The Benefits and Negative Effects of Cars - Essay Example

Automobility AUTOMOBILITY Titus Rock Manickam Order No. 272230 06 February 2006 AUTOMOBILITY Loren Lomasky in "Autonomy and Automobility" argues that on balance the benefits of automobility outweigh the negative effects of automobility. Which reasons does she provide to support her position The benefits or negative effects of cars are subject to much debate even now. Nobody appears to be paying attention to the howls of protest by environmentalists on the negative effects of cars. However, the unrelenting protests continue and so do sale of cars. At least in the developing regions of the world, the sale of cars does not appear to show any sign of plateau or going down. On the contrary, they are rising. In the developed countries, the sales are stagnating because almost everyone has a car. Loren Lomasky holds the view that automobiles allow us to choose where we will live, where we will work, and to separate these two choices from each other. She also thinks that automobiles enhance knowledge. She says that automobiles take us to any place from watching birds to visiting battlegrounds. She also says that automobiles enhance privacy and allow us control over our immediate environment. The reason why so many people are buying cars is because there are benefits in having a car, something that cannot be said about other means of transport. There are public transportations too such as buses and taxis. However, although these too have benefits, they do not provide privacy. Having a private car greatly increases one's mobility. The environmentalists may raise a hue and cry about the ill-effects of the car. But there is little they can do to provide alternatives (Loren Lomasky). Mathew Paterson argues that to explain the rise and subsequent dominance of automobility as a mode of transportation in contemporary societies it is necessary to examine: a) the political economy of automobility; and b) the cultural politics of automobility. How does Paterson's analysis differ from Lomasky's (a) Political economy of automobility. Matthew Paterson has used environment and the capitalist structure to highlight the reason for the rise and dominance of automobility. In the early years of the twentieth century when cars began to be used in the place of horse carts, the population of cars was insignificant and restricted to the very wealthy. In due time the number of cars increased. Today, the population of cars is high enough to warrant their restriction by environmentalists. A richer class of people will by all means buy a car. Paterson emphasizes the centrality of the car to capitalism. Capitalism had major influence in projecting the value of the car. The capitalist ideology provided the boost to the car industry to evolve through a combination of factors that cover industrialization, taxation, employment and road construction (b) Cultural politics Transportation is not the only need for a car. The basic purpose in owning a car is indeed transportation. However, there is the aura of a culture that has evolved with the automobile. Paterson projects the social, cultural and ability to commute fast in a car that has shaped the need for a car. Unlike Loren Lomasky, he has not concentrated on the benefits of the car. He has instead focused on the underlying reasons for the evolution of the car as a necessity rather than a luxury that has made it so ubiquitous today. Paterson says that our dependence on cars must be understood from the culture that we have allowed to take root in our midst. In order to address environmental issues it is necessary to address this culture and correct the anomalies that have allowed the car to play a dominant role in our affairs (Automobile politics). Several of the authors we have read have argued that is not useful to think about "automobile" and "driver" as separate entities. Rather, they argue that we need to think about them as constituting an "assemblage," which has also been termed a "car-driver," a "driver-car," a "Carson" and several other similar terms. Describe the characteristics of this assemblage The car is just a dumb machine. Its importance is in its driver. There is the car and driver union that makes the automobile useful and important. The "assemblage" is the car-driver or driver-car or the "Carson". The authors have drawn other parallels to make apt the comparison between the car and its driver. The car has been compared to the airplane, insurance, health care, and a great swathe of the economy. The car-driver duo is not the result of mating, but a genuine partnership of man and machine. It is the cementing of the inanimate with a human being, not literally but objectively. It is theoretical and tentative. There is the road. The work of the driver is to take the car along the road. Even in the road, the driver has to drive keeping certain rules and norms in mind. He cannot drive as he pleases. Even if he drives with pleasure it has to be done within the set rules. The term car-driver also brings to mind cyborg. The idea of cyborg is to implant a little device into the body which helps an organ or muscle perform optimally. Here the human is still in control. It is only little devices that help coordinate his movements or provide information into a control system (Tim Dant). According to the authors we have read to date, how has the experience of travel been transformed by motorized transport, first with the advent of railways and later with automobiles The railways transformed long-distance mode of travel. It created a mass movement of people and goods from one place to another. The advent of railways made travel cheaper and easier covering long distances. Also, the railways were invented first. The idea about traveling in a car came much later. However, the railways had their limitations. They were not suited for short distance travel, and for doorstep deliveries and collections. Also, the railways services were concentrated on traveling by a huge collection of people. They required very long, unending tracks, large premises for stations, and team work consisting large groups of personnel. The roads provided better convenience for doorstep deliveries. Construction of roads provided better facilities for door-to-door travel. Automobiles became the ideal means of travel for those who constantly had to reach doorstep destinations such as doctors, salesmen, and even the average man. A common man who wished to be dropped at his residential doorstep had to take the help of an automobile. The railways and automobiles complemented each other. The railways undertook to transport individuals across vast distances. The automobiles provided the services from the stations to the ultimate destination. However, at times they also competed with each other. In case the driver so wishes, he could take the car on very long drives. He could travel the distance the train traveled. Sources: Automobile politics: ecological and cultural political economy (paper), http://www.lavoisier.fr/notice/gb105925.html Loren Lomasky, Autonomy and Automobility, 01 June 1995, Competitive Enterprise Institute, http://cei.org/gencon/025,01437.cfm Matthew Paterson, Automobile Politics, http://www.cambridge.org/us/catalogue/catalogue.aspisbn=9780521691307&ss=fro Tim Dant, The Driver-Car, Theory Culture and Society, http://tcs.sagepub.com Read More