Occasionally I'd agree, but overall I feel a pleasant mixture of hope and some horror. There are people here with a compassionate, humane understanding of tech

Occasionally I'd agree, but overall I feel a pleasant mixture of hope and some horror. There are people here with a compassionate, humane understanding of technology, who see the dangers alongside benefits and get the complex social implications. Amongst the general population, and even within academia, I often feel isolated, but people here give me enormous hope and courage that I am not alone as a critical thinker. Their good humour lifts my spirits. A smaller group are callous, parochial, selfish but dangerously intelligent people with a Dr. Strangelove style fetish for Brave New Worlds, Singularities and Technological Master-Races. They believe they are a "majority", that others should get out of their way, and they hide behind the banner of "inevitable progress". They would steamroller over the weaker, poorer and less intelligent margins of humanity, burn freedom and sell their souls to make a buck. They are also humourless and prickly in defence of technological golden-calfs. En masse they constitute a blindly-progressive mob-rule centred around technology that terrifies me as much as any far left or right wing political or religious extremists. On balance, I think the former, reflective group have the upper hand. All kinds of opinions are fairly represented here in HN. That co-existence and mutual recognition gives me significant hope.