Catching word/term for people who support technology as a solution for everything and techno-progressivism? [closed]

Solution 1:

techno-utopian

From Wikipedia:

Technological utopianism (often called techno-utopianism or technoutopianism) is any ideology based on the premise that advances in science and technology could and should bring about a utopia, or at least help to fulfill one or another utopian ideal.

Hence, to refer to a person who ascribes to such a belief system: technological utopian or techno-utopian, with or without the hyphen - personally I prefer it with, as it is easier to read properly.¹ (Utopianist² also exists as an alternative to utopian and could also be used, if you preferred.)

Techno-utopian is quite a new word and the only dictionary I can find that specifically carries it is Wiktionary, which has it both with and without the hyphen:

Adjective

techno-utopian (comparative more techno-utopian, superlative most techno-utopian)

Believing that technological advances will create a utopia.

---

Noun

techno-utopian (plural techno-utopians)

A person of techno-utopian beliefs.

Despite the lack of dictionary entries, the word can easily be found in journalism, and is both well-established and readily understandable from its constituent parts for those to whom it is new:

The Singularity of Fools: A special report from the utopian future

Foreign Policy, David Rieff, April 29 2013

...

If utopia has always been a kind of escape clause from the human condition, contemporary techno-utopianism represents a radical upping of the ante. For entrepreneur Peter Diamandis, creator of the X Prize to spur the development of passenger-carrying private spaceships and other innovations, not only will technology make it so that "during our lifetime … we’re moving off this planet," but it will solve even the gravest problems that confront humanity — climate change, species extinction, water and energy shortages.

...

Don’t Believe the Techno-Utopian Hype

Newsweek, Niall Ferguson, 30 July 2012

Are you a technoptimist or a depressimist? This is the question I have been pondering after a weekend hanging with some of the superstars of Silicon Valley. I had never previously appreciated the immense gap that now exists between technological optimism, on the one hand, and economic pessimism, on the other. Silicon Valley sees a bright and beautiful future ahead. Wall Street and Washington see only storm clouds. The geeks think we’re on the verge of The Singularity. The wonks retort that we’re in the middle of a Depression.

...

technoptimist

The above Newsweek article also uses technoptimist with more or less the same meaning as techno-utopian. It hasn't made it into any dictionaries yet (or, at least, I couldn't find it).

Technoptimist is definitely in use, and isn't just a semi-witty nonce word coined by a journalist.

For instance, we can find the term in use in an interview on Quartz with a tech-enthusiastic doctor:

Bob Wachter, a physician and professor of medicine at the University of California, San Francisco, has championed the use of technology in hospital care. And, yet, he has seen time and again that the problem lies mainly in the implementation of technology.

where the accompanying picture of the interview subject is captioned:

The technoptimist doctor.

An article on the website of Oxford Insights, a consultation firm that provides tech implementation advice to the public sector, uses technoptimist in contrast to technoskeptic - opposite poles on a spectrum of opinion:

AI and legitimacy: government in the age of the machine

...

The truth of the effects of AI on societies is likely somewhere between the “technoskeptic” and the “technoptimist” predictions. Regardless of where one falls on the scale, the adoption of artificial intelligence by government raises important questions about government legitimacy.

(Depressimist seems to be the term that technoptimist is usually contrasted with, as indeed it was in the Newsweek article. While depressimist has the questionable merit of being a portmanteau word formed similarly to technoptimist, it isn't as specific or as easy to understand as technoskeptic, especially without having technoptimist to clarify the meaning in context.)

The word technoptimist seems to be most often used in people's self-describing self-promoting blurbs; I am reluctant to link to even one of them but it is trivial to find examples with any reasonable search engine.

Alternative forms, techno-optimist and tech-optimist (with and without the hyphen), can also be found, as can the full forms, technology optimist and technological optimist.

In a Huffington Post article entitled "Why Techno-Optimism Is Dangerous" from July 2016, we can see the following example:

This general view about technological progress has been endorsed by thinkers including Matt Ridley, David Deutsch, K. Eric Drexler and Peter Diamandis. These techno-optimists do acknowledge dangers. But they find reassurance in a dependable habit of technological progress to clean up after itself.

Simlarly, there is a blog post on DXC.technology with the title "Why I’m a tech optimist".

Technology optimist can be found, for example, in this article on the LinkedIn platform entitled "Why I’m a technology optimist – and you should be too".

We can find technological optimism in the linked article on Big Think called "5 Reasons for Technological Optimism".

Solution 2:

technophile ˈtɛknə(ʊ)fʌɪl
NOUN
a person who is enthusiastic about new technology.
"he became an ardent technophile, buying every new gadget on the market"

The word technophile is said to have originated in the 1960s as an "unflattering word introduced by technophobes."

"Other technophiles see genetic engineering as a route to growth that is almost without end"

[EDIT]

If the source for technophile offends your aim to avoid any negative connotation then a positive philosophy word is Technogaians as associated with Transhumanist

Technogaians argue that "only science and technology can help humanity be aware of, and possibly develop counter-measures for, risks to civilization, humans and planet Earth such as a possible impact event"

And if you insist on an established political slant we have

Technoliberals who support such ideas as balance of powers in the government, decentralization, affordable education, the protection of our planet, Fine Arts, and the freedom of speech and communication technologies. However you are moving off centre from the idea of a "Fan of technology" which was fully encapsulated in my first word.

Solution 3:

Since you've added the neologisms tag, how about the portmanteau technophilanthropists? It appears that this word is already in wide enough use as can be evidenced by web search results:

Google search for "technophilanthropist"

This is the most formal web-page I found with this word so far (Library of Congress Catalog page for a certain book) : http://catdir.loc.gov/catdir/enhancements/fy1202/2011039926-d.html

And here is a description of "technophilanthropy" that I found in a commercial website (incidentally, it's about the same book):

Technophilanthropy is one of the most exciting aspects of this current “We” generation. It embraces technology and communication, with a focus on solving problems and helping communities thrive.

Solution 4:

Consider developing an expression which includes the term "Makers".

The maker movement isn't limited to STEM-oriented making, it includes craft and art makers as well, but the maker movement is very strongly associated with DIY (do-it-yourself) technology of every description: Electronics, digital, mechanical, chemistry, even biology, and the intersections among them.

Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maker_culture

One small down-side is that the expression might not speak to people who aren't already familiar with or part of the maker identity, even though they might otherwise be fully ready to grok what it means.

Another is that it doesn't necessarily extend (yet) to a scale beyond projects executed by individuals or small groups of hands-on developers, but in my opinion that is changing: High tech, low size projects are changing the world for people in "underserved" regions of the globe who don't have access to wired utilities, supply chains or networks, and makers are doing it and helping others do it. In other words, what I'm saying is that maker culture begins to change the scale at which policy and technology affect populations. Instead of creating a utility-type or economy-of-scale type production project for some particular technology, makers invent ways for the solution to be developed by small populations with little capital.

I'm sure you can see how that concept strongly associates with the kind of policy values you're talking about, so, with that in mind, if you're able to invent or brainstorm a way to use this expression in your campaign, it could be a step or catalyst toward eliminating that second downside and being an effective bit of messaging.

Solution 5:

Gearheads

a person who pursues mechanical or technological interests (as in automobiles or computers)

Merriam-Webster