PNTC COLLEGES

Zone III, Lt. Cantimbuhan St. Poblacion, Dasmariñas City

GENERAL EDUCATION
ONLINE DISTANCE LEARNING MODULE

COURSE CODE SOC 116 PRE-REQUISITE NONE

COURSE TITLE Science, Technology and Society SEMESTER 1st
UNITS 3 YEAR LEVEL 2nd
COURSE DESCRIPTION The course deals with interactions between science and technology and social, cultural,
political, and economic contexts that shape and are shaped by them. (CMO No. 20, series
of 2013)

MODULE 7 (WEEK 8)
Technology as a way of Revealing
TOPIC LEARNING OUTCOMES

The students shall be able to:

Analyze the human condition in order to deeply reflect and express philosophical ramifications that are meaningful;
to the student as a part of society.

ENGAGE

Compare the two (2) images below:

(a) What did you notice in the two (2) images?

(b) What is the most striking difference between them?

EXPLORE

How will you describe the word "technology"?

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EXPLAIN AND ELABORATE

Technology as a Way of Revealing

Let's try to compare the Original Reflecting Telescope of Isaac Newton and the largest and latest space telescope of
NASA also known as James Webb Telescope.

The James Webb telescope is the world’s largest space telescope and is expected to capture views of the dimmest
and oldest galaxies in the universe and gaze into
cloudy nebulas where stars and planetary systems are formed (Wray, 2017).
It is expected to be launched in space by 2019 if all tests prove successful, and will serve as NASA’s “premier
observatory” for the next decade. While the original reflecting telescope have some limitations in capturing the
galaxy.

The following are the advancement of technology in Cosmology which slowly revealed the world beyond us.

600-130 BCE- Greeks were the first to develop astronomy into a theoretical science.

1543 AD- Copernicus proposed the heliocentric view of the Universe.

1668 AD- Sir Isaac Newton invented the first reflecting telescope.

1905 AD- Albert Einstein introduces the special theory of relativity.

1923- Edwin Hubble proved that galaxies are separate systems outside our own Milky Way.

1937- First radio telescope built in the USA by Grote Reber.

"Technology is a way of revealing. If we give heed to this, then another whole realm for the essence of technology
will open itself up to us. It is the realm of revealing i.e., of truth.

Technology is a means to an end.

Technology is a human activity.
Technology itself is a contrivance- in Latin, an instrumentum.

Four Causes to Explain the Knowledge of a Thing According to Aristotle

Causa materialis - The material cause: “that out of which”, e.g., the material out of which a silver chalice is made.

Ex - Why must silver or wood be chosen as the primary material for the chalice?

Causa formulis - The formal cause: “the form”, “the account of what-it-is-to-be”, e.g., the shape into which the
material is fashioned (shape of the chalice).

Ex- Why must the chalice be shaped that way, in relation to the occasion being celebrated?

Causa finalis - The final cause/purpose: “the end, that for the sake of which a thing is done”, e.g., the chalice is
made for the holy rite of communion.

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Ex- The chalice is made for a particular kind of activity, and its existence (as sacrificial vessel) is determined by this
context.

Causa efficiens - The efficient cause: “the primary source of the change or rest”, e.g., the artisan, or the silversmith
who crafts the chalice.

EX - The silversmith is not just seen as the agent that affects the production of the chalice, but also the one
responsible for the “revealing” of the chalice from the original material.

Technology is fundamentally ENFRAMING.

Enframing is a phenomenon in which our perspective is framed: we onle notice or care about or pay attention to
what can be done quickly or results in an efficient and further useable product (Cunning, 2015).

You may give the river as an example for enframing.

When an engineer sees a river, s/he may perceive it as a source of hydroelectric power. S/he sees the river through
the eyes of technology.

Another example would be human interest “in what others think of us, our immersion in idle talk, instead of the
more philosophical thoughts of which we are capable” (Kuperus, 2016).

Technology is not the end fate of humans. We must not be enslaved by it. It must only serve to reveal our humanity,
an instrument to better ourselves, the people around us, and nature. In the technological age, for something to 'be'
means for it to be raw material - part of the endless process of production and consumption.

For Heidegger, the horror of the technological age is that human beings are also seen as raw material
• Thus, the 'question concerning technology' is ultimately a question about human dignity. Modern technology
reveals the world in the manner of a challenging forth (Herausfordem)10 and not in the manner of a leading forth
from concealment into unconcealment (her-vor-bringen).
This challenging forth confront what lies in potential by extracting it in order to use it, and not as a
phenomenologically discoverable essence in need of safeguarding.

This challenging forth unlocks and exposes; and is always directed at something else - the maximum yield at the
minimum expense.

The goal of technology as a whole is thus the endless pursuit of efficiency in the exploitation of resources. For
Heidegger, technology possesses a highly ambiguous nature: it is dangerous, since it is the supreme provocation,
and yet it is salutary since we have no other access to the truth of Being in our times.

• How does Heidegger come to view technology as a way of revealing, as the way in which modern human beings
accesses truth?

Reflecting on the ancient Greeks, Heidegger notes that the root of the word 'technology' is techne. For the Greeks,
techne meant a revelation of something and uncovering or a bringing to light. The word techne according to
Heidegger then means a mode of knowing.

Thus, we can see that from his reflections on the Greek techne, Heidegger can conclude that modern technology is
also a manner of bringing forth out of concealed ness.
Heidegger notes that the manner in which modern technology reveals what is concealed is very different from that
of the ancient Greeks. The Greek experience of techne was revealing of what lay in potential. Hence, techne as a
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form of 'care', a way of enticing from beings their potential forms and functions. Heidegger tells us that:

Technology is in its essence a destiny within the history of Being and of the truth of Being, a truth that lies in
oblivion. For technology does not go back to the techne of the Greeks in name only but derives historically and
essentially from techne as a mode of aletheuein, a mode, that is, of rendering beings manifest [Offenbarmachen].
As a form of truth technology is grounded in the history of metaphysics, which is itself a distinctive and up to now
the only perceptible phase of the history of Being.

EVALUATE

Explain how does technology become a way of revealing human complexity?

EXTEND

How will you explain and apply in real life the quotation "Embrace technology but don't become it!"?

References

Serafica, Janice Patria J. Pawilen, Greg T. CAslib, Jr., Bernardo N. Alata, Eden Joy P. (2018). Science, Technology, and
Society. Sta. Mesa Heights,
Quezon City: Rex Printing Company, Inc..

Revision Status:

MOD SOC 116(7)

Rev.: 01
Issue Date:
September 10, 2021

Form No. BPM2-CME 20 F-009 SOC 116 (Module 7)

Rev.03 Page 4 of 4
COMPANY CONFIDENTIAL INFORMATION
Copyright © 2021 PNTC Colleges, All rights reserved.
When printed, this document is uncontrolled unless properly identified as controlled