Our information technology is a wonderful servant but a terrible master. It allows us to connect—but used without discipline it destroys connection.

It can obsess us, like a narcotic, if we let it. And corrupt minds use it to unleash hatred.

A writer, Gaymon Bennett in Sojourners (“Silicon Valley’s Original Sin,” January, 2019) complains of Silicon Valley’s lack of moral realism. “The trouble with the Valley, the trouble with the gospel of the iPhone, ubiquitous computing, and automation, is that it has been pursued as if technology doesn’t have a shadow.”

Science gets ahead of us, presents us with solutions but no understanding of shadows.

Advances in food technology freed populations in the developed world from the old scourge of famine. Who could not be grateful? Who wants starving men, women, and children? Yet freedom from famine, without discipline, led us to junk food and unhealthy lifestyles.

The widespread use of penicillin, beginning in the 1940’s, was followed by other “miracle” drugs to successfully combat the old scourge of infections. Yet, overused, the infections they fought became stronger still.

Science does not save us. It provides tools. How we discipline ourselves in the use of these tools determines their ultimate benefit. And that requires a moral compass beyond the capacity of science to provide.