More companies are learning the importance of destructive technologies—innovations that hold the potential to make a product line, or even an entire business segment, virtually outdated.
Indeed, our schools and universities are structured to mould pupils to be mostly obedient servants of rationality, and to develop outdated skills in interacting with outdated machines.
An estimated 6 million televisions and computers are stocked in California homes, and an additional 6,000 to 7,000 computers become outdated every day.
These researchers, influenced by Robert Heilbroner's now outdated development theory, tend to view nontechnological development as an obstacle to progress.
That's bad news for the environment — and our wallets — as these outdated devices consume much more energy than the newer ones that do the same things.