Technological Criticism

Technological Criticism

To be unable to criticize technology is to be insane. This particular kind of insanity is the hallmark of modern society.

Allow me to justify the preceding statements. 

The Logos of Techne

It is difficult to think of a word for what we call "technology" in any ancient tongue or culture. In fact, it occurred to me recently that the word is rather bizarre in itself--something approaching a contradiction in terms. Logos and techne were fundamental categories to the Greeks and especially the Greek philosophers, but they existed in strong contradistinction to each other. Logos is the realm of knowledge, of discourse, of accounting for a particular reality, whether by means of abstract philosophy, mathematical calculation, or narrative. Techne, in contrast, is the realm of craft, of skilled practice aimed at creation and action.

It is by this time a very old intellectual-history commonplace to point to the connections between magic and technology, even to say, as C.S. Lewis did, that the main or only distinction between magic and technology is that one worked, and the other did not. There is truth in this, but it is nonetheless somewhat deceptive. Techne or craft in the pre-modern sense is in fact closely allied to magic, precisely because by its very nature it defies logos in the sense of pre-determined abstraction and calculation. The magician is a practitioner of a craft, but like many pre-modern craftsman, his craft cannot be neatly set out in a mathematical simulation or technical manual; he operates on a mixture of innate skill, honed practice, habit, planning, improvisation, and technique. Wizardry operates on the guild system, with masters and apprentices; there is no magical proletariat. Books of spells or alchemical texts read much like the Byzantine recipes for paints and metal alloys that I translated earlier this year: succinct sets of directions for already skilled and practiced craftsmen to achieve practical ends, given in imprecise proportions, with many options and lots of freedom to alter and experiment baked in.

Technology, though, is not techne. It is not a skill inhering in a skilled laborer operating on technique and instinct beyond the realms of abstract knowledge and calculation. It is, by its very nature, totally calculated and determined in advance, through the distinctively modern and scientific obsession with applied mathematics. 

Neither, though, is technology logos in the general sense of that word. Plato in many of his dialogues provides what could be rather more fittingly described as technologies: that is, rational accounts of techne in general and its particular species, describing their rational ends, the skills involved, and how to become a better practitioner. Technology, while totally calculated, is aimed emphatically at merely practical and immediate ends; it is rarely analyzed in philosophical or moral terms, and no practitioner of technology would regard such analysis as essential to its nature or operation.

The Earth in Anarchy

The Earth in Anarchy

This is most likely the last thing I will ever write in this space on mass shootings.

This is not an issue I prefer to comment on for a very large number of reasons, the most emphatic of which is that it has become clear to me that it is precisely the writing and proclaiming and glorifying of such events that is most responsible for their continuation, as a virtually unique, imitative, mass-media-driven phenomenon. Mass shooters commit mass shootings first and foremost because they have heard and read about other mass shootings, have become deeply impressed by the cultural and social and political impact of such events, the fear and grief and anger they inspire, the iconic and symbolic nature of the killings, the manifestos and disaffection and claims and identities of the killers, and the deep, universally-acknowledged sense of meaningfulness about all the above, and so have decided to imitate them. The most directly impactful thing I, and probably most of you, can do to prevent mass shootings is to ignore them unless you are directly or indirectly affected by them. Even then, it is quite clear to me that the mass-media and political circus around such events deeply harms the actual victims of shootings, preventing them from grieving and moving forward by cynically channeling their grief into the news cycle. I have no desire to participate in any of the above, however remotely.

Nonetheless, in the current mass media landscape, such events as these are supposed to lead to conversations and policy debates about "gun control" and "gun violence." These conversations now commonly involve direct accusations of opponents being responsible for murder and the death of children, and lead, in practice, mostly to an increase in the generally violent valence of American society. 

Despite the above cautions, probably for the only time, is my own contribution to this discourse. It will not be repeated.

I should perhaps repeat at the outset that I do not own a gun, have no desire to own a gun, and in fact possess a fairly strong personal aversion to firearms, which was perhaps inherited from my maternal grandfather, who despite owning a firearm as a practical necessity (in his career as a cattle farmer), had a strong aversion to guns and avoided using them as much as possible.