[Wolke]

Economic systems such as capitalism and feudalism are of deeper and longer duration than political systems; but the technological system is of deeper and longer historical duration than any economic system. The technological system is the fundamental condition governing all patterns of social existence, having its own laws which are independent of human values and overshadow human values. Capitalism is only an epiphenomenon of technology; it is technology, not capitalism, upon which everything else depends. (By technology, of course, is meant all forms of mechanisation, automation, and cybernetic control -- all bureaucracy, military, government, industry, etc., -- it is indifferent whether the machine is composed of replaceable human parts or inanimate parts. I am also talking specifically about authoritarian, system-oriented technics, in contrast to the older, human-centred, small-scale 'technology' based on human energy.)

Our society has cast off absolute government, and replaced it with the more effective totalitarianism of the technological system. In absolute government, there was still a dependence on the human element. Modern technology has overcome this weakness. Unlike the old system, the centre of authority in the technological system is not a human being, but the system itself. Like the previous totalitarian systems, the technological system is motivated by insane drives based on the will to power -- particularly, the desire to build instruments of mass destruction, and to extend the system itself at any cost.

I believe that the entire network of global technological systems is a conscious intelligence, or developing into a conscious intelligence -- but whether you buy this or not, it is certainly autonomous, self-augmenting, unitary, and developing rapidly according to its own law, in opposition to human values. It is killing my wildlife, polluting my air and water, enslaving my children, and blighting my cities...It is the greatest threat to freedom humanity has ever faced. An anarchist who opposes capitalism while turning a blind eye to the technological system is a fool. The technological system will enslave us all.

[fuser]

join the insanity of Anarcho-primitivism then.

[jessupjonesjnr87]

It's true. In the end our strive for technological advancement will be our undoing. The only real benefit we get from technology is an extended life expectancy, but with the world's population swelling beyond capacity is it really a benefit at all?

[SolarCross]

Surely the OP is merely trolling, but in case he is sincere(ly insane) then fuser has your answer. The rest of us will continue to use technology and if you want to stop us, you will find that the AK-47 trumps stone axes...

[Goldberk]

I think there is a valid point to be made about how technological relations engender alienation, comodification and consumption and thus should be criticised from a left perspective.

[SolarCross]

I think there is a valid point to be made about how technological relations engender alienation, comodification and consumption and thus should be criticised from a left perspective.

Criticise all you want, no one cares and it won't change anything.

[jessupjonesjnr87]

Criticise all you want, no one cares and it won't change anything.

I thought the whole point of this forum is to state your opinions. Nothing you or i say here is going to change anything and whether someone cares or not is a matter for personal opinion.

[Paradigm]

I think there is a valid point to be made about how technological relations engender alienation, comodification and consumption and thus should be criticised from a left perspective.

Yes, and there is a way in which industrial scale technology can be quite hegemonic, and control our lives more than it liberates us. E.F. Schumacher, though not an anarchist, was certainly aware of these problems, and I find his concept of appropriate technology to be worthy of serious consideration. It's not a matter of high-tech or low-tech, but rather having technology at a human scale and being mindful of how technology is deployed. There is the much bigger question of how much of our current technology can be made sustainable, and while I'm a bit more optimistic on that front than the anarcho-primitivists, I think they have a very valid point in raising such objections. In moving toward a more sustainable future, I suspect technology will have to become more advanced in some respects but more simple in other respects.

[quetzalcoatl]

The totalitarian nature of technological systems is an inadvertent byproduct of economy of scale.

But the era of economy of scale is drawing to a close. Automation (which in its current stage is heavily capital intensive) cannot proceed much further without economic incentive, and as human workers are deprecated the consumer base has tended to evaporate. Thus, we have a continuous and growing global industrial overcapacity - one that is now into its fourth decade.

The future of technology will move away from large scale to small scale, from interchangeability to uniqueness, and from megacorporate control to diffuse and distributed control. The political ramifications of this change will lag by decades, as the elite struggles to maintain control, but the end result will be an anarchism (of sorts).

[Wolke]

Criticise all you want, no one cares and it won't change anything."

If you are opposed to political and economic tyranny, why not be opposed to the more effective and all-encompassing slavery of modern technics? Our society has simply thrown off the rather inefficient totalitarianism of absolute governments, and replaced it with the perfected totalitarianism of technology. If you are against the old tyranny, but a friend to the new one, you are an enemy to human freedom. The technological system eliminates human freedom and personality, runs on its own law indepepedent of the historical process, and takes control over the earth and of mankind itself.

"Yes, and there is a way in which industrial scale technology can be quite hegemonic, and control our lives more than it liberates us. E.F. Schumacher, though not an anarchist, was certainly aware of these problems, and I find his concept of appropriate technology to be worthy of serious consideration. It's not a matter of high-tech or low-tech, but rather having technology at a human scale and being mindful of how technology is deployed. There is the much bigger question of how much of our current technology can be made sustainable, and while I'm a bit more optimistic on that front than the anarcho-primitivists, I think they have a very valid point in raising such objections. In moving toward a more sustainable future, I suspect technology will have to become more advanced in some respects but more simple in other respects.

Mumford makes a distinction between what he calls 'democratic technics' and 'authoritarian technics'.

Democratic technics rely on small-scale methods of production resting on human skill and under the control of the craftsman. This technology is adaptable, sustainable, resourceful, durable.

Authoritarian technics originated in the 4th century BC. Initially a mass organisation resting on physical slavery (i.e. human machines), it was usually confined to urban areas. It never took hold of society as a whole until the advent of urbanisation in the 19th and 20th centuries. Now authoritarian technics has come back in a perfected form.

By 'technology', I am referring specifically to what Mumford calls 'authoritarian technics', i.e. the newer, system-oriented technics, in contrast to the older, human-centred, small-scale technics.

I don't see any evidence that we are moving in the direction of democratic technics. On the contrary, we are becoming more and more enslaved to technology with each passing year.

[mikema63]

Then I can never be an anarchist.

What quaint madness is this? "oh noes the internet is crushing my freedomz!!!"

[Wolke]

Then I can never be an anarchist.

What quaint madness is this? "oh noes the internet is crushing my freedomz!!!"

Technology is power, it is made up of instruments of power, and therefore produces structures of power, and hence domination. It is not the internet or any specific technology that is crushing human freedom, but the technological system itself (which, in the form of slave labour, has existed since before the wheel was invented, though it never took hold of society as a whole until the 20th century). Our society is the technological system (Jacques Ellul), it is not the capitalist system, not the industrial system, not the postindustrial society, not the consumer society, not the affluent society, not the service society, etc., etc. Technology is the key that covers and explains our society; it is the infrastructure in which all of these other things are happening. Let's direct our attack at the system itself, not the by-products of the system. The final end of this system is to replace life, or rather, to transfer the attributes of life to the mechanical collective in which humans will (at best) serve as replaceable and interchangeable parts.

[mikema63]

All I can say is that I would become a fascist before I gave up science and technology, it is my single greatest love and the most important thing in the world to me.

I'd enslave you and everyone else for it.

[Wolke]

All I can say is that I would become a fascist before I gave up science and technology, it is my single greatest love and the most important thing in the world to me.

I'd enslave you and everyone else for it.

At least you admit that you are an enemy to human freedom. If only more techno-spergs would be so honest.

[mikema63]

techno-spergs

enemy of human freedom

Except for how horribly wrong you are, sure.

I suppose enslavement to mysticism and the vagaries of nature are "freedom" now.

[Wolke]

Except for how horribly wrong you are, sure.

No one has offered any critique of my arguments. The few people who have said anything of substance in this thread have basically agreed with me.

I suppose enslavement to mysticism and the vagaries of nature are "freedom" now.

What are you talking about?

[Sithsaber]

How primitive should we go? Society wide monasticism is implausible, although an individual doing this is somewhat doable if you save up for a decade or two and live on nothing but crackers in a hut until the day you die.

[quetzalcoatl]

Technology is power, it is made up of instruments of power, and therefore produces structures of power, and hence domination.

Technology is power, only in the sense that your fingers are power. Technology is a lever that amplifies human actions. A hammer amplifies the fist. A horse amplifies the feet. A wheeled cart is an extension of the human arms as load carriers.

How does technology enable domination? It can only do so on the basis of exclusivity; if I have a horse I may be able to dominate you, but if we both have horses I have no advantage to press. Exclusivity of technology has been historically fleeting, and the existence of technology as a mode of domination always plays a back seat to human interaction.

It is not the internet or any specific technology that is crushing human freedom, but the technological system itself (which, in the form of slave labour, has existed since before the wheel was invented, though it never took hold of society as a whole until the 20th century). Our society is the technological system (Jacques Ellul), it is not the capitalist system, not the industrial system, not the postindustrial society, not the consumer society, not the affluent society, not the service society, etc., etc.

You (and Jacques) are putting the cart before the horse, to use a technological metaphor. Technology is one of many elements that lever human actions, but none of them intrinsically specify the nature of those interactions. They simply magnify the existing social relation, for good or ill.

Technology is the key that covers and explains our society; it is the infrastructure in which all of these other things are happening.

Technology is not THE key. it is a piece of the puzzle. To a feminist, patriarchy is the key. To a libertarian, government is the key. I would argue that money is the primary element of social control, since it controls access to the goods that enable survival. Yet it would be foolish to advocate the elimination of money without some assurance that things would actually improve for most people. The elimination of technology falls under such a quixotic category.

Had you argued for the social control of technology, you might have constructed a more convincing argument.

I don't see any evidence that we are moving in the direction of democratic technics. On the contrary, we are becoming more and more enslaved to technology with each passing year.

We are moving in the direction not of a democratic technics, but of an anarchic technics. Such technology tends to sabotage all modes of hierarchy and social control.

[anticlimacus]

Technology is in and of itself neutral. It's what we do with it that makes it beneficial, destructive, or both. Technology by itself is not doing anything to you or your wildlife. It's how technology gets used in social systems that matter. Anarchists, as far as I see it, can only benefit by embracing technology particularly by seeking to democratize it.

[Paradigm]

Then I can never be an anarchist.

What quaint madness is this? "oh noes the internet is crushing my freedomz!!!"

The internet is one technology I'd wish to preserve, and as a decentralized network with user-created content, I think it exemplifies anarchist principles beautifully. Anarchists should think about transforming technology in the same way they seek to transform society: Decentralized, horizontal, and maximizing human autonomy. Karl Hess, who was either the most left-wing an-cap or the most right-wing mutualist, once spoke about how solar power is democratic while nuclear power is authoritarian. One can be distributed widely without being controlled by a single firm, while the other is a top-down, centralized institution.