CHAPTER ⅩⅤ: TECHNOLOGY AND HUMAN NATURE

摘要

Western philosophy has often treated the idea of human nature as an 'essence' or as a specific reality which is qualitatively different from that of any other living being. The defence of this idea, and of the integrity of so exceptional a nature, has conditioned the twentieth-century debate on the significance and role of technology for man and for the entire world. What is meant by 'technology' is a complicated affair for a number of reasons. Is it merely a general name for the aggregate of human skills, or an entity on its own, a special 'essence', as some go so far as saying ? Certainly, the meaning (the 'nature', if you like) that is attributed to it varies with the function - positive or negative, indispensable or accessory, etc. - that is assigned to it. As certainly, an axiological evaluation of technology (whether of technology in its present state, or of a particular use of it) precedes and perhaps even guides, more or less explicitly, a theory of technology. As much certainly, the meaning assigned to technology is double-bound with a theory of man.