=在技术世界里，你每天都会看到这一原则在发挥作用。曾经一度被视为非常神奇的东西很快就变的习以为常，更糟的是，当这些东西运转不正常时，还会令人沮丧。
3. It’s hard, it turns out, to keep in mind what things were like before the new technology came along.
=事实表明，要把新技术问世之前的情形牢记在心原来是如此困难！ Para. 6
1. Does our fast assimilation of technological progress mean, then, that technology makes no difference?
=那么，我们对新技术的快速吸收是否意味着技术没有发挥什么作用呢？
2. No. It just makes the question of technology’s impact, for good or ill, more complicated.
=不，决非如此。不论好坏，这只是把技术对人类的影响的问题变得更复杂而已。
3. Let’s start with the downside. =让我们先从负面影响谈起吧。
4. There are certain ways in which technology makes life obviously worse.
=在某些方面，技术显然使得生活更加糟糕了。
5. Telemarketing, traffic jams, and identity theft all come to mind.
=譬如，我们马上会想到电话推销、交通阻塞以及身份资料失窃等情况。
6. These are all phenomena that make people consciously unhappy. =这些都是让人们明显意识到不幸福的现象。
7. But for the most part, modern critiques of technology have focused not so much on specific, bad technologies as the impact of technology on our human relationships.
=可是，现代的技术评论文章多半都没有把焦点集中在具体的、有害的技术本身上，而是集中在技术对人际关系的影响上。 Para. 7
1. Privacy has become increasingly fragile in a world of linked databases. =在数据库联网的世界里，隐私变得越来越脆弱。
2. In many workplaces, technologies like keystroke monitoring and full recordings of phone calls make it easier to watch workers.
=在许多工作场所，诸如按键监控和电话全程录音之类的技术使得对员工的监视变得更加容易了。
3. The notion that technology disrupts relationships and fractures community gained mainstream prominence as an attack on television. =技术扰乱了人际关系，破坏了社区交往——这样的观念成为人们攻击电视时的主要焦点。
4. Some even say that TV is chiefly responsible for the gradual isolation of Americans from each other.
=有些人甚至说，电视是美国人逐渐相互疏远的罪魁祸首。 5. Similarly, the harmful effects of the Internet, which supposedly further isolates people from what is often called “the real world”.
=同样也有人认为，互联网的负面影响进一步使人们远离了我们常说的“真实世界”。 Para. 8
1. This broad criticism of technology’s impact on relationships is an interesting one and is especially relevant to the question of happiness, because one of the few things we can say for certain is that the more friends and the closer relationships people have, the happier they tend to be.
=这种广义上关于技术影响人际关系的批评颇有趣味，尤其与幸福的问题密切相关，因为我们真正有把握说清楚的事情没有几件，但其中之一是：人们的朋友越多，关系越密切，就越幸福。 Para. 9
1. Today, technological change is so rappid that when you buy something, you do so knowing that in a few months there’s going to be a better,
faster version of the product, and that you’re going to be stuck with the old one.
=今天的技术变化异常神速，购买某种产品时你就知道，在过几个月，比这个产品性能更好、运作更快捷的款式就会问世，而你却不得不继续使用旧款式的产品。
2. Someone else, in other words, has it better. =换句话说，别人买到的产品要比你的好。
3. It’s as if disappointment were built into acquisition from the very beginning.
=这种失望感仿佛从你开始购买这件产品时就已经深深植入你的认知系统中了。 Para. 10
1. Daily stress, an annoying sense of disappointment, fear that the government knows a lot more about you than you would like it to ----- these are obviously some of the ways in which technology reduces people’s sense of well-being.
=日常生活的压力、一种令人烦恼的失望感、对政府知晓你的情况超出你所希望的程度而造成的恐惧感——这些显然都是技术降低了人们幸福感的几个方面。
2. But the most important impact of technology on people’s sense of well-being is in the field of health care.