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Paper #1

Technology: A Psychological Substitution for the Western Frontier

        Frederick Jackson Turner, one of the most famous of American historians, believed that the western frontier made the American character expansive.  In his essay, “The Significance of the Frontier in American History,” Turner emphasizes the frontier’s influence on the American character: “American social development has been continually beginning over again on the frontier.  This perennial rebirth, this fluidity of American life, this expansion westward with its new opportunities, its continuous touch with the simplicity of primitive society, furnish the forces dominating American character” (519).  The western frontier offered Americans new opportunities, including a chance to settle on free land, and also a sense of freedom and adventure.  Once the free land disappeared and there was no room left for further expansion, Americans needed other ways to stretch their horizons.  Americans were forced to find psychological substitutions for the western frontier in order to continue to expand the American character.  They turned to technology, especially advances in economics, politics, and medicine.
	Similar to the western frontier, the technological frontier offered Americans new opportunities and a sense of adventure.  This sense of adventure provided Americans with the motivation to take certain risks that we may not have been able to take in the past.  Even though motivation is necessary to take these chances, it cannot carry out them alone.  Technology provides the means necessary for carrying out these chances.  Because Americans have succeeded in carrying out risks, we have advanced in many areas.  These areas include economics, politics, and medicine. 
	Technology has benefited both economics and politics greatly.  It has helped Americans to increase production by allowing us to manufacture more goods in less time.  This allows us to increase our retail, which eventually benefits our economy.  Technology has also helped Americans to make political advances.  It has led to both the development of new weapons and the increased production of these weapons.  Because our weapons are much more advanced than other nations, we are able to maintain our high political status.  The economy and politics are not the only areas that have benefited from the technological frontier. 
	Medicine is another area that technology has helped to progress.  It deals with the prevention, alleviation, and cure of diseases.  Technology has enabled Americans to study diseases in detail, as well as to discover important information about these diseases, including underlying causes and symptoms.  We have been able to create more effective treatments using this information, as well as preventions and cures. There are still many unknown diseases, so the technological frontier of medicine will continue to aid in advances in this area.
	The economy, politics, and medicine are all areas that have benefited from the technological frontier, due to advances made in all of these areas.  Technology is just one of the psychological substitutions that Americans have found for the western frontier.  It is a way for Americans to stretch their horizons.  Technology continues to expand the American character in the same way that Turner believed the western frontier did in the past.  This new frontier provides Americans with opportunity and a sense of adventure just as the western frontier had offered at one time. 





















Works Cited
Turner, Frederick Jackson.  “The Significance of the Frontier in American History.” 
	Creating America: Reading and Writing Arguments.  3rd ed.  Eds. Joyce Moser 
	and Ann Waters.  Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice Hall, 2002.  518-26.