Recently I have been preparing an article on the historiographical program for a general history of technology to present at this year’s conference on phenomenology and the philosophy of technology. The article has been somewhat hard to bring to term; in fact, I am trying, through this project, to reconsider anew what the essence of “technology” actually is. Here I will first deviate from the paper’s theme and write down some of my recent thoughts.
In Heidegger’s mode of approach, we always have to begin by finding an everyday definition, affirming its reasonableness, but questioning its thoroughness, and then, by following the thread, sorting out its more original meaning.
Heidegger’s inquiry into “technology” starts from the everyday definition of technology. He points out that there are two common understandings of technology: a means to an end (an instrument); and human activity. He believes these two definitions are one and the same, “because setting ends, creating and using means to ends, is human activity.” (Collected Works of Lectures and Essays)
Heidegger believed this everyday definition to be “correct but not true.” He traced the concept from “end” back to “cause,” and finally arrived at the conclusion that technology is uncovering.
Heidegger’s way of thinking is of course extremely brilliant. Yet I have long felt it somewhat unsatisfying. First, this definition does not seem everyday enough; in particular, it departs in certain ways from twenty-first-century everyday concepts. Second, I feel it can still be elaborated from other angles.
For Heidegger, the most typical technologies are the hammer, as well as houses, waterwheels, and so on. Although he mentions some modern technologies, such as hydroelectric stations and radar stations, these modern technologies, which stand in sharp contrast to ancient technologies, have in fact also become relatively unfamiliar within the lifeworld of our generation. And among the things around us, what are the most typical “technologies”? Mobile phones, computers, the internet. In short, IT (information technology). When we see news about “technology” or “science and technology,” in most cases it is about IT-related things.
Take the hammer as an example when speaking of technology, and the definition of a means to an end seems to raise no question. But if we take the “mobile phone” as an example and talk about technology, then what? Is a mobile phone a means to an end? What end? Calling? Texting? Those used to be the main “ends” of a “mobile telephone,” but for today’s smartphone, those ends have long become secondary. A mobile phone can be used to go online, play games, socialize, look at maps, check the time, check the weather, and so on and so on.
We all know that a mobile phone is technology, but if we say it is a means to an end, that is a bit puzzling—what exactly is the end of a mobile phone? A mobile phone seems to have many, many “ends,” but if I ask what purpose I am getting a phone for, it seems that none of those ends is quite the most accurate pointer. In fact, a mobile phone or a computer is more like an open platform; rather than saying it exists for what end, it would be better to say that it provides many ends. One after another, new “ends” are discovered in the course of playing with the phone.
The phrase “a means to an end” seems to imply that “the end” exists first, and then one finds a means to “fit” it. But in cases like mobile phones and computers, we find that rather than finding a tool to suit an end, it is more like developing ends that suit the tool. With the same mobile phone, as I keep becoming familiar with it and continually developing it, the “end” it “suits” is constantly changing: at first I mostly used it to make calls, later mainly to go online, and sometimes to take photos, and so on. The phone’s ends are changing, so what, then, is the essence of the phone as a phone?
Of course, to say that a mobile phone is a means to an end is not wrong. In any specific context, a phone in use does have one purpose or another. But these purposes are not there beforehand. Rather than saying the phone is a tool that serves an end, it would be better to say that it is a tool that produces ends.
I remember that when I was in fifth grade, my father bought me my first computer, a 586, and later he also got dial-up internet for the home. At the time he did not really know what a computer could do; he just thought it was a fashionable new thing and, supposedly, very useful. So, on the principle of not letting the child lose at the starting line, he bought it for me to learn and play with. As for me, I also did not initially know what this computer could do. I knew it could be used to play games, but I also knew it was not only for playing games. As for what it could actually do, I learned while playing and figured out more and more uses for it.
My experience should be typical. Children today’s first contact with smartphones is probably also like this: at first they are handled as something akin to a toy. A toy does not point outward toward certain ends, or rather, it is itself an end. But a mobile phone or a computer is not merely a “toy”; they are indeed the most typical “technical objects.” What could be more fitting for the word “technology” than they are?
Technical objects like mobile phones and computers, we might as well call “multimedia technologies”: they are an aggregation of multiple media; “through” them one can point toward countless ends and present different objects. This kind of technology is a specialty of the electronic age. It differs from the “modern technology” described by Heidegger as “enframing,” but whether it is a more closed form of “Gestell,” or a sublimation of ancient technology, is still hard to say.
In any case, taking mobile phones and computers as examples, can we find a more apt basic definition than “a means to an end”? What, after all, is technology?
What is most problematic in “a means to an end” is not so much the word “end” as the word “to,” which gives the feeling that the “end” is ready-made and then one goes to fit it, just like reasonable, lawful, or, by analogy with the correspondence theory of truth, a proposition must “fit” something already there. Yet what we see is that the thing “fitted to” is not a ready-made referent standing there, but something gradually produced through the use of the means.
So this “to” should, more precisely, be understood as the “to” of “coming together,” the “to” of “working into fit,” not one side approaching the other, but both sides interacting with one another, gradually converging together through friction and probing. In the process of coming together, both sides are changing.
The word “hui” (会) is marvelous: it also includes the sense of being able to use, being good at using. I can use a computer, I can operate a mobile phone, I can swing a hammer—these all indicate that I have mastered a certain technology. But what does “hui” mean? “Hui” in this sense is still consistent with “coming together”; “being able to use” is also a process of working into fit. Any technology requires us to “learn it.”
The process of “learning” technology is precisely the process by which means and ends “come together.” Learning is not necessarily simply imitating a rigid procedure of using ready-made means to achieve a determinate end; learning is a process of exploration and interaction. Even if there is an instruction manual, a textbook, or a teacher to show you how to use a computer, the uses you master will often far exceed what the teacher has conveyed. Not to mention that, in many cases, children basically learn to use mobile phones and computers entirely on their own.
Why can people learn a technology on their own, without a teacher? On the one hand, because technology is always an “extension of the human,” designed for the human body. On the other hand, the way of using technology is always “stored” in some form outside the human body—for example, the configuration of the object itself contains hints about how to use it; when you see the handle of a hammer and the head of a rivet, you can guess where to grasp it and in what direction to strike. Other hints are conveyed to you in written and verbal form through manuals or by other people; observing others use technology is of course also a way of learning.
In short, the process of learning is the process of internalizing these external things into one’s own behavior or habits, while at the same time externalizing one’s own body outward. For example, I may adjust the weight and length of a hammer according to my bodily habits; I may install software and upgrade hardware on a computer according to my preferences; I may also at any time feed back my experience of use to other people, including the maker of the object and the teacher who taught me how to use it. After receiving feedback, they may in turn convey new things to me or to the next learner… The entire process of learning and using technology is a two-way process of interaction and working into fit, moving from inside to outside and from outside to inside.
At this point, I try to offer a new definition of what technology is, namely: “something that can be learned.” Whether at the level of objects or at the level of behavioral skills, when we speak of “technology,” we refer to something that can be learned. The learnability of technology has two aspects: one is making, the other is use. These two aspects happen to intersect in technical objects, where maker and user work into fit with each other, and the result is the production and diffusion of technical artifacts.
Some forms of “making” cannot be learned, such as the uncanny workmanship of nature. Take a stone: when we regard it as a natural object rather than a technical object, it is not because it cannot be used for some purpose—a stone can be a tool that serves the purpose of cracking walnuts—but because its production cannot be learned. Technical objects produced by human beings, by contrast, have a making process that can be learned. Of course, the loss of certain exquisite crafts is another matter. When we call some object a technical object, at least in principle it can be replicated. Those handmade products that are too exquisite to be learned often fall outside the category of technical objects and become works of art. When we evaluate a craftsman’s “technology,” we are also referring to the bodily habits he has learned, or rather, honed through practice. By the way, starting from alchemy, people tried to learn nature’s uncanny workmanship and produce artificial objects identical to natural ones. This shook the traditional boundary between nature and technology, and was one of the starting points of the modern technological world. Even so, in the everyday concepts of modern people, technology is still understood as a concept opposed to nature.
“Something that can be learned” seems to point precisely to “science,” to mathematical, physical, chemical, and other scientific knowledge. But these seem to be only a very special subset under “technology.” Science belongs to technology; it is the sum of certain special memory technologies, calculation technologies, experimental technologies, and predictive technologies. In fact, when we talk about words like “learn” and “practice,” they are often unrelated to “science”: learning to drive, learning to use a computer, learning to sing, learning to drink, learning from Lei Feng, learning how to be a person… These “things that can be learned” are difficult to classify under “science” in the broad sense, but they can be classified under “technology” in the broad sense.
“Something that can be learned” does not seem like a very everyday definition. Very few people would state such a definition outright, but often people tacitly accept it in practice. When my father bought a computer and gave it to me to play with, in his mind the computer was less a “means to an end” than simply “something that can be learned.” Even when we talk about a means to an end—for example, “you can ride a bike to school”—the “riding a bike” here, before being understood as a means to an end, is still first regarded as something learnable; otherwise the proposal would not even arise.
This definition still needs further clarification. At the very least, I have long hoped to introduce “learning” as a major keyword in the philosophy of technology. In addition, from this we can also reexamine the relation between technology and science.
Translated from the Chinese original with AI assistance. The original text is authoritative.
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