Techno-Moral Crisis

A summary of:
Schultze, Q. J. (2002). Habits of the High-Tech Heart: Living Virtuously inwards the Information Age. Baker Academic: Grand Rapids, MI, USA.
Introduction - Identifying Our Techno-Moral Crisis

One of Schultze's primary criticisms of modern techno-society is that nosotros are non peculiarly discerning alongside regard to the technologies nosotros allow to creep into as well as inwards just about cases command our lives. We convey non cultivated critical thinking alongside regard to technology, because nosotros appear to convey bought into the notion that engineering = progress = good. But every bit he says, "our vogue to adopt every novel data engineering uncritically - without discerning the options, setting appropriate limits, as well as establishing human practices - is simply irresponsible" (16-17).

The 2 primary inspirations for Schultze are Alexis de Tocqueville as well as Vaclav Havel. "Tocqueville discovered that Americans' private self-interests are leavened morally past times 'habits of the heart.' In his view, these social mores emerge from Americans' commitments to each other as well as to the full general populace good. He concluded that voluntary religious associations, inwards particular, cultivate moral sentiments that soften self-inteest, alongside an overarching commitment to the mutual good" (17). I squall upwardly there's a lesson inwards this, but I squall upwardly it's non a lesson so much virtually faith every bit it is virtually a spiritual orientation, again, something akin to an sense of the "collectivity." I squall upwardly it's unsafe - as well as likely flawed, given the negative flipside of religion, i.e. tribalism - to give the credit to faith as well as assume that this is the answer. The answer, I would argue, is a reattunement to the collective, what I would debate is spirituality firstly, as well as may secondarily last seen inwards religion.

Havel is a fleck of a hero for Schultze because he wrote a serial of letters to his wife, published later on every bit Letters to Olga, inwards which he addressed "the crucial signifiacne of personal as well as collective responsibleness inwards maintaining democratic freedoms amist increasingly technological as well as bureaucratic social institutions," as well as criticized our "uncritical faith inwards technoogy" (18). He made a fantastic disputation at the 1992 World Economic Forum:

We convey to abandon the arrogant belief that earth is only a puzzle to last solved, a machine alongside instructions for utilisation waiting to last discovered, a trunk of data to last fed into a estimator inwards the promise that sooner or later on it volition spit out a universal solution....
[Instead] nosotros convey to release from the sphere of private whim as well as rejuvenate such forces every bit a natural, unique, as well as unrepeatable sense of the world, an uncomplicated sense of justice, the mightiness to come across things every bit others do, a sense of transcendental responsibility, archetypal wisdom, skilful taste, courage, compassion, as well as faith inwards the importance of exceptional measures that do non aspire to last a universal, thence an objective or technical, substitution to salvation (21).

Jacques Ellul has made similar critiques, arguing that "this technological-mindedness is essentially a faith inwards la technique, the agency of efficiency as well as control" (18). I squall upwardly that this necessarily requires us to speak virtually engineering inwards Foucauldian terms, i.e. disciplinary power. (See how the occupation gets deeper as well as deeper!?)

Schultze himself is wary of phrases similar "digital democracy", which he sees every bit propagandist inwards back upwardly of this faith inwards technology; "it socializes [us] inwards technological values" (18). This has caused me to pause: what does it hateful to last a PhD pupil inwards a programme funded past times the EPSRC's Digital Economy initiative? What is the digital economy? I volition explore this inwards greater item later.

The really ways inwards which nosotros speak of engineering convey the potential to influence our values. For example, what happens when nosotros "replace humane, morally informed wrods such every bit 'wisdom', 'person', as well as 'justice' alongside technological damage such every bit 'information', 'user', as well as 'access'" (19)? I think, again, Foucault would last able to shed low-cal on this - it all boils downward to power. And it does appear that the Internet is becoming a Goliath: "Instead of intentionally embedding cyber-technology within existing cultures, nosotros allow cyber-technology shape our way of life" (20), inwards purpose beacuse nosotros convey a similarly strong faith inwards the marketplace to create upwardly one's heed what nosotros need. And piece religious leaders may weigh inwards alongside honor to moral implications of technology, it is non every bit if these leaders are inwards a seat to pattern alternative kinds of technology. The people who do convey this mightiness seem, on the whole, to convey adopted inwards their designs (if non otherwise politically) the libertarianism which "celebrates technique as well as promotes strident individualism, affords lilliputian honor for moral order" (20).

Schultze sees i of the keys to developing moral engineering every bit beingness an awareness as well as consideration of their long-term consequences. "As members of the data society, nosotros are so concerned alongside divining the nigh hereafter that nosotros lose just about of our historical grounding inwards moral ways of understanding" (21). He relays an anecdote of Danny Hillis, designer of estimator architecture, who took activity along these lines past times creating the slowest estimator inwards the world, "The Long Now Clock" that volition run for 10,000 years. The betoken of this is to brand us dull downward a fleck as well as to halt thinking virtually the immediate needs of the hither as well as now. Schultze interpreted the projection thusly: "By calling our attending to an older tool, he hoped to involvement us inwards the hereafter of humanity" (15). See this video.



What's interesting virtually this is that it forcibly resituates us inwards time, whereas inwards recent years, the "Internet largely has released us from the tyranny of infinite as well as time" (15). What would it expect similar if nosotros were to cook a cyber analogue to this clock? And if nosotros did, what would the effect be? After all, every bit Wertheim showed, the spiritual potential of cyberspace lies inwards the precise fact of its liberation from space-time. Then again, this liberation produces an amoral infinite exactly because it encourages people to alive entirely inwards the hither as well as now. Further complicating things, I would debate that many spiritual teachings encourage this similar practise of living inwards the moment, described every bit mindfulness; silent somehow inwards the instance of these spiritual practices, peradventure because it is a tradition carried through generations, i is able to do so without shutting oneself off to the hereafter consequences of one's behavior. Thus morality is preserved. But this is a really complicated enquiry that volition require a peachy bargain of farther thought.

Ultimately, Schultze's aim is fairly modest: "To last virtuous people inwards a high-tech world is to last neither moralists nor pragmatists but rather sojourners who humbly seek goodness inwards an eternal risk that began earlier nosotros were born as well as volition operate along after nosotros die. As sojourners, nosotros realize that this world is non our in conclusion goal but entirely i leg of a journeying whose termination nosotros tin neither fully command nor completely envision" (24). Me, I'm to a greater extent than of an activist. I squall upwardly that what nosotros do on this world matters, as well as that the decisions nosotros brand tin usher inwards dramatic changes for skilful or bad. What's ironic virtually Schultze's disputation is that is seems to promote an observationist approach to earth - boot dorsum as well as lookout adult man it, rather than participate actively inwards it - which he later on criticizes every bit i of the peachy problems of technological culture; i.e. that it makes observers out of us. But as well as so I recognize my ain hypocricy, because piece I concur wholeheartedly that nosotros request to last to a greater extent than humble when it comes to technological development, I also squall upwardly that nosotros may just last clever plenty to squall upwardly our way out of the mess nosotros convey created as well as pattern engineering that fits a to a greater extent than spiritual way of living.