By admin In other words, does technology continue to develop, improve, and advance no matter what we do?
Do we control technology, or does it already control us?
Is it possible to function in the world without technology?
And does technology stand on its own, or has it always been — or is it now — an inseparable part of our essence and existence?
During 2024, I read several books from the 1960s, mostly ones I found in community libraries scattered across Jerusalem.
One of them, the one in the picture, stood out particularly for its depth and breadth.
The Technological Society by Jacques Ellul was published in 1964.
I wasn’t familiar with either the book or the author, but I think it’s ultimately one of the best and most profound books I’ve read.
Here’s a thread of quotes from this book (and others) that attempt to answer the questions I’ve raised here.
At the beginning of 2024, I published an opinion piece on Ynet, Israel’s largest news website, about humanity’s journey alongside technology — from the dawn of prehistory to the present day.
In essence, I argued that our entire world is artificial, entirely created with and thanks to technology, and that we have forged (or it has emerged) a comprehensive and almost complete union with technology.
Thanks to these technologies (and science), we have reached the highest levels of prosperity and development in the history of humankind.
Back to the book.
Although the book is titled The Technological Society, the author focuses on a much more significant term throughout its pages — technique.
Jacques Ellul makes a very clear distinction between machines (technology) and technique.
The Hebrew translation of the word or term “technique” doesn’t quite capture the definition Ellul uses. It’s not just a “method of work” or “procedure.”
I’m not defining it here yet, hoping that its breadth and depth will become clear as the thread unfolds.
Jacques Ellul himself approaches the subject with substantial social, economic, and political critique, which I won’t delve into here. However, traces of it can be seen in some of the quotes I’ll share.
“Technique has taken over the whole of civilization. Death, procreation, birth all submit to technical efficiency and systemization.” Jacques Ellul
Jacques Ellul argues that in the 19th century, “technique” came into full force, transforming the entire fabric and way of modern life.
“The machine took its place in a social milieu that was not made for it, and for that reason created the inhuman society in which we live.”
During the First Industrial Revolution in England, when the Luddites began burning factories and assassinating factory owners, the way of life was completely upended.
Their protest wasn’t against the machines themselves but against what the machines represented and the changes they brought about — a total shift in the way humans lived and worked.
For the first time in history, people no longer worked from home. Instead, they were required to leave home and work in factories, operating machines.
Urbanization, which Ellul dedicates an entire chapter to in the book, changed our world in countless ways.
In other words, there is a very complex and interconnected relationship between machines (technologies) and technique.
“The machine could not integrate itself into nineteenth-century society; technique integrated it.”
The connection, adaptation, or “matchmaking” between machines and human society was and continues to be performed through technique.
As Lewis Mumford noted, “Machines sanctioned social inefficiency.”
Technique, however, ensures a more rational and systematic use of machines. It places machines precisely where they are needed and demands from them exactly what they are designed to do.
This highlights technique’s critical role — not merely as a method but as the force that organizes, optimizes, and aligns machines within the human sphere.
In the 20th century, according to Ellul, there was a fundamental shift in the application, adoption, and “domination” of technique over our lives and world, including the scientific domain.
“In the twentieth century, this relationship between scientific research and technical invention resulted in the enslavement of science to technique. In the nineteenth century, however, science was still the determining cause of technical progress. The society of the eighteenth century was not yet mature enough to allow the systematic development of inventions.”
Ellul asserts that 20th-century science became reduced to the “scientific method” — a technique that dictates how we approach and perform science.
With this critique, I find myself almost entirely in agreement.
“The ‘scientific’ position frequently consists of denying the existence of whatever does not belong to current scientific method.”
Two months before ChatGPT was released, a short academic article of mine was published, in which I primarily pondered what it means to engage in scientific work — “sciencing” — when the entire scientific method is fully automated by generative artificial intelligence.
What will be the role of the scientist, and what will science itself mean, in this new era?
Jacques Ellul argues that in ancient Greece, there was a clear and well-maintained separation between science and its application.
“The Greeks, however, were the first to have coherent scientific activity and to liberate scientific thought…”
“The almost total separation of science and technique.”
“Plato shunned any compromise with application, even in order to forward scientific research.”
In the 19th century, and especially in the 20th century, Ellul claims this separation dissolved, and technique began operating immediately and without delay.
“Techniques are always put to immediate use. The interval which traditionally separates a scientific discovery and its application in everyday life has been progressively shortened. As soon as a discovery is made, a concrete application is sought. Capital becomes interested, or the state, and the discovery enters the public domain before anyone has had a chance to reckon all the consequences or to recognize its full importance.”
From the moment a scientific discovery is made, the time taken to seek ways to apply it becomes almost instantaneous. This occurs without sufficient deliberation or examination of potential risks.
The discovery is effectively taken out of the hands of scientists and researchers and handed over to the interests of capital or the state, where its application is discussed, often prioritizing profit or strategic advantage over caution or ethical considerations.