Modern Technology Makes Us Buy Things We Don't Need

I once read a story, in which a philosopher who has spent his life absorbed in study goes to a market one day. He is shocked, and says: “There are so many things here which I have no use for.”

For a long time I was confused – why would the philosopher be so shocked? But now I understand that his shock came from realising the huge gap between his own default settings and those of mainstream society.

Every time modern technology presents us with a new possibility, we quickly learn to see it as a necessity, and it becomes a default. The process is becoming shorter and shorter. Consumption has become something that we see as only right and proper.

http://www.chinadialogue.net/article/show/single/en/2228-Default-settings-and-modern-lifestyles

As an anarchist I don't buy stuff I don't need. Seriously, you don't need all iPods, cars, clothes, CDs, computers, TVs and shit. We need to buy less and live more. That's what's anarchism is all about: personal freedom against the power of the multinational corporations. Don't let them turn you into a consumer slave!

Statistical Life Worth Less Today

The "value of a statistical life" is $6.9 million in today's dollars, the Environmental Protection Agency reckoned in May — a drop of nearly $1 million from just five years ago.

Though it may seem like a harmless bureaucratic recalculation, the devaluation has real consequences.

When drawing up regulations, government agencies put a value on human life and then weigh the costs versus the lifesaving benefits of a proposed rule. The less a life is worth to the government, the less the need for a regulation, such as tighter restrictions on pollution.

http://abcnews.go.com/Technology/wireStory?id=5353888

Why do we have to measure everything in money? Isn't money-obsession what got us into polluting our own planet and corrupting our communities?