​AMISH

Limits on technology

 

Amish own horse-drawn buggies, not cars (but they can take a ride in someone else's car).

Farm machinery is generally horse-drawn, although some communities permit tractors with steel wheels as such tractors can't be used on the road.

They don't allow telephones or electricity in their houses, because both of these technologies would literally connect them to the world through their wires. Electricity and petrol/diesel power are used in barns for work purposes. Shared telephones are available outside houses in business premises or telephone booths.

Televisions, radios and stereos are not used, which helps keep the Amish unpolluted by the values advanced by the mass media.

For similar reasons, computers with internet access are banned, although Amish can use a computer at an outside workplace.

They don't use cameras because photos break the biblical ban on making 'graven images' (Exodus 20:4)