Technology just means information technology.

Hear the sharp words of Peter Thiel, venture capitalist and thinker of disruption, who once declared: “Technology just means information technology.” In this phrase lies both a critique and a revelation. For though humanity has known countless forms of technology—engines of steam, wings of flight, harnessed fire, and atomic power—our present age has narrowed its gaze. When men speak of technology now, they almost always mean computers, algorithms, networks, and the digital realm. Thiel’s words call us to recognize the shift: in our time, information technology has become the crown of invention, overshadowing all others.

The origin of this saying is found in the rise of Silicon Valley, where Thiel himself stood among the early pioneers of PayPal and other ventures. In those days, the great promises of the late 20th century—space travel, new materials, bioengineering—seemed to pale before the rapid advances of the digital world. Every headline, every promise, every fortune seemed bound to software and information. The world no longer thought of technology as factories or engines, but as code, as screens, as systems of information that shaped lives more profoundly than steel or steam once had.

Consider the revolution of the internet. In mere decades, it altered not only communication but commerce, governance, and even the nature of human identity. A thousand years of progress in transportation could not equal the transformation wrought in a single generation by digital networks. And so, in the minds of the people, technology became synonymous with information. Ask the ordinary man on the street of the 1990s or 2000s about “technology,” and he would not think of bridges or medicine—he would think of computers, phones, and software. This is the essence of Thiel’s observation.

History shows us that such narrowing of vision is not new. In the Industrial Revolution, “technology” became almost interchangeable with machines and steam engines. In the age of exploration, it meant sails, compasses, and cannons. Each era crowns its own invention as the heart of progress, forgetting the breadth of the term. Thiel’s remark reminds us that our own time has chosen information technology as its king, and perhaps we have forgotten that there are other realms of human ingenuity awaiting light.

The heart of his wisdom is both a celebration and a caution. It celebrates the undeniable triumph of digital progress: the ability to move knowledge across the earth in seconds, to calculate in moments what once took centuries, to connect souls across oceans. But it cautions us too, for when we believe that technology means only information, we may blind ourselves to other frontiers—energy, medicine, space, and beyond—that still hunger for discovery. To confine our imagination is to stunt our destiny.

The lesson is clear: honor the power of information technology, for it has reshaped the world. But do not forget that technology in its true sense is broader still. Seek innovation not only in code and data but also in the healing arts, in the stewardship of the earth, in the exploration of the stars. Refuse to let the word “technology” become too small, too narrow, lest our vision of progress be chained to a single field while others wither in neglect.

So I say to you, children of tomorrow: be grateful for the gifts of information, but remember that technology is the story of humanity’s partnership with tools in every form. Do not let your age’s obsession blind you to greater horizons. For Thiel’s saying is both mirror and warning—technology just means information technology today, but it need not always be so. Let the next age expand the word again, until it encompasses not only what we know but all that we dare to dream.