Technology, Progress, and Freedom by Edward W. Younkins Technology represents man's attempt to make life easier. Technological advances improve people's standard of living, increase leisure time, help eliminate poverty, and lead to a greater variety of products. Progress allows people more time to spend on higher level concerns such as character development, love, religion, and the perfection of one's soul. If people resisted technological change, they would be expressing their satisfaction with existing levels of disease, hunger, and privation. An innovative idea from one man not only contributes to the progress of others, but also creates conditions permitting people to advance even further.
Ideas interact in unexpected ways, and innovations are frequently used in unforeseen applications.
Technological progress involves a series of stages consisting of experimentation, competition, errors, and feedback. Innovations do not simply replace other products. Rather, they develop new and expanded markets of their own. New technology does not cause a net increase in unemployment or make labor obsolete. While technology eliminates some jobs, it is a net creator of jobs because resulting higher profits are reinvested.