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Technology and Isolation
By reconsidering the theme of isolation in the philosophy of technology,

and by drawing upon recent developments in social ontology, Lawson
provides an account of technology that will be of interest and value to
those working in a variety of different fields. Technology and Isolation
includes chapters on the philosophy, history, sociology and economics of
technology and contributes to such diverse topics as the historical
emergence of the term ‘technology’, the sociality of technology, the role
of technology in social acceleration, the relationship between Marx and
Heidegger and the relationship between technology and those with autism.
The central contribution of the book is to provide a new ontology of
technology. In so doing, Lawson argues that much of the distinct
character of technology can be explained or understood in terms of the
dynamic that emerges from technology’s peculiar constitutional mix of
isolatable and non-isolatable components.
clive lawson is currently Director of Studies in Economics and Senior

College Lecturer at Girton College, Cambridge, as well as Assistant
Director of Studies at Gonville and Caius College. He is an editor of the
Cambridge Journal of Economics and a founder member of the Cambridge
Social Ontology Group. Lawson has published in economics, geography,
psychology, sociology, philosophy and environmental economics.
Downloaded from https://www.cambridge.org/core. UQ Library, on 10 Feb 2019 at 03:16:39, subject to the Cambridge Core terms of use,
available at https://www.cambridge.org/core/terms. https://doi.org/10.1017/9781316848319
Technology and Isolation
clive lawson
University of Cambridge
University Printing House, Cambridge CB2 8BS, United Kingdom
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education, learning, and research at the highest international levels of excellence.
www.cambridge.org
Information on this title: www.cambridge.org/9781107180833
DOI: 10.1017/9781316848319
© Clive Lawson 2017
This publication is in copyright. Subject to statutory exception
and to the provisions of relevant collective licensing agreements,
no reproduction of any part may take place without the written
permission of Cambridge University Press.
First published 2017
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ISBN 978-1-107-18083-3 Hardback
Cambridge University Press has no responsibility for the persistence or accuracy of
URLs for external or third-party Internet websites referred to in this publication
and does not guarantee that any content on such websites is, or will remain,
accurate or appropriate.
For Lucy, Jesse and Callum
Contents
Preface page ix
Acknowledgements xiii
1 Technology Questions 1
2 From Obscurity to Keyword: The Emergence
of ‘Technology’ 17
3 Ontology and Isolation 31
4 Science and Technology 52
5 The Sociality of Artefacts 62
6 Technological Artefacts 79
7 Technology and the Extension of Human Capabilities 99
8 Technology and Instrumentalisation 114
9 Technology and Autism 129
10 Technology, Recombination and Speed 160
11 Marx, Heidegger and Technological Neutrality 177
Bibliography 202
Index 226
vii
Preface
It has often been suggested that technology, whatever its benefits,

comes at the expense of more isolated and impoverished human lives.
This has been a recurrent theme in the philosophy of technology,
especially that influenced by Heidegger, where modernity reduces
everything – including us – to resources ready for optimisation and
control. But the idea will also be familiar to readers of dystopian science
fiction, in which technologically sophisticated societies rarely contain
any recognisable or meaningful form of human community. More
technology, it would seem, leads to more isolation, be it isolation of
humans from nature or from each other.
In recent times, however, such ideas have become less prominent.
One important reason for this is that some of the most dominant
technologies of our time, such as the internet, facilitate a connectivity
between people that is unlike anything we have ever known. How can
the general tendency of adopting more technology result in greater
isolation? One of the main motivations of this book is the intuition
that, whilst it is impossible to make such simple pronouncements as
‘more technology means more isolation’, there are some good reasons
why the theme of isolation recurs throughout discussions of
technology. Although in need of substantial modification, there is
much in these older debates about isolation and separation that are
still of significance to current (increasingly technology-reliant)
societies, despite the fact that we can so easily Skype our family or
play music with strangers on other continents over the internet.
To recover more interesting conceptions of isolation and the
different senses in which these have featured in older literatures,
I argue, requires a return to ontology. To suggest a turn to ontology
is not likely to be treated with the kind of immediate disdain it would
have provoked even a few years ago. Indeed, it is almost possible to say
that first critical realism and then more recently actor network theory
and speculative realism, have made ontology, if not fashionable, then
ix
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x Preface
certainly ‘acceptable’ in many quarters. However, it is also fair to say

that these developments in ontology, for different reasons, have not
really made much of a contribution to understanding the nature of
technology, even though there seems to be great scope for doing so.
One of the main concerns of this book is to develop an ontology of
technology that draws upon these recent developments in social
ontology.
It seems hardly contentious to suggest that we live in a world of
things. Indeed, the idea that the world is full of things with different
causal powers, affordances, organisational properties, etc., seems
essential to everyone’s ability to get by in the world. However, it is
equally uncontentious, I think, to suggest that things operate within
and on the basis of being components in different systems. Not all
things have similar properties or ways of acting, and many of these
differences depend upon differences in the way they are organised.
Given this, a central question is the extent to which some things can
be understood to operate in relative isolation from other things.
Although philosophy and the social sciences are replete with attempts
to provide general answers to this question, ranging from reductionist
individualisms to emergentist holisms, there seems little doubt that in
practice some things are more isolatable than others; some things can
operate and be the kinds of things that they are, relatively
independently of their relations to other things, others cannot.
Moreover, the extent to which things can be understood in isolation
is for the most part a matter of empirical discovery. There is not much
that can be said a priori.
A central assumption of this book is that the social and non-social
worlds are rather different from each other when it comes to matters of
isolatability, and that these differences underlie the various ways of
being and dynamics of different phenomena, as well as setting
constraints on the methods that can be used to understand them.
Moreover, issues of isolatability, though neglected, are of particular
importance when it comes to the study of things that incorporate
aspects of both the social and the non-social in a fundamental way,
such as technology.
Although the term ‘technology’ is one we all capably use on a regular
basis, there are actually surprisingly few attempts, across all social
sciences and social theory, to pin down exactly what we all mean by
the term. A clear example of this is to be found in economics, where,
Preface xi
amongst the mainstream at least, there is little interest in developing

ideas about the nature of technology. Effectively, anything that changes
the relationship between inputs and outputs of some production
process is referred to as technology; once we know (which of course
we never do) the shape of the functional relationship between inputs
and outputs, then no more knowledge of technology is required.
This book arose out of an attempt to fill this rather obvious gap by
drawing upon the social ontology with which I was most familiar to try
to spell out exactly what we mean by technology. One ‘quick’ paper
divided into three or four relatively unsatisfying journal articles, and it
became obvious that a book was required to make even a stab at the
project I had set myself. However, the main argument that I want to
make is very simple. Technology is made up of both social and non-
social elements. These elements, in turn, are susceptible to different
amounts of isolatability. Whilst the boundaries between the social and
the non-social and the isolatable and the non-isolatable are often
porous and dynamic, much that we know of the character of natural
and social science, such as the status of controlled experiment in each,
suggests that there are huge differences in isolatability in each domain.
I will argue that much of the distinct character of technology, and our
relationship to it, as well as many of the significant contributions to the
study of technology, can be explained or understood in terms of the
particular dynamic that emerges from technology’s constitutional mix
of isolatable and non-isolatable components.
I believe this dynamic explains all kinds of phenomena from
economic growth, to the special relationship that those with autism
tend to have with technology, to many of the criticisms levelled at
current capitalism or modernity. However, to get to these arguments
requires some prior setting up of the basic account of technology I want
to defend. I must apologise to those readers who will find the
preliminary chapters too slow and/or repetitive. But many will find,
depending upon their background, that one or more of the early,
introductory chapters covers familiar material that can be skipped
without losing the argument the book is trying to make.
In short, this book is motivated by a concern with ideas that have
currently fallen out of favour but which I believe are as important as
they have ever been. It is not a book that attempts to establish whether
the net effect of more technology means less community or more
isolated people. Neither is it concerned with which technologies tend
xii Preface
to connect us and which do not (although the ontology developed in

this book should be useful in answering either question). Rather, it is
a book about the nature of technology more generally. By focusing
upon the way that different ideas of isolation weave in and out of
a variety of historical understandings and debates about technology,
this book attempts to ground and give meaning to a particular, novel
account of technology that is itself set in terms of a particular approach
to ontology.
Acknowledgements
This book has been gestating for some time. Consequently, there are
a lot of people to thank. The idea for the project first arose whilst on
leave visiting the University of Western Sidney and Brian Pinkstone in
particular. The main writing was done over two further sabbatical
leaves in Vancouver, one visiting the University of British Columbia,
the other visiting Simon Fraser University. For the first visit I am very
grateful for the welcome and support from Margaret Schabas in
particular. On the second visit I am indebted to Andrew Feenberg
who gave very unselfishly of his time and stopped me from wasting
my time reinventing the wheel. More recently, most of the main writing
has taken place in a small cottage in the Breton Beacons – many thanks
to Leslie Turano and Chris Taylor.
The main intellectual debt lies with members of the Cambridge
Social Ontology Group. Weekly meetings, thrashing out ideas about
everything from markets and commodities to the ontology of traffic
lights and photocopiers, have provided the main ideational resources
for the book. I am especially grateful to Bahar Araz, Phil Faulkner,
Tony Lawson, Helen Mussel, Stephen Pratten and Mary Wrenn for
giving up their time not only to read earlier drafts of these chapters but
to then patiently go through it all with me. In particular I would like to
thank Tony Lawson, Stephen Pratten and Phil Faulkner for extensive
comments on earlier versions of most, if not all, of these chapters.
I would also like to thank Mark Burgess, Lucy Delap, John Lawson
and Altuğ Yalçıntaş for comments on specific chapters.
Lastly, I want to thank my family – Lucy, Jesse and Callum – who
were so wonderfully supportive and understanding over what must
have seemed (and in Callum’s case just about was) a lifetime.
xiii
1 Technology Questions
It is often suggested that we live in a technological age. Although it is

rarely made clear exactly what this statement means, or why or in what
ways previous ages are thought not to be technological, most of us seem
to agree that technology plays an important role in our lives. We may
also agree that this role is becoming increasingly important. In all kinds
of daily activities such as buying a bus ticket, guessing how the weather
will change, listening to music, paying for shopping at a supermarket,
archiving family photos or borrowing a book from the library, we all
experience a constant prodding to our routine or ‘normal’ ways of
doing things that can be traced to some or other new technological
development. For the most part, moreover, such developments come
into being in ways, and for reasons, that lie outside of our control.
In other words, we all, through our everyday activities, experience
technology’s power as an external agent of change.
This experience suggests a range of important questions. To what
extent is it possible or desirable to influence the introduction of new
technology? To what extent do different technologies determine or
constrain the kinds of social changes that follow or accommodate
them? Do societies have broad trends or characteristics that are related
to the amount or form of technology that have emerged within them –
for example, can it be said that people are more or less connected to
each other in virtue of the technology they use? Does technology bring
with it opportunities for a better life or tend to smuggle in unnecessary
problems? Does the form or speed of change of different technologies
matter? Is technology always neutral, only taking on good or bad
features in some particular context of use? Is it even possible or mean-
ingful to talk in general about ‘technology’ at all?
Such questions will be familiar to many if not most of us. They have
been the lifeblood of science fiction since the beginning of the genre.
More formally, or academically, such questions have occupied a wide
variety of social theorists since at least the time of the ancient Greeks.
Recently, contributions concerned with such questions have been orga-

nised together as constituents of a ‘philosophy of technology’.
However, it is fair to say that there remains widespread ambivalence
towards this newly established discipline. An example of such ambiva-
lence is the fact that as interest in this new discipline is growing, interest
in its core questions, such as those above, appears to be waning; in the
midst of ‘the technological age’, those questions that we might call the
‘classic’ technology questions are receiving relatively less attention.
Indeed, such questions seem to be currently very unfashionable.
I want to argue, however, that contrary to recent trends, there is
actually much to be gained from systematically pursuing just the kinds
of questions noted above. Not only is it the case that these questions are
(still) in need of answering, but I want to argue that now is a very good
time to address them from a particular perspective. Specifically, this
book approaches such issues from a perspective that owes much to
recent developments in social theorising, in particular in social ontol-
ogy, which have as yet received very little interest from theorists of
technology. To be clear, neither have social ontologists shown much
interest in technology, nor have philosophers of technology shown
much interest in the kinds of ontological developments I have in
mind. An important motivation of this book is the desire to draw out
connections between these two sets of contributions and initiate
a dialogue between them.
The rest of this chapter is given over to providing an introduction to
the relatively new discipline of the philosophy of technology, and to
explaining the apparently contradictory fact that as the philosophy of
technology has received increasing interest, there has been an identifi-
able ambivalence towards its classic problems and questions. Such an
undertaking is also strategically helpful, in that it helps to contextualise
the arguments that follow in the rest of this book. The starting point,
however, is to give a brief overview of the subject matter to which the
label ‘philosophy of technology’ is usually understood to refer, which is
the focus of the following section.
On a note of qualification, however, I should point out that I am not
at this stage advancing my own conception or definition of technology.
Rather the point here is to provide the reader, especially if unfamiliar
with the philosophy of technology, with a feel for the kinds of problems
and issues that have concerned those usually understood to be contri-
buting to the philosophy of technology. Such a strategy may give rise to
The Philosophy of Technology 3
some apparently contradictory conceptions of ‘technology’, but I shall

delay stating exactly what I mean by the term until after the historical
discussion of the emergence of the term ‘technology’ in the following
chapter. The reason for doing this is to explicitly incorporate existing
meanings and understandings of technology where possible and help-
ful. As such, the themes discussed in the remainder of this and much of
the next chapter serve to introduce the main ideas that a convincing
account of technology should be able to accommodate.
The Philosophy of Technology

At risk of severe oversimplification, two broad themes have dominated
the philosophy of technology. The first might be briefly described as the
moral or ethical evaluation of technology (or more narrowly, the
relation of technology to ‘the good life’), whilst the second focuses
upon the ways in which our lives are constrained, transformed or
controlled by technology (especially as formalised in theories of tech-
nological determinism or technological autonomy). Although clearly
connected, these two broad themes are initially discussed separately, in
turn.
It is fair to say that the recent spate of readers on and companions to
the philosophy of technology reveal an intellectual landscape in which
evaluative attitudes to technology swing back and forth over time.1
Typically, a story is told of an initial scepticism towards technological
ideas that is reversed by an enlightenment optimism, then replaced by
a romantic ambivalence or ‘unease’, which is itself eventually replaced
by some kind of neutrality view of technology (see for example
Mitcham, 1994).2
The philosophy of technology is usually presented as having its
origins in ancient Greece, in the ideas of Socrates, Plato and Aristotle.
Once more, two broad themes tend to be highlighted. The first revolves
around attempts to create (or defend beliefs about) hierarchies of types
of knowledge and learning. For example, there is a distinction made
1
See for example Scharff and Dusek (2003), Dusek (2006), Kaplan (1964), Meijers
(2009).
2
Such retrospective demarcation of the domain of philosophy of technology must,
of course, be treated quite cautiously as a summary of ideas about technology,
given that it is not clear that the term ‘technology’ is used in exactly the same
manner throughout the contributions highlighted.
between craft, political and philosophical knowledge. Put simply,

whilst the craft knowledge of those such as farmers and artisans, is
more ‘true’ and ‘honest’ than knowledge of a political kind, it still falls
some way short of the ‘wisdom’ available to philosophers (knowledge
of the good life arrived at by those who love knowledge). At the heart of
these distinctions is the belief that general knowledge is of a higher
order than particular or specialised (including technical) knowledge
(Dusek, 2006).
This distinction between craft and other kinds of knowledge, relates
directly to the second theme, often presented in terms of some kind of
scepticism. Greek philosophers tended to believe that although techni-
cal knowledge is a necessary part of life, it is in some sense also bad or
dangerous. These ideas are evident in a range of stories and myths such
as Daedalus and Icarus, the Tower of Babel, and Prometheus. Each of
these stories embodies the idea that a preoccupation with technological
matters involves a turning away from something good (usually faith in
God or nature) and an undermining of individual striving for
excellence.3
This largely negative or suspicious orientation towards technology is
not substantially revised until the writings of Francis Bacon
(1561–1626). For Bacon, in contrast to the Greeks, technical knowl-
edge is superior to all other kinds of knowledge and technological
artefacts are thought to be inherently good in nature, with any possible
dangers being viewed as accidental, or a sign of ‘misuse’. Moreover, not
only does a turn to technology not involve a turn away from God, as
seemed to be the case for the ancient Greeks, but according to Bacon
a knowledge of nature and its technological uses can be employed by
humans to achieve a ‘purity of mind and behaviour lost in the “Fall”
from the Garden of Eden’.4 For Bacon, God had given a clear mandate
to pursue technology in order to relieve human suffering. Moreover,
because humans are created in God’s image, it is inevitably in the nature
of humans to create and innovate.
3
‘[Technology] according to these myths, although to some extent required by
humanity and thus on occasion a cause for legitimate celebration easily turn
against the human by severing him or her from some larger reality. This severing
manifesting in a failure of faith or shift of the will, a refusal to rely on or trust God
or the gods’ (Mitcham, 1994).
4
See for example Bacon (1909).
Traces of Bacon’s irrepressibly progressive conception of technology

can be found in the work of a range of other well-known thinkers.5 And
even as the Renaissance dawned, with its recasting of questions of
theological obligation, the belief that humans are effectively unable to
live without technology of some form remained. At the same time the
pursuit of technology was thought to have positive effects not only on
the morals, but the well-being of humans.6 In this context, the status of
those thought ‘expert’ in technological matters began to increase, thus
initiating debates that would later revolve around conceptions of tech-
nocracy, early versions of which can be found in the works of Auguste
Comte (1798–1857) and Saint Simon (1760–1825).
This new optimism in the role that could be played by technology
emerged at the same time as the unprecedented power that was
unleashed in the Industrial Revolution. However, this wealth of
power seemed to generate countervailing attitudes towards technology
in very general terms. On the one hand, there was widespread awe of
the possibilities being opened up by the wealth of inventions and
innovations of the period. On the other hand, there emerged a distrust
of the actual results of such developments. In fact, the real-life con-
sequences of that revolution prompted a range of contributions that
were more critical of technological advance. Within such writings,
Bacon’s ideas were now held up as the main foil against which criti-
cisms of the enlightenment were made. Perhaps the most prominent of
these critics was Jean-Jacques Rousseau (1712–1778). Whereas for the
Greeks technology was, essentially, bad but necessary, Rousseau
attacked what he saw as a complacent progressivism. For Rousseau,
the progress of the sciences would lead to decline and decadence,
especially destroying the ‘virtue and vigour’ of the barbarian nations
(see for example Rousseau, 1992). Rousseau’s anti-Baconianism
played an important role in the Romantic critique of the Industrial
Revolution more generally and, especially in Germany and England, it
played a part in the general sea change of ideas in which, for instance,
an organic conception of reality emerged to challenge Newtonian
mechanics, and in which logic and reason were counterposed to imagi-
nation and feeling.
5
One notable, relatively subtle, form is taken by Kant, see especially (Kant, 1784).
6
This, for example, is the position adopted by Hume (Hume, Green and Grose,
2001).
Many of the contributions that followed, however, fell in between

this Baconian belief in technological progress and Rousseau’s romantic
aversion to it. For example, Karl Marx occupied a complex position
which drew upon both developments. As I make clear in Chapter 11,
although Marx was very critical of the simple Baconian utopias of
those such as Saint Simon and Comte (Marx shared the romantic
distrust of the employment of technology in the short run, especially
under the conditions in which capitalism was in full swing), he was
clearly optimistic about the long-run possibilities of technology’s ben-
efits for mankind.
More recently, a fourth position has emerged in which there is a
tendency, especially evident in the recent constructivist literature, to
criticise all positions that imply either an essentially (or generally) good
or bad character of technological knowledge or artefacts. Any evaluative
statements about technology are understood to be misguided or simply
false. Technology, if the term has any meaning at all at such a general
level of analysis, can only refer to neutral means to some end or other and
it is the ends that might be evaluated in some limited fashion.
Before focusing upon this constructivist position, however, I should
say a little more about the position against which it is so often presented
as a reaction – technological determinism. As noted above, technolo-
gical determinism, along with the thesis of technological autonomy,
features centrally in the second core theme of the philosophy of tech-
nology, which is centrally concerned with the idea that technology
constitutes some kind of power or force that is largely independent of
the human will.
Jacques Ellul is perhaps the most prominent theorist of the autonomy
of technology (Ellul, 1964, 1980). At the heart of Ellul’s contribution is
the idea that human control of technology is not as capable (or real) as
we would like to think. Ellul often uses the term ‘technique’ to refer to
the way that much of our daily activity is brought into conformity with
strictly laid-out rules and regulations that increasingly reduce reason to
the instrumental. In the process of producing this conformity, the ways
in which we are thought to control technology become, rather,
a response to the requirements of technology itself. This is especially
true, Ellul argues, for those authorities or organisations most thought
to be in a position to control and modify technology to our purposes.
Ellul spends a good deal of time explaining why we are blind to such
processes. Experts overestimate their own skills, scientists and
engineers display embarrassing naiveté with respect to the social

implications of different technologies, everyday users of technology
increasingly give up any attempts to control technological phenomena,
leaving such matters to the experts. Moreover, Ellul argues, the tech-
nological system as a whole ‘entrances’ us all (technologists, politi-
cians, consumers). Advertising changes our desires and the endlessly
creative force of technological values displace traditional morality
(Ellul, 1964). Aspects of Ellul’s account are often mixed with the
contributions of others to provide a more sophisticated picture of
technology’s properties. For example Winner’s idea of ‘technological
somnambulism’ mixes the properties of technology with human
complacency and willingness to defer to experts to explain why
technology feels so out of control (Winner, 1983).
However, it is the term ‘technological determinism’ that is best
known for conveying these ideas, even though it is a term that is both
less appropriate and less consistently used. A real problem here, is that
even amongst prominent and well-respected accounts of technological
determinism, it is unclear exactly why they are so labelled, and what
exactly is meant by determinism. A prominent example is the discus-
sion provided by Merrit Roe Smith and Leo Marx, who distinguish
between hard and soft technological determinism (Marx and Smith,
1994). In fact, the hard-soft distinction turns out to be polar cases of
a spectrum of technological determinisms, with movement along the
spectrum involving the degree of agency, or the power to effect change,
attributed to technology. At the hard end, technology has certain
intrinsic attributes that allow little scope for human autonomy or
choice. At the other end of the spectrum, soft determinism simply
emphasises the large scope for human interventions and choice.
Indeed, for Smith and Marx at least ‘the soft determinists locate [tech-
nology] in a far more various and complex social, economic, political
and cultural matrix’ (ibid., p. xii).
Why, however, should such accounts be considered to be determi-
nistic at all? To the extent that both hard and soft versions accept that
there is some scope for human choice, and merely contest the issue of
how much, why would we want to use the term deterministic to
describe either of them?7 In response to this confusion of terminology,
Bimber distinguishes nomological and normative forms of
7
See also Lawson in Latsis, 2007.
technological determinism. The nomological is that which takes the

‘determinism’ in technological determinism most seriously. For
Bimber, ‘technological determinism can be seen as the view that, in
the light of . . . the state of technological development and laws of
nature, there is only one possible future course for social change’
(Bimber, 1996, p. 83). There is no scope for human desires or choices.
Alongside this form of determinism, Bimber distinguishes a version
he terms ‘normative’ technological determinism. In the normative
version, technology appears to us as autonomous because the norms
by which it is advanced are ‘removed from the political and ethical
discourse and . . . goals of efficiency or productivity become surrogates
for value-based debate over methods, alternatives, means and ends’
(ibid., p. 82). Here technological development is an essentially human
enterprise in which people who create and use technology are driven by
certain goals that rely unduly on norms of efficiency and productivity,
thus excluding other criteria (ethical, moral) and producing a process
that operates independently of the political processes and mechanisms
usually thought to operate. The end point is one in which society
adopts the technologist’s standards of judgement. Thus there is
a technological domain, which includes elements of society generally,
acting as a constraint and a causal force on other aspects of society.
Searching for examples of such technological determinisms proves to
be a revealing exercise. Notably, it is actually very difficult to find
examples of the nomological technological determinism distinguished
by Bimber. Most possible candidates (perhaps unsurprisingly) come
from the economics domain. The most familiar of these is Marx’s
famous statement that ‘the hand-mill gives you society with the feudal
lord; the steam-mill society with the industrial capitalist’ (Marx, 1956,
1955 [1900]). However, it is very difficult to attribute anything like
a hard or nomological form of technological determinism once a wider
reading of Marx is undertaken (see Chapter 11 or Rosenberg, 1976,
Mackenzie, 1984a, Harvey, 2006).
Turning to Bimber’s normative form of technological determinism,
Habermas is singled out as a particularly good example (Habermas,
1970). Habermas bases his account on the distinction between work,
which is success oriented – purposive action concerned with controlling
the world – and interaction, which involves communication between
subjects in pursuit of common understanding. Modernity is charac-
terised by the colonisation of the system of objectifying (de-linguifying)
behaviour of the former on the latter ‘lifeworld’. Thus the problem,

with which determinism grapples, is actually one of the inappropriate
extension of one domain to another.
Although Bimber fails to mention him, a perhaps more obvious
example of the normative form is provided by Heidegger. Heidegger,
famously has a conception of technology that involves unavoidable
negative change, ushering in a ‘dystopian modernity’. For Heidegger,
we are engaged in a transformation of the entire world (and ourselves)
into mere raw materials or ‘standing reserves’, objects to be controlled
(Heidegger, 1977, p. 183). Methodical planning comes to dominate,
destroying integrity and encouraging a view of everything in terms of
functionality rather than a respect for things for their own sakes. The
central point is that technology itself is not neutral. The domination of
technological processes leads to a situation in which everything is
reduced to the status of a resource that has to be optimised in some
way. Especially disturbing is the tendency for people to see themselves
in the same way. Increasingly, sight is lost of what is being sacrificed in
the move to utilise human and other resources for goals that become
increasingly unclear.
Although many differences exist in Heidegger and Habermas’s con-
tributions, their central concern is strikingly similar, namely, the reduc-
tion of meaning and value in the domain of everyday living or the
lifeworld that comes about through our engagements with technology.
Underlying the accounts of Heidegger and Habermas is the idea that an
instrumental attitude is adopted towards means and ends that results in
various activities, including non-technological activities, being drained
of meaning. Personal or emotional involvement is reduced to
a minimum and the values of possession and control end up dominating
social life. Our engagements with technology thus end up transforming
us; the use of technology creates a new lifeworld, which isolates and
impoverishes both the natural world and ourselves. Moreover, it is easy
to see with these examples how the themes of evaluation and determin-
ism are often connected.
Although there is far more to the philosophy of technology than can
be discussed in such a short space, the above does serve to introduce the
main ideas that this book is concerned with. However, as suggested
above, it is important also to convey something of the rather peculiar
status of the philosophy of technology as a discipline. More specifically,
two overlapping questions require attention. The first is, why has the
philosophy of technology only recently become formalised into

a ‘respectable’ discipline? And, secondly, why have the main questions
and themes of the philosophy of technology declined in importance as
the discipline has become established? These questions are addressed
in turn.
The Late Appearance of the Philosophy of Technology

Until recently, philosophers have been relatively uninterested in any-
thing we may now refer to as technology (Dusek, 2006).
The Research in Philosophy of Technology Society, the prime orga-
nisation for the philosophical study of technology, dates back only
to 1975. And, within analytical philosophy at least, the study of
technology has been viewed as at best a rather uninteresting
‘specialisation’.
Several factors explain this state of affairs. One problem is the
difficulty involved in specifying exactly what the term ‘technology’
refers to. Even a very casual review of the technology literature
reveals the fact that different writers use the term ‘technology’ in
very different ways. Technology is frequently portrayed as knowl-
edge, as artefacts, as ways of doing things, as any means to an end,
as a form of study and even as a form of social institution.
Sometimes languages or symbolic devices such as calculus are trea-
ted as a technology. As noted above, in economics, technology is
understood as the relationship between inputs and outputs or even
as capital. How are we to adjudicate between such uses? Moreover,
whilst there appears to be considerable agreement that certain
things can be identified as examples of technology (such as compu-
ters, washing machines, aircraft, cameras, etc.,) and others that
cannot (small children, flowers, paintings, jewellery, food, toys,
etc.,) there is little agreement about which features of each grouping
are responsible for the contrast.
If it is difficult to agree upon what the term technology refers to, how
is it possible to discuss the broad features of societies that incorporate
relatively more or less technology? Indeed, are such questions even
meaningful? At least part of the disinterest in the philosophy of tech-
nology, or its questions, comes from a wider consensus that in the
absence of a clear definition of technology, such questions are not really
meaningful.
Late Appearance of Philosophy of Technology 11
Even where a particular definition of technology has been applied,

there are reasons why the philosophy of technology has not been taken
very seriously. For example, one prominent definition has been of
technology as ‘applied science’. But if this is all technology is then, it
would seem, the interesting philosophical issues lie elsewhere, such as
in the philosophy of science, especially in the epistemology of science.
Moreover, for some there is a belief that science, and so by implication
technology, is in some sense ‘neutral’. Thus, if technology has implica-
tions for society generally, given its unproblematic source in science,
such implications are relatively uninteresting (philosophically) or can
be dealt with independently as a matter of ethics (see for example
Scharff and Dusek, 2003). As such, it is possible to see how the study
of technology has tended to fall ‘through the cracks’ between science
and ethics.8
Another likely reason for the philosophy of technology’s particular
status within the academy is the fact that it is, as a discipline, somewhat
ex post; although a growing literature now exists setting out broad
themes focused upon, and providing lists of examples of writers who
can be thought of as contributing to a philosophy of technology, such
demarcations would not have occurred to those authors in question
(for examples of recent excellent anthologies see Scharff and Dusek,
2003, Dusek, 2006, Kaplan, 2009, Meijers, 2009). This might not in
itself be a problem as long as such retrospective boundary setting
captures something important, and I believe it does, but it has not
helped the credibility of the (ostensibly) new discipline.
A further problem for the philosophy of technology has been the
rather daunting range of authors and of topics that are now regularly
listed as contributing to the discipline. This list, ranging from Socrates,
via Heidegger, to recent actor network theory, not only requires a good
knowledge of a wide range of thinkers, but also a familiarity with
complex and diverse sets of ideas and themes.9
Despite these problems, however, the philosophy of technology is, as
noted, currently receiving significant attention. However, as also
8
One might also add that the truly worrying effects of technology, such as nuclear
war, environmental degradation, biological manipulation, etc., have only
emerged relatively recently.
9
Indeed the complexity of the subject and the vast range of skills required have
been suggested by some notable technology writers to account for the reason why
technology is ‘allowed to run out of control’ (Ellul, 1980).
noted, this attention and academic presence has coincided with a fall in
interest in the ‘classic’ questions identified at the outset as traditionally
constituting the core of the new discipline. This claim requires some
elaboration.
Criticisms of the Philosophy of Technology

By far the most sustained and prominent criticisms have come from
constructivist positions, and are aimed at preconceptions of the philo-
sophy of technology’s main contributors that are perceived to be
deterministic.10 Although constructivism is itself far from being a
homogeneous position, various points of agreement exist, at least
with respect to the charge of technological determinism, which turn
out to be important for the account that follows.11
First there is an explicit rejection of the idea that technical change can
be seen as on some fixed or monotonic ‘trajectory’. Technological
change is, rather, thought to be genuinely contingent and not reducible
to some inner technological ‘logic’. Secondly, the view of the relation-
ship between science and technology (in which science is seen as the
independent, rational, non-political source of technological ideas) is
questioned, as is the idea that technological change leads to (deter-
mines) social change and not vice versa. Instead, a rich source of case-
study material is drawn upon to demonstrate the contingent nature of
technical change and on how technology is ‘shaped’, especially by
different social groups in the process of settling a range of technologi-
cal/social controversies and disagreements (MacKenzie and Wajcman,
1985a). Crucially, at any point, there are many different trajectories or
10
Prominent examples that do not quite fit into the constructivist mould tend to
argue (in different ways) that the philosophy of technology focuses too much
upon the effects of technology without considering very carefully what
technology is (see for example Pitt, 2000, Mitcham, 1994, Kroes and Meijers,
2000).
11
The main roots of social constructivist accounts of technology appear to lie in
the sociology of scientific knowledge (for example, Bloor, 1976, Shapin, 1982).
The term ‘social constructivism’ is most often used in a narrow sense to refer to
the social construction of technology (SCOT) approach outlined by Pinch and
Bijker (1987) or Bijker (1995) and related approaches (Woolgar, 1991).
However, it is possible to include here the ‘social shaping’ approaches
(MacKenzie and Wajcman, 1985b, Wajcman, 1991) and the actor-network
approach of Latour (1987) and Callon (1987). These approaches are roughly in
agreement (to varying degrees) over the following points.
Criticisms of the Philosophy of Technology 13
routes that technology could take (it is underdetermined) and always

depends to some degree upon human (especially collective) action.
Perhaps the greatest strength of these contributions is the plethora of
demonstrations that technology is indeed irreducibly social. But there is
much to say about the manner in which the social aspect is introduced,
especially as regards the role played by the ideas of symmetries.12
A central idea here is taken from the sociology of scientific knowledge
literature (see, for example, Bloor, 1976): that it is best to remain
agnostic about the truth, falsity, rationality, etc., of competing claims
in settling scientific controversies. Translated to the technological
realm this means that the researcher should remain impartial with
regards to the actual properties of the technology and their relative
functionality or efficiency determining which technologies become
‘settled upon’ (Pinch and Bijker, 1987).13
Given the de-emphasis of the nature of technology itself, in having
much bearing upon its own acceptance or dominance, existing technol-
ogy is understood or analysed in terms of the stabilisation of different
controversies and disputes. Once stabilisation is achieved, controversy
is removed and the properties of this stabilisation (how consensus is
achieved) determines how that technology functions. The focus, as
with the sociology of scientific knowledge literature, is upon how
‘closure’ is achieved. Crucial to this conception of closure, is the idea
that technology is not interpreted or understood in any fixed way.
These different interpretations of technology are not only concerned
with its social characteristics or relative functionality, but with its
technical content – with how it works. Thus, ‘facts’ about technology
are simply the (different) interpretations of different social groups
12
Various accounts put this aspect as central stage (Lynch, 1992, Collins, 1985).
Some accounts even present the field as a series of extensions of the symmetry
principle (Woolgar, 1988).
13
The researcher must, in other words, treat as possibly true or false all claims
made about the nature of technology – such claims must be treated
symmetrically (explaining them by reference to similar factors), since there is no
independent way of evaluating the knowledge claims of scientists, technologists,
et al. As in the sociology of scientific knowledge literature, two ideas underlie
these arguments. First, the ‘real world’ plays no role in settling controversies (in
settling the form that technology takes) and, second, that the researcher has no
independent access to the world, so there is no way of evaluating competing
claims. Thus claims about the relative efficiency or successfulness of different
technologies or technical progress (or how some technology comes into being)
are to be avoided (Staudenmaier, 1995, Pels, 1996).
(Bijker, 1995). The term ‘closure’ is therefore used to refer to a rheto-

rical process of settling disputes via negotiation and social action.
Technology is thus socially shaped and socially constructed.
The problem with these responses to technological determinism is
that they result in a situation where it is difficult, if not impossible, to
distinguish technology from any other social phenomenon (Winner,
1991, Lawson, 2007). Whilst there may be some questions or analyses
within which this is itself not a problem, it certainly makes it impossible
to address any of the ‘technology questions’ noted above that form the
core of the traditional philosophy of technology. For example, it makes
it difficult to explain the special role that technology takes in prodding
or provoking all manner of social changes.
Constructivists are clearly correct to argue, against nomological
determinist accounts, that contingency matters. However, little is said
about the normative form noted by Bimber and others. Unseating the
privileged position of science in technology’s development, whilst also
surely correct, actually distracts from the very factors to which
Habermas, Heidegger and others are drawing attention – that the use
of technology tends to bring with it values of possession and control
that can dominate social life and drain it of meaning. These are ques-
tions about which the constructivist has little to say.
Put bluntly, reasonable criticisms of aspects of the determinist
position have encouraged a situation where technology cannot be
distinguished from any other social phenomenon, and so the classic
questions of the philosophy of technology become impossible or
unnecessary to address. In contrast, this book is concerned with just
these questions. However, I shall argue that such concerns are quite
compatible with the irreducibly social character and essential contin-
gency insisted upon by constructivist accounts. Moreover, I shall argue
that these questions are most easily addressed by establishing a con-
ception of technology that systematically draws upon and develops
recent accounts of social ontology.
Outline of the Book

To take stock, I believe there is much of value in the older, or classic
questions of the philosophy of technology. And whilst there is also
a good deal of value in the more recent, predominantly constructivist,
criticisms of this literature, constructivist critics end up painting
Outline of the Book 15
themselves into a corner in which it is impossible to address, or even

pose, the main questions with which the philosophy of technology has
been most concerned. In short, it is impossible to portray technology as
being different from any other social phenomena.
This being the case, there is a need to find a way of formulating these
older questions fruitfully, which accommodates the more interesting
constructivist criticisms of technological determinism. In order to do
this, as noted above, I wish to draw upon relatively recent develop-
ments in social theory, specifically social ontology, which have thus far
not found their way into the technology literature in any sustained
manner. In short, my aim is to make an ontological contribution to the
philosophy of technology from a particular social ontological
perspective.
In order to facilitate this, some introductory and context-setting
remarks are required. This is the task of the first part of the book.
More specifically, the following chapter provides an account of the
nominal features of technology that require accommodation. This is
pursued by asking when and how the term ‘technology’ acquired its
current significance. Chapter 3 makes the case for pursuing an ontolo-
gical approach and also sets out the ontological strategy I adopt, along
with a summary and development of recent ontological contributions
that I draw upon in later chapters.
Chapter 4 begins to construct an ontological account of technology
by first considering the relationship between science and technology.
Although critical of classic conceptions of technology as applied
science, this chapter maintains that understanding the nature of
science is still important for understanding the nature of technology.
Chapter 5 focuses upon the irreducibly social nature of technology
highlighted by constructivists. However, this ‘social-ness’, or social-
ity, of technology is formulated in more ontological terms, especially
in terms of social positions. Chapter 6 attempts to distinguish
technological artefacts from other kinds of artefacts, and Chapter 7
argues that such artefacts can also be understood to be extending
human capabilities. Chapter 8 attempts to consolidate ideas from
the previous four chapters on the ontology of technology by making
comparisons to other recent accounts of technology, especially to
instrumentalisation theory.
The final three chapters draw out implications of the account given
for a range of very different questions. Chapter 9 focuses upon the
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dos espanhóis mas dá iguais. E se querem experimentar já lhes não
digo que leiam d’Annunzio e logo Gauthier. Leiam por exemplo
d’Annunzio e Suderman. Se vos não der a impressão que os livros
de d’Annunzio são escritos por uma mulher, não sei que diga!
Tolstoi quando começou às punhadas a Shakespeare devia sentir
a tortura do russo do livro de Eça. E todavia Tolstoi com tôda a sua
mansidão, a sua paciência sofredora, a sua resignação passiva e
néo-cristã não pode compreender a tempestade de paixões que é
Shakespeare. Porque Shakespeare é o colosso do Ódio e do Amor,
o Céu, a Terra e o Inferno. E eu penso que é preciso ser-se um
vélho bruto para não compreender Shakespeare.
Outro tanto dirão de mim. Não compreender d’Annunzio? ¿O
poeta do amor subtil, dos perfumes, dos lilazes, da volúpia perene,
capitosa e aristocrata; o prosador imaterial, cheio de doçura,
magistral, ilustre, divino, mirífico; a pena de ouro que traçou o
Fuoco, o Crime, as Virgens? Eu sei lá! Mas é um crime! E estou
repêso de confessar o meu pecado. Eu não sabia... E ponho-me a
querer entender d’Annunzio. Tomarei um explicador. Porfiarei. A
minha ignorância é lamentável. Mas, quando estou envergonhado e
confuso um diabinho irónico vem e segreda-me ao ouvido que os
outros, que o adoram, que o admiram, percebem-no tanto como eu.
Compreendo agora. É uma «ideia feita», o culto de d’Annunzio. E
como o desgraçado Cornuski, eu, torcendo as mãos, na minha
impotência de o compreender terei que murmurar
desconsoladamente o meu:—«Como é belo!»
Um poema
(Carta ao general Henrique das Neves)
Meu amigo:
JÁ lá vai mês e meio de silêncio sôbre o recebimento do poema
Apoteose Humana, que o meu amigo teve a gentileza de me ofertar
em nome do autor. Só hoje lhe escrevo, mas lá diz o ditado... O
amigo sabe o que o ditado diz. Pediu-me a minha opinião. Sem
embargo dela ser uma opinião a pé, uma opinião infantaria, pacata,
modesta e de bons costumes, vou dar-lha. Sou pouco amigo de dar,
mas emfim...
Eu podia dizer-lhe cousas muito lisongeiras do poema do seu
amigo. Podia dizer-lhe mesmo que ambos eram talentosos,
modestos, bem criados, que recolhiam a horas, não fumavam, etc.,
etc. Mas não. Prefiro dizer-lhe abertamente o que penso,
brutalmente, sem transigências nem banalidades. Portanto o que aí
vai é rude, com a rudeza dum homem que não precisa para nada
dos seus confrades em letras, consagrados, e não consagrados, e
que vive «achando a quàsi todos os deuses pés de barro, ventre de
gibóia a quàsi todos os homens e a quàsi todos os tribunais portas
travessas» como já nos Gatos escrevia Fialho.
Bem se vê que o seu poeta, o sr. M. Joaquim Dias, nunca saiu do
Faial. Se saisse não fazia poemas a uma cousa que não conhece
senão em teoria:—O Homem. Mantegazza, que o estudou a fundo,
sabe o que êle é; eu que lido com êle, ha muito sei o que êle vale. O
que lhe digo em verdade é que êle nunca mereceu os versos do seu
amigo.
O poeta julga o Homem pelos livros. Livros são, quàsi sempre,
gramofones de ideias. Deixe-os cantar. Valia-lhe mais um ano de
viagens do que ler todos os livros que tratam do Homem. É o seu
amigo, médico? É teólogo? É psicólogo? É legista? Só assim se
compreendia que êle conhecesse o assunto do seu poema. Porque
o médico conhece o homem em tôda a sua miséria; o teólogo em
tôda a sua estupidez; o legista em tôda a sua maldade, e o
psicólogo em tudo isto junto. Mas o seu amigo é sómente poeta?
Poeta, nada mais? Sim, isso vê-se logo. Poeta é sonhador. Os
poetas teem ideias muito diversas de todos os outros mortais. São
poetas e basta.
Pediu-me uma carta. A carta aqui vai. Se lha não envio particular,
pelo correio, é porque receio que lhe introduzam algum décimo da
lotaria espanhola e o amigo sofra transtornos por minha causa. Mais
nada.
Logo no prefácio diz o seu poeta: «...Fiz, pois, uma apoteose ao

Homem, a êsse ser que triunfou nas lutas terríveis do passado, que
compreende os fenómenos e as leis e progride». Ora eu não admiro
o Homem. Se algum sentimento tenho por êle ou é desconfiança ou
desprêzo.
Deus, criando o homem à sua imagem e semelhança, foi um
escultor bem medíocre. E pode limpar a mão à parede, se é essa a
suprema manifestação do seu génio. Depois, maravilhosa forma de
reclamo, deu às criaturas o poder de reproduzirem infinitamente a
sua obra prima.
Ora diga-me, meu caro amigo: ¿Em que devemos admirar essa
obra, essa vil e miserável máquina de ossos, nervos, músculos e
tendões? ¿Que criou, que inventou ela de produtivo? ¿Inventou a
dinamite, a melinite, a himalaíte? ¿Canhões que arrasam cidades,
projécteis cataclísmicos, blindagens pavorosas? ¿E isso que vale?
¿Inventou os deuses, os reis, as religiões, os ritos e os dogmas? ¿E
isso para que serve?
Antigamente, nos tempos primitivos, o Homem trocava um
machado de pedra pela pele dum urso. Agora troca a mesma pele
por umas pequenas rodelas de ouro, de prata ou de cobre, com uns
números, a que chamou dinheiro, que são tudo, valem tudo e tudo
podem.
Antigamente não pagava décimas, nem contribuições, nem
impostos. Era senhorio da sua caverna e não necessitava de tomar
óleo de fígado de bacalhau. Não tinha botas, mas não sofria dos
calos. Com a invenção das botas vieram os calos, e com os calos o
rifão que diz «quem tem calos não vai a apertos». Parece que o
general vae concordando? Apenas falei em calos, pareceu-me ouvir
dizer o meu amigo: «Diga-me cá a mim o que isso é!»
A mulher era nua e mentirosa. O homem era quási urso, porque o
urso era quási homem. Ainda não havia médicos, nem boticas, nem
literatos, e a poesia, meu caro amigo, tinha muito menos pau de
campeche. O ar era de todos, a terra de todos era e cada um fazia o
que muito bem queria. Depois é que veio essa pouca vergonha de
arregimentar a gente, sob o nome de famílias, tríbus, nações, etc.,
que fêz com que viesse a praga dos chefes, chefes e mandões de
tôdas as castas e feitios, qual deles mais nocivo e funesto: chefes
de família, chefes de repartição, chefes de polícia, chefes de estado
e até generais, meu caro amigo.
Os enterros eram todos iguais. Não havia enterros de primeira
classe. Desconhecia-se o espartilho, a sobrecasaca, o chapéu alto,
e as vantagens do algodão, que impinge por boa mulher o arenque
mais chupado. Veja lá que temposinho!
Se os povos estavam em guerra era tareia bruta, mòcada de criar
bicho. Mas não metia tiros. Era tudo a cacete. Ainda se não tinha
inventado a metralhadora, o leque da Morte, nem a baioneta, uma
navalha que por não se poder trazer na algibeira do fato, se traz
pendurada à cinta, numa algibeira de lata.
Os deuses eram muitos, mas todos súcios, todos pândegos. E
apesar de não haver jornais, todos sabiam perfeitamente o que se
fazia no Olimpo. Se chovia é que Baco se empiteirara e que o vinho
era branco,—que é bebida diurética. Vá vendo!
Caminhamos pois da liberdade para a servidão. ¿Onde está êsse
progresso de que fala o seu poeta? Se êle me quere impingir que
progredimos, porque mais isto, mais aquilo... temos conversado!
Quere um exemplo? ¿O general não padece de apertos de
uretra? Ora suponha que padecia. Se fôsse no tal tempo vertia onde
muito bem desejava, que ninguêm tinha nada com isso. Mas nestes
tempos de progresso, vá o general fazer isso na rua, e verá o que
lhe sucede. São dez tostões de multa. Vá vendo que progresso tão
catita!
Mas que o progresso é indubitável... sim... não digo que não. Veja
lá se nos tempos em que o homem se cobria de peles podia haver
gatunos de carteiras! Isso podia êle. Ainda não havia bolsos! E se
antes de se inventarem as casacas se corria perigo de confundir um
criado de mesa com um conselheiro de estado!
Eu embirro com o meu semelhante. É, por via de regra, cínico,
trapaceiro, mentiroso e velhaco. Li algures que êle era meu irmão...
em Cristo. Deve ser intrujice, porque eu não conheço Cristo nem
seu irmão.
Quando me estende a mão lá tem a sua fisgada. E eu desconfio
logo que, se já me não embarrilou, está para me embarrilar.
Nestes tempos de progresso, tenho pena de não ser troglodita.
Teria tudo que não tenho e sobejar-me-ia muito do que tenho. Seria
feliz. Dir-me-há o general que hoje se sabe. ¿Mas que diabo de
felicidade dá o saber que êles foram muito mais felizes do que nós?
Olhe que saber alguêm feliz faz sangue mau. ¿E pode por acaso
ser-se feliz, hoje? Não. E então podia.
Aí tem. Antigamente havia liberdade. A de hoje é só poética. O
homem de hoje é um escravo e a sua carta de alforria é a morte. Se
o general contesta lembro-lhe se não tem por desventura alguma
décima relaxada. Não tem? Não tem, mas pode ter.
Como vê, não concordo com o tema da Apoteose Humana. Êle é
de tal ordem que, se o poeta não merece que o general lhe dê oito
dias de detenção, tambêm não é caso para louvor na ordem do dia.
Eu não concordo. Sou novo e conheço já um número
avultadíssimo de patifes. O general é velho, deve conhecer muitos
mais. O diabo então, que é velhíssimo, deve conhecer um pavor
deles.
Já vai longa esta. Eu não sou maçador de profissão e já me ia
tornando impertinente.
Desculpe-me e creia-me
um soldado raso de letras, bastante
insurreccionado.
Oriente
O trabalho é afinal uma cousa consoladora. Talvez a única felicidade
que a vida tem. Trabalhar, trabalhar muito, o trabalho tornado ideia
fixa, sem dar logar a outras ideias, sem dar logar ao sonho, sem
deixar que a Fantasia arquitecte os seus castelos dourados em
douradas bolas de sabão! Invejo os que assim trabalham. Zola
invejava o trabalho rude dos operários. Ser marceneiro, ser
carpinteiro, chegar a noite, ter a sua cadeira ou a sua cómoda
pronta, e descansar! Todavia Zola era como poucos um trabalhador.
Lembro-me de Zola sempre que olho para a estante da minha
livraria, onde se enfileira a obra vasta de Blasco Ibáñez. Eu, algures,
já lhe chamei o Zola da Espanha. Cada vez que vejo a sua obra me
convenço mais de que não errei. Sómente Zola era um rude e
esforçado trabalhador, vindo ainda com um plano que nada
conseguiu fazer mudar e, à semelhança de Balzac, pondo-o em
prática numa série interminável de volumes. Blasco não. É um Zola
sem plano. Talento robusto e pasmoso, não tem de Zola a
testarudez orientadora nem o gigantesco e sintético sôpro
insuflador. Mas para Zola espanhol está bem. Um admirável e
correntio estilo, uma ironia às vezes contundente, amável outras
vezes e sobretudo um poder pictural assombroso. Colorista intenso
são verdadeiramente zolaescas as suas descrições. E até no
aspecto humano se parece com Zola. Como Zola êle é um homem
de bons músculos, nervos sólidos e uma pertinácia que chega a
assombrar.
Vem isto a propósito do novo livro de Blasco. Intitula-se Oriente e
é a reunião de crónicas suas publicadas em jornais espanhóis e sul-
americanos. Tem êste volume na sua obra um número bastante
elevado. No seu género é porêm o segundo ou terceiro. Blasco tem
um livro adorável que intitulou Nel pais del arte e o Paris, reunião de
artigos. O primeiro da sua viagem à Itália, crónicas maravilhosas de
leveza e de transparência; o segundo das suas impressões da
capital do universo, como os franceses pomposamente chamam à
sua feia cidade. Êste, são impressões da sua estada em Vichy,
estação de água célebre, e da sua visita ao Oriente das mil e uma
noites, das princesas encantadas, das mulheres de véu na cara, dos
serralhos, dos rajás, dos sultões, onde há sublimes portas e
séquitos maravilhosos, pedrarias, lendas, desconhecidas floras,
mulheres desconhecidas, sensações nunca experimentadas. É por
isso que dentro da alma de cada artista uma mulher velada se
debruça segredando-lhe—Ao Oriente! Ao Oriente! O Oriente é o
desconhecido, será sempre o desconhecido.
Leiam-se embora tôdas as descrições desde as Cartas que os
padres jesuitas escreveram do Japão no ano..., e das Peregrinações
de Fernão Mendes Pinto até aos mais recentes trabalhos; leiam-se
os autores franceses e inglêses que se esforçam por mostrar-nos o
Oriente scientífica, artística e mentirosamente; leia-se tudo, leiam
tudo o que quiserem, que sempre êsse desejo lhes empeçonhará a
existência. Quem não foi a Paris anseia por ir lá. Depois quere ir
mais longe. Mas emquanto não foi, Paris é tudo. Há criaturas
debruçadas sôbre esta palavra: Paris, a Babilónia, onde a Arte é
grande, onde tudo é grande, porque tudo é grande na fantasia. A
cidade enorme, onde há esplêndidas mulheres, equipagens
faustuosíssimas, nababos, banqueiros, artistas ante os quais o
mundo inteiro boquiabre a sua admiração. Porque a criatura que
sonha não sonha que as esplêndidas mulheres são ambiciosas
vulgares onde só a toilette é alguêm, que as equipagens
conheceram e conhecerão múltiplos donos, que os nababos são às
vezes postiços, que os banqueiros são quási sempre escrocs, e que
os artistas são sempre uns pobres diabos que se matam, que se
arruinam, que se gastam a correr atraz duma quimera que com êles
se encafua quási sempre dentro do caixão de chumbo ou de
casquinha que os leva direitinhos, com a guia de marcha para a
Imortalidade, a dormir no Père-Lachaise.
Ao Oriente! Ao Oriente! Chateaubriand foi ao Oriente. Foi lá
tambêm Flaubert. Foi lá Maxime du Camp. Gomez Carrillo então
quintessencia o maravilhoso nas suas impressões da viagem
encantada—blagueur eterno, mixto risonho de fanfarrão espanhol e
jornalista parisiense. Já Amicis, êsse Amicis, ultimamente morto,
traçara as páginas adoráveis da Constantinopla. Pierre Loti então,
postiço, sonhador e desdenhoso, contava as cousas com um ar de
quem tinha o Oriente na algibeira. E para dizer que tinha, fizera da
loucura realidade. Os seus salões eram orientais. E se alguêm
duvidava, êle, correcto oficial de marinha, ciceronando, mostrava um
Pierre Loti vestido de Buda, um Pierre Loti vestido de bonzo, ora
hierático, ora pontifical, ora mandarinado, ora em uma cabaia de
vulgar mortal.
Blasco Ibáñez escutou tambêm a mulher velada.
Tinha lido alêm de tudo isto aquele imortal louco que se chamou
Julio Verne. Acreditava pois em maravilhas. Foi, viu e escreveu um
livro, o que é uma linda vingança. Antigamente dizia-se chegou, viu
e venceu. Daqui os amorudos lamechas fizeram o incomparável—
chegar, ver e ser vencido. Isto é de molde dizer-se de joelho em
terra, a mão no peito e assim um certo ar patético. Assim um certo
ar bironiano, como se o pobre lord tivesse que ver com estas tolices.
O escritor, porêm, lê, acredita, faz as malas, compra o bilhete, vai,
roubam-no descaradamente em tôda a parte, é comido de
percevejos cosmopolitas, percevejos que, tendo vindo da
Cochinchina no couvre-pieds dum inglês, embarcam no outro dia na
manta de viagem dum tirolês, encontra por tôda a parte caminhos
de ferro, patifes, estradas reais intransitáveis, uma ignorância
pasmosa e um fedor humano?! Que faz para se vingar? Puxa da
caneta, uma caneta com depósito de tinta, puxa dos linguados e zás
—sai livro. Em logar de contar o que passou, o que sofreu, as suas
aventuras e os seus arrependimentos, as saudades que teve da sua
casota e as vezes que torceu a orelha e ela não deitou sangue, não
senhor! Conta cousas maravilhosas, fantasia, intruja e passa a
balela aos outros. De tudo isto resulta um pouco: que todos os livros
de viagem se parecem, exactamente como as cartas de amor, cujo
fundo amoroso passional e estilístico está nesse livro de génio que
se chama o Secretário dos amantes, tão genial que devia ser
obrigatório, e que se não existisse se tornaria patriótico inventá-lo; e
que as viagens me são extremamente aborrecidas, com o que
ninguêm tem absolutamente nada.
Se o Oriente não trouxesse a etiqueta de Vicente Blasco Ibáñez,
eu diria encolhendo os ombros e parodiando o verso célebre de
Espronceda: «que haya un libro más que importa al mundo!» Mas
não. Tive que o ler, e declaro que não perdi o tempo. O Oriente é
curiosamente interessante, e interessantemente curioso. Há nele de
tudo. Descrições maravilhosas, ironia fácil, graça, e de vez em
quando até gravidade, uma gravidade nada protocolária, porque eu
não sei o que isso seja em Espanha, quando me lembro da Marcha
da Cadiz e do Morrongo.
Publicado primitivamente em crónicas, recolhidas agora em
volume, êste livro nada destôa da obra de Blasco, mesmo se
dissermos que Blasco é autor de livros maravilhosos como La
Horda, Entre naranjos, Flor de Mayo e outros. E que, alêm disso,
está horrorosamente traduzido em tôdas as línguas, como o Máximo
Gorki, de quem um entendido me dizia outro dia: «Gorki é um mártir.
Imagine que êle, escrevendo em russo, tem sido traduzido em tôdas
as línguas e dialectos por aí abaixo». É assim uma cousa parecida
com uma história contada aqui e que mil bôcas fôssem passando
umas às outras até Alcântara. Cada uma tinha dado um átomo da
sua originalidade. Tinha ido substituindo ou transformando. ¿Pois
não é uma lei que «na natureza nada se perde, tudo se
transforma»? Quando chegou a Alcântara a história está tôda
transformada. Deixou de ser do seu inventor para ser duma
sociedade anónima. Tal qual Gorki. «O Gorki em russo, diz o meu
interlocutor, parece-se tanto com o que aí conhecemos, que foi
traduzido do espanhol para onde havia vindo do francês e assim por
diante, como uma galinha se parece com uma espada, para não
dizer um ôvo com um espêto».
O Oriente deslumbrou Blasco. Foi, viu e publicou o seu livro. Acho
bem. Acho bem, tanto mais que deu aos seus 20:000 ou não sei
quantos leitores o prazer de ler um livro adorável e
desenfastiadamente escrito, que nos põe bem com a arte e com as
viagens.
E agora, que fechei o livro e me preparo para fechar a crónica,
sempre lhes direi que o trabalho é uma cousa consoladora. Eu
penso assim. O meu vizinho,—todo o cronista tem um vizinho
pensador ou pensativo,—pensa que o trabalho é bom para preto.
Não importa. Eu penso que o trabalho ainda nos põe bem com a
vida e que, se assim não fôsse, eu não teria ido ao Oriente em
espírito, não teria lido um livro magnífico e não teria gostosamente
esportulado os seis tostões que me custou o livro de Blasco.
As flores
CERTA ocasião em que, ido dos confins de Lisboa, me decidi a
visitar o solitário poeta do Hereje e da Traição na sua casa da rua da
Bela Vista, à Graça, ouvi dele, ao perguntar-lhe qual a sua flor
favorita, a seguinte resposta: «Que sei eu, meu amigo? As flores
são como as criaturas. Há nelas tambêm uma hierarquia. ¿Quem
pode deixar de adorar uma dessas rosas do Japão, aveludada,
enlanguescida, aristocrata, soberana? A rosa chá é uma duqueza
formosíssima e decotada. Ah! a rosa chá! Mas tenho uma decidida
predilecção pelo cravo rubro, o cravo sangue, estridoroso, flamante
como uma bandeira desfraldada. O cravo petulante! A violeta é uma
menina romântica. Há violetas que sabem de cor versos inteiros de
Soares de Passos. A camélia é uma delambida. Não veste bem.
Tem algo duma burguezinha carnuda e afectada. Mas não desadoro
na sua humildade o cacto silvestre e a flor de lis».
Ora, como o meu querido Gomes Leal, considero que não há
nada que se pareça tanto com uma linda mulher do que uma bela
rosa. E por isso é que, sempre, ao ver uma rosa me lembro duma
bela mulher. Ao ver um campo de flores, um jardim cuidado e
mimado, como Alexandre ao espraiar os olhos pelo seu exército
dum milhão de homens, não posso deixar de scismar em que tudo
aquilo foi feito para morrer. Alexandre considerava que ao fim dum
século nenhum de todo aquele brilho sobreviveria, nenhum dos seus
guerreiros conservaria o seu porte marcial e humano. Eu, ao ver a
montre dum florista, na falta de jardins por onde alongar os olhos,
penso tristemente que nada restará daquela beleza ao fim de cinco
dias. Envelheceram os cravos, murcharam as rosas, penderam os
lírios, os amor-perfeitos secaram. O próprio funcho, o feto silvestre,
êsses mesmos se vão secando. E de tôda aquela beleza nada
resta, nada. Fôlhas sêcas, fôlhas moribundas, flores agonizantes. O
tempo, impiedosamente, com sua mão gelada as tocou e lhes foi a
pouco e pouco dando a morte...
Uma rosa branca é uma linda mulher. A mulher envelhece como a
rosa; a rosa morre como a mulher. Conservo na minha vida uma
grande saudade. Foi duma rosa branca, enorme, perfumada, que
numa jarrinha, onde um par dulcíssimo e precioso, entrajado à
Império e miniaturado à Watteau, dançava um clássico minuete,
viveu, agonizou e morreu. Trouxera-a uma tarde, déra-ma não sei
quem. Posta na sua jarra, depois de mil cuidados, a rosa era linda e
desdenhosa. Linda e desdenhosa me acostumara a vê-la. Falava-
me às vezes. O seu perfume dizia-me cousas estranhas,
misteriosas, exquisitas, que me embriagavam, que me faziam
sonhar.
Acostumei-me a corporizar a rosa.
Já não era uma flor com a sua anatomia que a botânica me
ensinara. Era uma linda criatura, sonhadora, melancólica, fiel e
amada, que me fazia feliz, mas que se definhava na sua solidão. A-
pesar do calor dos meus beijos, do meu recolhimento profundo e
magoado, ela foi-se «pouco a pouco amortecendo», como no soneto
célebre de João de Deus. Uma dorida mágua a mirrava e
entristecia. Sem saber porque, via a minha rosa tossir. Mimei-a.
Incapaz de amar alguêm, de a alguêm ser fiel, ageitei-lhe o pouso,
dulcifiquei-lhe a estada. Fui seu enfermeiro vigilante. A pouco e
pouco, porêm, a-pesar-de todos os meus cuidados, emurchecia.
Uma tristeza vaga entrou com ela. Perdeu o brilho. Do setim das
suas fôlhas sumiu-se o lustro, e amarrotou-se como as saias de
sêda que se metem a trazer por casa. Encarquilhou-se. E um belo
dia, como aquela donzela dos versos de Vítor Hugo, que morreu
valsando, a minha rosa morreu. Tombou da haste agonizante.
Docemente, tristemente, assisti à sua morte. Vejo agora no fundo
duma caixa, o seu caixão, aquela rosa que foi o meu único amor, e
que é hoje a única saudade da minha vida. Porque amei
estremecidamente aquela linda rosa aveludada cujo perfume ainda
hoje me entontece. E não a posso ver, ao seu cadáver, uma múmia
galante e ressequida, que não entristeça. Era tão linda!
Tambêm amo apaixonadamente as violetas. Diga embora o meu
poeta que elas são românticas. Eu adoro os românticos, porque não
sou no fundo mais do que um romântico que se travestiu em homem
desta época para que o não roubem, para que o não assaltem, para
que o não explorem, para que o não espanquem. Se adoro os
românticos, é porque êles são afinal os únicos que sabem sentir e
os únicos que souberam amar.
Camilo, o romântico apaixonado, amou outra vez ao escrever a D.
Maria Izabel as cartas de amor que seu filho assinava. E pelo rapto
foi uma flor que o vélho romântico indicou para dar o sinal no peitoril
da janela da raptada. Uma flor! Camilo, que fôra um romântico tôda
a vida, como um romântico amando, e odiando com uma sanha que
só hoje se encontra nos vélhos alfarrábios, como um romântico
morreu. Quem poria hoje uma flor? diz Alberto Pimentel. Ninguêm.
¿Tambêm, quem ama hoje as flores apaixonadamente? Um ou outro
maduro que as cultiva, que as estremece e que as chora. Adoro as
violetas. São simples e são modestas.
O perfume das flores é o espírito das mulheres. Há flores
magníficas, supremas de graça, estonteantes de côr, que não
cheiram. Não gosto delas. Há mulheres vestidas de setim,
perfumadas a lilás, que não teem perfume. Quem as pode amar?
Os homens, querendo corrigir a natureza, fizeram flores de conta
própria por cruzamentos e enxertos. Sairam flores macabras, flores
canailles, flores que lembram cocottes, berrantes, auriflamantes,
estonteadoras. Mas não cheiram. Não teem perfume. Como o pintor
da antiguidade que encomendara ao discípulo uma Vénus e que
êste lha apresentara ataviada, mas feia—gargantilhas de pérolas,
barreira de ouro, colar de diamantes, pedraria em profusão—as
flores cruzadas são lindas mas não teem perfume. E logo a resposta
do mestre nos vem à bôca: Fizeste-a rica porque a não pudeste
fazer formosa! É o mesmo. Porque as não puderam fazer
perfumadas, fizeram-nas formosíssimas.
É agora a época das flores. Os dias de sol, lindos, dias tépidos
como os de agora, fazem amar as flores, porque ¿quem as pode
amar em dias londrinos, de nevoeiro e chuva? ¿Quem pode viver
sem o perfume da violeta? Se não fôssem as violetas, a vida seria
duma monotonia assustadora. E tão indispensável se tornam à vida
que duma linda mulher sei eu que não pode viver sem elas. Quantas
vezes, bocejante de tédio, neurastenizada, ela me diz
parafraseando a frase célebre do filósofo alemão:—«Ah! meu
amigo! Se não fôssem as violetas eu não gostaria de viver». Ao seu
peito um ramo de violetas rejuvenesce eternamente. No seu
toucador um frasco de violetas perfuma o ambiente e lhe perfuma a
carne. À sua mesa certas são as violetas, em que os seus dentes
gulosos se atufam, como nas fôlhas de rosa os dentes brancos
dessa poética Madona do Campo Santo.
Depois destas flores mimadas, veem as flores modestas e as
flores terríveis. Flores modestas, a papoula e o malmequer. «Mal me
quer... muito... pouco... nada». Sina rudimentar, sina do acaso. Aos
iludidos ela diz sempre falso: “Muito”. O tempo vem e afinal era
“nada”. Como o malmequer mentiu?! O malmequer é sempre
mentiroso. Se diz “muito” a gente duvida e tem sempre razão. Se diz
“nada” a gente não acredita. E é por isso que falando êle sempre
verdade, porque sempre diz nada, a gente o não quere nas jarras, o
desfolha sem amor. Porque nós odiamos quási sempre quem nos
diz a verdade sem lisonjas e sem paixões.
Nas flores terríveis temos a mancenilha. A mancenilheira é uma
criatura diabólica. Persisto em corporizar as flores. A mancenilha é
uma mulher, uma mulher que dá a morte. Uma daquelas mulheres
que matam, sorrindo, que sorrindo arruinam, e que trazem consigo
sómente a infelicidade. Nunca encontrei nenhuma mulher-
mancenilheira. Eis aqui porque adoro a mancenilha, que não
conheço. Porque a não conheço e porque dá a morte sorrindo.
Quanto custa uma mulher?
TIBÉRIO, filósofo machacaz e meu amigo, tendo lido nesse
extraordinário doido que se chamou Nietzsche, que tudo pode ser
pago porque tudo tem seu preço, veio a mim, resoluto e inquietador,
saber qual o preço que em boa razão se deve dar por uma mulher.
Tibério é um filósofo cheio de ironia azêda e eu, pobre de mim,
confessando-lhe a minha ignorância, resolvi consultar os padres
mestres, os calhamaços e os chavões. Áquele que perdêra os
óculos a arrumar a livraria, aconselhou Castilho que os procurasse
no Dicionário, letra O, que lá estavam. Pois nos livros,—nos livros
há de tudo como na botica—devia vir por fôrça a resolução do
problema.
Procurei, deitei abaixo a livraria e nada. Os meus livrecos eram
todos, ou quási todos, subservientes. Em lhes cheirando a saias...
Tinha ideia dum tal Schopenhauer, filósofo de bôca amarga,
estômago sólido e algibeira quente. O que êle dizia, porque todos
estes filósofos dizem cousas, era pouco, mesmo muito pouco.
E Tibério esperava resposta, mãos nas algibeiras, perna traçada.
Então?...
Suava. Guérin Ginisty dizia, isso lembrava-me eu, que, no fundo,
uma mulher nunca resiste a bons argumentos: «Com quinhentos
luíses, a mais segura delas, indigna-se... Com mil, defende-se...
Com dois mil, perturba-se... Com mais alguma cousa, cede». Tibério
amigo, aqui tem você! Foi o que se pôde arranjar! Mas Tibério sorria
e fazia uma careta. Acho forte, respondeu! Dois mil luíses é muito!
Acho caro! Muito caro, mesmo.
E Tibério, lesto, acabou o cigarro,—não sei se disse que Tibério
fuma desalmadamente!—abriu a porta e foi-se.
Agora aqui fico considerando na pergunta. Fôra uma vergonha
tanta ignorância junta. Mas, era a derrota de tôda esta livralhada de
que me ufano tanto. Era a derrota de tudo isto, ante o gesto
desdenhoso e a pergunta irritante dum filósofo safardana e
impertinente. Nada, não tinha geito nenhum. Considerei, estudei o
problema.
Já lá vai algum tempo depois da pergunta. Agora, se o bom
Tibério me aparecer, mostrando o meu ar mais profundo e o meu
mais retórico gesto, dir-lhe-hei:
«Tibério amigo: O preço duma mulher varia conforme as
circunstâncias. Na Austrália compra-se uma mulher por uma garrafa
de vidro, ou por uma faca ferrugenta. Hás-de concordar que não é
caro! Na Cafraria, por uma quantidade de cabeças de gado bovino,
quantidade que varia de dez a setenta cabeças. Na Índia, por um
porco ou por bois. Mas, se deres mais de dez bois, já foste comido!
Na Islândia compra-se uma mulher por um marco. Em pontos da
África por uma garrafa de rum, e olha que não é barato! O rum
sempre vale mais.
Entre os povos civilizados, o negócio é mais demorado. Casar
com ela, é a fórmula. Então dá-lhe o nome. E ela vendeu-se ou
porque sim, ou por ver a sua tranquilidade assegurada, ou porque o
marido tem boa posição, é deputado, ou lhe pode dar vestidos. Há
tambêm uma outra moeda. Essa, chama-se Amor.
O Amor é uma bebida e uma embriaguez. São duas criaturas que
se encontraram e se propozeram beber do mesmo copo. Beberam
até cair. Depois a bebida começa a repugnar-lhes e adormecem.
Essa repugnância chama-se Saciedade e o adormecer,
Esquecimento. Quem um dia adormeceu no amor ou quando
acordou está curado ou não acordou jamais.
Ora eu, amigo Tibério, não acredito no Amor, cousa em que
jamais algum homem forte acreditou. O amor é uma cousa para
crianças, uma teia de aranha. É preciso estar quietinho para que ela
se não rompa. Depois não acredito que tu ames! ¿Pois tu, com êsse
carão ignóbil de farçola, sabes lá amar? Mesmo que amar é
subalternizar-se. Quem ama curva-se. Quem ama, meu caro amigo,
transige. Quem ama, sim, quem ama... emfim não te aconselho a
que compres mulher nenhuma com essa moeda. Sai pelos olhos da
cara.
Bem. Mas suponhamos que realmente a queres comprar por êsse
preço. Eu te digo: Tu que a queres, é porque a desejas. Ora não há
nada tão jesuita como um desejo. (Isto é de Balzac, mas tão
profundo que parece meu). Mas desejar não é tudo. É preciso
paciência, uma paciência enorme, uma daquelas paciências que
vulgarmente se chamam paciências de ...cordato paciente. A
paciência, ou leva ao triunfo, ou à cura. Com paciência, saberás
esperar. As impaciências são nefastas e tão funestas em trato de
gente limpa que Acácio, conselheiro, a caminho de presidente do
conselho, diz que elas são próprias da gente ordinária. Acácio é
chavão, Acácio sabe disso. Nada percebe de amor, mas tem
dinheiro, e quem tem dinheiro, tem tudo e mais amor.
Ora, ia dizendo! com paciência descobrirás o fraco da pretendida.
Lá diz Molière: Não é bem Molière, é Castilho, mas isso não tira
nem põe:
Nem o mais forte resiste

Aos que no fraco lhe dão.
Que mais queres? Meio Brummel, um quarto de Tartufo e um

logar no ministério da Fazenda deve chegar. E, se não chegar, olha
que sempre te digo que é caro. É pela hora da morte. «Um animal
de cabelos compridos e ideias curtas» como quere Spencer!
Acredito que, não a achando em conta, a não comprarás. «Não te
deixes ir atrás dos artifícios da mulher» é o palavreado bíblico, e
olha que é certo como as cousas certas.
Comprar a mulher em troca dum vitelo, como se faz na
Hotentócia, não acho caro.
Em troca duma tanga vermelha e quatro penas de pavão para a
carapinha, ainda está bem. Dum boi, se os bois abundam, ainda não
está fora da conta. Agora comprá-la pelo casamento acho caro. O
casamento «é um contrato perpétuo»... por tôda a vida, bem sei, diz
o código. Ora um contrato por tôda a vida, para sempre, de que um
homem se não pode evadir senão morrendo, acho duro. E é
comprar uma cousa que não serve para nada e de que a gente se
não pode desfazer vendendo-a a terceiros.
Nada. Não te aconselho êste meio. Pelo amor, vá. Amor com uma
parte de indiferença e duas de desconfiança.
Mas Tibério amigo, isso é platónico? Estarás tu apaixonado?
Apaixonado! Mas isso é inacreditável num scéptico, num ironista,
num desenganado, num filósofo emfim. Como os filósofos são
frágeis! Como o homem é afinal e no fundo uma pena leve que o
vento levanta e muda. Como você, Tibério, se deixou apaixonar.
(Aqui Tibério protestará com a veemência dum deputado da
oposição e eu rejubilo por o meu amigo Tibério ainda não ter
escorregado).
Bem me queria parecer! você, amar! Você o mordaz, o cínico, o
que diz conhecer os homens e as mulheres!
Olhe, Tibério, quere um conselho? Os homens fortes não amam.
Amar é próprio dos fracos. Tenha sempre esta máxima à cabeceira.
Guerra Junqueiro disse a Mercedes Blasco que pusesse à
cabeceira da cama a vida de Cristo e a vida de Buda. Pois digo-lhe
que guarde à cabeceira da cama a recordação do que lhe digo.
Tenha sempre presente. O amor é como o toucinho, e dêsse diz
Paulo Diacre, que todo acaba por criar ranço. Ora quem começa a
amar acredita lá que o seu toucinho crie ranço algum dia!?
Tibério: Meu amigo. ¿Leu você nos jornais a notícia daquele
homem que se suicidou em Paris, por causa duma mulher que o
deixou? ¿Leu você a história daquele que, ciumento, furou a pele
doutra com uma dúzia de punhaladas? ¿Leu você a daquele outro
que, por causa dEla, matou o rival com uma cacheirada no toutiço?
Leu você? Ora aqui tem exemplos dos que as compraram bem caro,
se é que as compraram mais do que em Ideia. Veja você se pode
passar sem isso. Não compre nenhuma. Veja se alguêm lha
empresta, ou se a encontra. E se emfim sempre se puser a comprá-
la, compre-a por tudo menos por essa tal moeda que se chama
Amor. Não se apresse. Vem no Frei Luís de Souza... «As cousas
são grandes ou pequenas, segundo a medida do desejo com que se
buscam...» Quanto menos as desejar mais baratas lhe aparecerão.
E que pena que Tibério já se tivesse ido embora! Era um discurso
tão bonito!...

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Technology and Isolation 1st Edition

Technology and isolation First Paperback Edition Lawson

Dynamic Isolation Technologies in Negative Pressure

Marauder 1st Edition Clive Cussler

The Raven Queen s Harem Complete Collection 1st Edition

Ebony Rising The Raven Queen s Harem 2 1st Edition

Raven s Mark The Raven Queen s Harem 1 1st Edition

Smarter Than You Think How Technology Is Changing Our

Bills of Health 1st Edition Richard Lawson

By reconsidering the theme of isolation in the philosophy of technology,

clive lawson is currently Director of Studies in Economics and Senior

Cambridge University Press is part of the University of Cambridge.

It has often been suggested that technology, whatever its beneﬁts,

certainly ‘acceptable’ in many quarters. However, it is also fair to say

amongst the mainstream at least, there is little interest in developing

to connect us and which do not (although the ontology developed in

It is often suggested that we live in a technological age. Although it is

Recently, contributions concerned with such questions have been orga-

some apparently contradictory conceptions of ‘technology’, but I shall

The Philosophy of Technology

between craft, political and philosophical knowledge. Put simply,

Traces of Bacon’s irrepressibly progressive conception of technology

Many of the contributions that followed, however, fell in between

engineers display embarrassing naiveté with respect to the social

technological determinism. The nomological is that which takes the

behaviour of the former on the latter ‘lifeworld’. Thus the problem,

philosophy of technology only recently become formalised into

The Late Appearance of the Philosophy of Technology

Even where a particular deﬁnition of technology has been applied,

Criticisms of the Philosophy of Technology

routes that technology could take (it is underdetermined) and always

(Bijker, 1995). The term ‘closure’ is therefore used to refer to a rheto-

Outline of the Book

themselves into a corner in which it is impossible to address, or even

Logo no prefácio diz o seu poeta: «...Fiz, pois, uma apoteose ao

Nem o mais forte resiste

Que mais queres? Meio Brummel, um quarto de Tartufo e um

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