“Technology is neutral, humans are the mistake” (quote no. 3)

On today's menu, a slice of anthropological pessimism accompanied by béarniaise sauce. Definitely, the inventiveness of the innocent is rich in tasteless and unnutritious dishes. But enough of the jokes, if there is a cliché that illustrates the need to gain height, it is this one.

I — Technology as a dominant social force

To say that technology is neutral hides the fact that its development has created the conditions for a completely transformed world. To believe it to be neutral is to make the mistake of seeing in it only a tool strictly comparable to a hammer or a brush. But where the brush can be made from a piece of wood and horsehair that is immediately available, technology can never take advantage of the same ease of access. By itself, the computer already requires (jumble) an organization capable of relocating its production to countries where labor costs little, an extraordinary mechanical capacity for mining, a structure capable of training ever more engineers and other development managers, an organization capable of training more and more engineers and other development managers, a market and advertising planning, a stable electrical network, etc.

The above reasoning can be repeated for each alleged tool that the technological company makes available to us. In this regard, let us quote the words of Wolfgang Sachs and Gustavo Esteva:

For example, let's look at an electric blender. It extracts fruit juices in less time than it takes to say so. What a wonder! ... at first glance. You only have to look at the plug and the wire to see that you are in front of the domestic terminal of a national and, in fact, global system. Electricity arrives via a network of lines powered by power plants that in turn depend on dams, offshore platforms or derricks installed in remote deserts. The entire chain only guarantees adequate and rapid supply if each link is supervised by battalions of engineers, managers and financial experts, themselves linked to administrations and entire sectors of industry (when not to the army). The electric mixer (like the automobile, the computer, or the television) depends entirely on the existence of vast systems of organization and production that are welded together. By starting the mixer, you are not simply using a tool, you are connecting to a whole network of interdependent systems. The transition from simple techniques to modern equipment involves the reorganization of the entire society.^[1]

Or those of Theodore Kaczynski:

Take the refrigerator as an example. Without machined parts or modern tools, it would be nearly impossible for a few local artisans to make one. If by some miracle they succeeded, it would be useless in the absence of a reliable source of electricity. It would therefore be necessary for them to build a dam on a watercourse as well as a generator. But a generator requires large quantities of copper wires. Do you think it is possible to produce these cables without modern machines? And where would they get the refrigerant gas? It would be much easier to build a cold room to store food, to dry or brine it, as was done before the invention of the refrigerator.^[2]

As a dominant social force, technology aims at nothing more than to create the conditions for its perpetual reinforcement, which comes at the expense of any reality that is significantly experienced. Thus, as the supermarket cashier was replaced, the artist's glory will wither in the face of the AI capable of putting a series of keywords into images. But in the end, aren't these two experiencing the fate of any individual who is forcibly integrated into technological society? Just as the craftsman's gesture is dying out, friendship is reduced to a message on social networks, travel and discovery are confined to tourist routes, nature is only preserved in a few places called “reserves”. In the technological world, everything changes into its opposite, and as Guy Debord wrote: “Everything that was directly experienced has moved away in a representation.” The same Guy Debord who, moreover, also described this character of self-generation:

12. The show comes across as a huge positivity that is unquestionable and unattainable. It says nothing more than “what appears is good, what is good appears.” The attitude that he requires as a matter of principle is that passive acceptance that he has in fact already obtained by his way of appearing unanswerable, by his monopoly of appearance.

13. The fundamentally tautological nature of the spectacle derives from the simple fact that its means are at the same time its aim. He is the sun that never sets on the empire of modern passivity. It covers the entire surface of the world and is steeped in its own glory indefinitely.

14. The society that is based on modern industry is not incidentally or superficially spectacular, it is fundamentally Spectaclist. In the show, an image of the reigning economy, the goal is nothing, development is everything. The show doesn't want to get to anything but itself.^[3]

So let us ask ourselves the following question: is it neutral to participate in one's own growth at the expense of nature and life? Is it neutral to maintain the illusion of being a means when you are a system?

II — The impossibility of human choice

This cliché, by placing the responsibility for the disaster solely on human choice, contributes to this belief in the possibility of a good use of technology. After all, if we only need a little bit of goodwill to create a technological paradise, then reform is still possible! Understandably, this type of argument only relieves technology of any power to control our lives; as if it were enough to press a switch for its presence in the world to turn off, as if it could really pretend to be silent from the tool on the workbench. As if the concretization of the Earth and the retreat of forests, the major transport routes (air, land, sea), the omnipresence of the threat of atomic extinction, the pollution of bodies and waterways were only variables that could be erased at a glance.

In their very development, technologies rely on the psychological needs of researchers more than on any utility. Where good taste would require scientists, for example, to claim to be working for the good of humanity, it is in fact the satisfaction they derive from their work that guides them, regardless of the task assigned to them. Thus, the researcher in theoretical physics and the designer of missiles are in the same boat.

In 1971, Einstein wrote that: “All of our much-praised technological progress, and even civilization in its entirety, is like an ax in the hands of a psychopath.” So it is difficult to give altruistic motivation to Einstein's work. Einstein certainly realized that any advance in physics could have practical applications, and thus promote technological progress, which he himself compared to an ax in the hands of a criminal. However, he continued to work in theoretical physics well into old age — even after witnessing the development of the nuclear weapons to which his research contributed. So why didn't he stop working? It was undoubtedly an obsession. In the twilight of his life, he noted, “I can't get away from work. He is inexorably keeping me prisoner.”^[4]

Likewise, it is sometimes perilous to use the personal pronoun “we”. “We” created rockets, “we” discovered atomic energy, “we” polluted the Earth, etc., etc., we often hear. However, the individual who, by mistake or through narcissism, attributes to himself the authorship of discoveries, also ascribes their responsibility. But since neither you nor I are capable of such wonders, are we really responsible for them? In reality, for the cases mentioned, the responsibility is overwhelming and cannot generate anything other than a profound sense of powerlessness.

With respect to its creations, the technological system seems to have gone from the explosion of responsibility (that is, from the absence of a clearly identifiable culprit due to the collective production of the technology used) to its dissolution in the mass of people. Thus transforming a defect into an asset in the service of its domination, the technological system offers a community of substitution to those it has deprived of communities in order to extend its power. Without knowing how to get rid of the sad isolation of the technological society, we attribute our prowess to feel a sense of belonging. Therefore, a fair return to Epictetus cannot be too much, as it is harmful to believe that you are responsible for what does not depend on you: “So remove your aversion from everything that does not depend on us, and transfer it, in what does depend on us, to everything that is contrary to nature.^[5].” The only community that this system offers us is that of Disaster.

Therefore, if there is a human choice in the midst of this doldrums, it is that of refusal. That of the opposition to a system that pretends to be a tool, that of the revolution against technology, for the preservation of what can still be preserved and the conquest of our freedom.