Defining Technology

Douglas Adams once said our view of technology changes with age:

1. Anything that is in the world when you're born is normal and ordinary and is just a natural part of the way the world works.

2. Anything that's invented between when you're fifteen and thirty-five is new and exciting and revolutionary and you can probably get a career in it.

3. Anything invented after you're thirty-five is against the natural order of things.

It’s funny, but it explains a lot.

We mistake the technology we grow up with for the “natural” state of the world. For someone born in the 1990s, the internet isn’t revolutionary ... it’s just part of the infrastructure. That baseline shapes how we see new ideas and how we design for others who might not share it.

Between fifteen and thirty-five, we’re in the “sweet spot” for innovation ... old enough to understand systems, young enough to change course. Most major tech waves (the web, mobile, social) were driven by people in that window. Their values get baked into what they build.

After thirty-five, resistance sets in ... not just from stubbornness, but from sunk cost. You’ve learned how the world works; new tools threaten that. And when new tech solves problems you don’t have, it’s easy to dismiss it.

The irony is that these attitudes reinforce themselves. Younger people build the future, older people critique it, and both sides end up right in their own ways. Social media is a case in point ... celebrated for connection, criticised for its costs.

Adams’s rules aren’t destiny, though. The best technologists keep curiosity alive long past thirty-five. They know their instincts aren’t neutral, they’re generational. Recognizing that bias is how you stay open, build better, and bridge the gap.

Originally inspired by Douglas Adams's "The Salmon of Doubt: Hitchhiking the Galaxy One Last Time." Read more about the context here.