ABSTRACT
Technological progress is increasingly framed as inevitable and universally beneficial, sidelining moral deliberation. The failure to recognise crossroads in decision-making – points where alternative paths and values could be considered – creates a moral vacuum, or blindness, in which efficiency and optimisation override ethical concerns. Across domains from education and creativity to warfare, space colonisation, and transhumanism, technological possibility becomes an imperative. This frictionless trajectory privileges dominant interests, marginalises alternative visions, and normalises exploitation, making resistance or even noticing alternatives ever more difficult.
