[an_ko]

It comes down to definitions. What is "positive impact" to you? To me, it means "increasing the total amount of human understanding", not "making everybod happy and Amish".

Edit: By the way, this is the essential difference between Bentham's and Mill's versions of utilitarian philosophy, if you'd like to research further. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Stuart_Mill#Utilitarianis...

[quxbar]

I'd like to barge in and call false dichotomy on this. Despite the excellent citation, I don't think it's correct. I believe technology should let people enjoy more of their lives, not replace it. Understanding is essential to this, but it becomes cheaper as your technology improves, so you're not sacrificing happiness at a fixed rate. We've already gone from industrial steam engines to tiny glass wonder-phones in a couple hundred years, what if technology continues to become less intrusive? Maybe we'll all be look amish yet be omnipotent.

[meric]

human knowledge != human understanding.

You can read about humans, to understand humans you have to form relationships with them and experience them yourself. An analogy would be reading K&R compared to bashing against GCC.