Discussions on the Anthropocene as the geology of mankind imply the question whether globalized technology such as energy technologies or A.I. ought to be first and foremost conceptualized as a strategy of the human in relation to nature or as a strategy of some humans over others. I argue that both positions are mirrored in the philosophy and sociology of technology through the concepts of technology as an extension and as a fetish. The extension concept understands technology as an extension (...) of the human body and its capabilities, resulting in a local ‘inward’ perspective. The fetish concept offers a contrary ‘outward’ perspective by drawing attention to the global socio-material context of modern technology. Despite their differences, I argue that both concepts share an underlying operation principle of technology as functional simplification. Technology always involves a functional simplification of physical as well as social causality. Sociologists and philosophers of technology would do well not to give primacy to the former as it leads to the belief in technology as a universal tool that neglects how technology is not embedded in but consists of (unequal) social arrangements. (shrink)

In a recent book devoted to giving an overview of cognitive science, Justin Lieber writes:…dazzingly complex computational processes achieve our visual and linguistic understanding, but apart from a few levels of representation these are as little open to our conscious view as the multitudinous rhythm of blood flow through the countless vessels of our brain.It is the aim of hundreds of workers in the allied fields of Cognitive Science and Artificial Intelligence to unmask these computation processes and install them in (...) digital computers. (shrink)

The essays collected here do not constitute a philosophy of technology, in the sense which, for instance, Don Ihde requires. According to Ihde the philosopher of technology must reflectively analyse technology in such a way ‘as to illuminate features of the phenomenon of technology itself’. The contributors to this volume do not concern themselves with the essentiahst enterprise of defining technology; they more or less take it for granted that the reader is familiar with a variety of technologies such as (...) Information Technology, and proceed from there. Hence the title is the conjunctive one of Philosophy and Technolog . (shrink)

The following study is an attempt to ascertain the most adequate way to understand the relationship in modernity between religion and technology. This relationship is first analyzed by looking at a common way in which technology has been categorized and discussed as representing the religion of modernity. The first chapter critically evaluates several popular and scholarly works which contain arguments for understanding that the modern world participates in some kind of 'religion of technology.' The inadequacies of these arguments are shown (...) to arise from the problematic ways in which they invoke the meanings of both religion and technology. The suggestive possibility of viewing religion as a kind of technology leads to a consideration of how technology is being understood in the field of the philosophy of technology. (shrink)