow. For instance, if we look at the scientific method, I would have originally defined something this method produced as technology, whereas my dad would define the scientific method itself as technology. Another key word in my dad’s definition is the word ‘specialized’. I think that this word plays a major role in what my dad would call technology. Technology is not simply doing some random thing and eventually accomplishing something by sheer luck, but it is planned out, and created to accomplish whatever task is at hand. This brings up the idea of technology as being well thought out and somewhat advanced in that you cannot simply stumble upon technology.