Technology and Language

EDI RUS 1-6 https://orcid.org/0000-0002-3828-8578 McGuire Coreen 0000-0002-8876-1669 S. I. Vavilov Institute for the History of Science and Technology of Russian Academy of Sciences, St. Petersburg Branch Nikiforova

St. Petersburg, Russia

Mythologies: The Spirit of Technology in its Cultural Context With its subtle reflection on the essence of modernity, intellectual alarmism, and counter-positioning of the spiritual and the material, Nikolai Berdyaev‘s essay „Man and Machine“ is a productive point of departure for reflections on the Spirit of Technology in its Cultural Context. A new translation of Berdyaev’s 1933 essay and two critical commentaries (Trimble, Mitcham) set the stage for seven research articles which examine the spirit of technology from various perspectives and cultural contexts. The authors work on the problematization of the myth of modern mentality (Böhme), national specificities in the conceptualization of progress and technology (Azarov, Nikiforova, Soentgen), the philosophy of cosmism (Serkova), the politics of technology (Kesarev and Korochkin), and the interaction of technology and religion (Kurtov). The history of electricity in Russia, narratives of resource scarcity in Germany, an intercultural comparison of COVID-tracing apps provide concrete exemplars - complemented by studies of memory in the museum and of the Chinese looking back into the future. A general account is offered in a critique of Yuval Noah Harari‘s juxtaposition of a natural order and an imagined order, of natural science and a social fabric woven merely from stories. This collection of papers closes with a critical juxtaposition of a belief in the inevitability of major breakdowns and a belief in the efficacy of minor repairs. McGuire, C. & Nikiforova, N. Mythologies: The Spirit of Technology in its Cultural Context // Technology and Language. № 4(2). P. 1-6. https://doi.org/10.48417/technolang.2023.02.01 10.48417/technolang.2023.02.01 316.72+004 Philosophy of technology Modernity Berdyaev National identity Harari Technological myth Politics of technology https://soctech.spbstu.ru/article/2023.11.1/ 1-6.pdf

RAR RUS 7-26 Berdyaev Nikolai Man and Machine (the Problem of Sociology and the Metaphysics of Technology) In 1933, the Russian philosopher Nikolai Berdyaev (1874–1948) published the essay ‘Chelovek i Mashina’ (‘Man and Machine’) in a Parisian journal for Russian exiles. While the article has seen numerous translations, so far an accurate and annotated version is lacking in English. While ‘Man and Machine’ is an important historical raisonné of thought about technology in its time, it is also one of the first critiques of the deep importance of technology for Soviet totalitarianism. Berdyaev believes that modern civilisation puts tools in in the place of their users and that, if we do not reassess our aims in life, the advances and comforts provided by technology will lead to our destruction as human beings. Berdyaev contrasts this situation with the eschatological views of Nikolai Fedorov and the ‘cosmists’ who neither rejected technology nor fell into submission before it. As a ‘Christian existentialist’, Berdyaev holds that the highest aims of humanity are those in which we realise our place as bearers of the image of God. Technology used to this end can lead us toward our self-realisation. 10.48417/technolang.2023.02.02 Nikolai Berdyaev Nikolai Fedorov Technological epoch Organism and organisation Russian cosmism Technology as culture Stalinism Eschatology Spirit https://soctech.spbstu.ru/article/2023.11.2/ 7-26.pdf

RAR RUS 27-38 57336400800 0000-0002-9463-7613 Grand Canyon University Trimble Walker

Phoenix, AZ 85017 USA

Reading Nikolai Berdyaev’s ‘Man and Machine’ This article introduces the author’s English translation of Nikolai Berdyaev’s article ‘Man and Machine’ ninety years after its initial publication. It appeared in the journal Put’: Organ russkoi religioznoi mysli (‘The Path: Organ of Russian Religious Thought’). Established in 1925, Put’ was the journal of Berdyaev’s own Religious-Philosophical Academy founded in exile. The journal had a free-thinking, clearly anti-Soviet bent while also feeling the pulse of European temperaments. We examine Berdyaev’s work in its historical context, its references and influences, including the special role of Russian cosmism. While noting the popularising and dated character of his positions, we maintain the continued relevance of Berdyaev’s argument that machines should assist humanity in achieving goals that transcend humanity rather than humans being mere agents in the progress of machines. We compare this position with the current angst over Artificial Intelligence as expressed, for example, in the works of Yuval Noah Harari who treats the tool and the human as equal agents in history. We argue, in contrast, that one should view intelligent machines as partners in progress toward transcendent goals rather than interlocutors or competitors. The prescience of Berdyaev’s argument is, alas, borne out by the fact that we have lost much of a sense of what such transcendent goals for humanity might mean. 10.48417/technolang.2023.02.03 130.2:004 Philosophy of technology Berdyaev Christian existentialism Cosmism Futurism AI Yuval Noah Harari https://soctech.spbstu.ru/article/2023.11.3/ 27-38.pdf

RAR RUS 39-43 0000-0003-4199-5940 Colorado School of Mines Mitcham Carl

1500 Illinois St., Golden, CO 80401, USA

Berdyaev Returns Religious criticisms of technology attempt to examine it from the perspective of ethics, with ethics resting, at least in the Abrahamic traditions, on some relationship to divinity. The religious dimension of human life has both practical and theoretical sides: morals and theology. Although these two subjects cannot be completely separated, it is useful to consider religious critiques that approach technology from the perspective of practical religious life or of religious thought, that is, theology. Nikolai Berdyaev sought to elucidate the basic characteristics of the technical age and how it brings to a close the earth-centered period of human history and democratizes society. Accepting the new civilization as historically given, he inquires into its religious consequences: What is the religious meaning of the technical-mechanical form of civilization? According to Berdyaev and Jacques Ellul something radically important is being lost in the technoscientific lifeworld in which technology has become a dehumanizing, life-distorting addiction. The only truly human or spiritual way forward is by renewing and reapplying the radical Christian tactic of attacking all false gods. Just as Christianity demythologized the natural-organic world of myths and superstition, Christianity can reassert human freedom and spiritually by demythologizing the technical-mechanical world. The attack on the false gods of nature disenchanted nature, opening a pathway to the modern science of nature, and thereby to modern technology and the techno-lifeworld. Now the same tactic must be re-deployed to torpedo our enchantments with and by technology. 10.48417/technolang.2023.02.04 130.2:62 Nikolai Berdyaev Jacques Ellul Natural-organic Technical-mechanical https://soctech.spbstu.ru/article/2023.11.4/ 39-43.pdf

RAR RUS 44-53 Technical University of Darmstadt Böhme Gernot

Darmstadt, Germany

Harari: The New Grand Narrative During his life-time, Gernot Böhme (1937-2022) provided a wide range of studies on alternatives in science, on a social science of nature, on Kant and the alienation of reason, on an ecological aesthetics, on phenomenology of the living body, on architecture and atmosphere, on invasive technologies, and much more. All of these reflect his commitment to make philosophy matter for the practice of living in a world that is shaped by modern science and technology. Twelve days after his 85th birthday and only a few days before his death, the Neue Züricher Zeitung published his critical essay on the popular writings of Yuval Noah Harari which, according to Böhme, provide a contemporary myth of the transcendence and demise of humanity through technology. Böhme‘s critical arguments are important because they expose how such myths leave us mystified, even paralyzed – fixated on prophecies of redemption or doom. Seeking to break Harari’s spell, Böhme proposes to pose differently the question of the human self. Böhme, G. Harari: The New Grand Narrative (A. W.-K. Liu, Trans.) // Technology and Language. 2023. № 4(2). P. 44-53.. https://doi.org/10.48417/technolang.2023.02.05 10.48417/technolang.2023.02.05 130.2:62 Yuval Noah Harari History and Narrative Organisms and Algorithms Evolutionary Humanism Self-Knowledge https://soctech.spbstu.ru/article/2023.11.5/ 44-53.pdf

RAR RUS 54-63 0000-0002-2029-9930 Rheinische Friedrich-Wilhelms-Universität Bonn Azarov Konstantin

Bonn, Germany

Laozi and the Myth of Progress in China The Chinese myth of progress is one of the most comprehensive and systematic alternatives to its Western counterpart. It is particularly worth considering at a time when the West’s progressive mythology is stagnating. Laozi played a special role in the creation of this alternative and his section 11 demonstrates an implicit form of the philosophy of technology elaborated by the Chinese progressivist reformers of the 19th century. In turn, the reformers’ Daoist connotations help to reconstruct and validate the philosophy of technology in Laozi. Laozi studies have an additional explanatory strategy through Laozi’s influence during a critical time for his civilization. This article uses Sinology methodologically, comparing ideas from Laozi and Chinese intellectuals of the 19th century to reconstruct and interpret new meanings in Laozi’s philosophy. It considers the psychological-comparativist approach by Evgeny Torchinov and others, making it possible to connect their comparativist approach to the Daoist philosophy of technology for the sake of future existential analysis of the techno-human situation from Laozi’s perspective. Laozi and other Daoist thinkers suggest existential strategies, even in a world where everything is mathematized. Berdyaev’s “new heroism,” about staying human in the age of machines, has an unexpected ally in Laozi and his tradition. Therefore, Laozi is vital for understanding the technological age. 10.48417/technolang.2023.02.06 124.5+299.513 Laozi Technology Heroism Liang Qichao Becoming https://soctech.spbstu.ru/article/2023.11.6/ 54-63.pdf

UNK RUS 64-71 57192080845 0000-0003-4543-0496 Peter the Great St. Petersburg Polytechnic University Serkova Vera

St. Petersburg, Russia

Memory Technology in the Philosophy of Nikolai Fedorov Nikolai Fedorovich Fedorov is one of the most original interpreters and critics of the direction of technical progress, which he identified with the beginning and development of industrialization. His “Philosophy of the Common Task” is well known. However, the theoretical “substructures” which are not directly related to the theory of the “Common Task” deserve attention in how they strengthen its basis. Thus, his views on cultural memory and the ways of fixing it remain little explored in the philosophical literature. The purpose of the study is to analyze the importance of cultural memory for the formation of the national spirit and connection of generations, and the role assigned to the museum in this process. This research is based on an axiological method, drawing on critical studies of Fedorov's philosophy in Russian and international interpretations of his work. The function of the museum in the processes of preserving the memory of the preceding culture is revealed. The ways of inheriting basic cultural values through the meaningful collection of museums are analyzed. This understanding of the importance of the museum in the life of people is compared with contemporary concepts and discussions around the museum as an institution or a business. The discussion of Boris Groys and Douglas Crimp on the purpose of the museum in contemporary cultural practice is taken as the basis for this. 10.48417/technolang.2023.02.07 1:069 Russian religious philosophy Nikolai Fedorov Cultural memory Museum Cultural oblivion Boris Groys Douglas Crimp https://soctech.spbstu.ru/article/2023.11.7/ 64-71.pdf

RAR RUS 72-87 0000-0002-8876-1669 S. I. Vavilov Institute for the History of Science and Technology of Russian Academy of Sciences, St. Petersburg Branch Nikiforova

St. Petersburg, Russia

“Useless Fossils”, Precious Waste and Streams of Energy. Soviet Electrification and Natural Resources for the Socialist Future (1920s – 1930s) The young Soviet state was captivated by the idea of technological development, and the vision of progress that centered around the possibilities of electrical energy. The vision of electricity was accompanied by utopian and futuristic connotations. Technological progress was associated with Socialist political order and a desirable social future, the key characteristics of which were material abundance and social equality. The possibilities of electrical energy and of the future energy grid determined the attitudes toward nature and natural resources formulated and popularized by engineers, economists, and politicians. Soviet electrification was based on two conceptual foundations. First, reliance on local fuels (peat, oil shale, low-grade coal, water) to remove the dependence on foreign fuel. Local fuel contained moisture, ash and sulfur and required specific technical solutions (German boilers often failed). A second aspect consisted in rational fuel use. This meant the combination principle and use of secondary energy resources. Combines were understood as enterprises where the waste from one production became a raw material for another production (ash from oil shale was used to make building materials). Mineralogist Alexander Fersman spoke of “non-useful fossils” – it was necessary to use all extracted raw materials, even seemingly useless. Economists called waste a treasure and urged enterprises to use them. It is possible to speak more broadly of the Soviet culture of reuse and careful treatment of waste. This conceptualization of resources affected the materiality of electrification. 10.48417/technolang.2023.02.08 008: 537 Electrification GOELRO Soviet unified energy system Peat Hydropower Communism Natural resources Commodification of nature Resourcefulness https://soctech.spbstu.ru/article/2023.11.8/ 72-87.pdf

RAR RUS 88-96 University of Augsburg Soentgen Jens

Augsburg, Germany

No Resources, but a lot of Skill: A German Political Myth and its History While during the 19th century Germany was characterized by the formula “land of poets and thinkers.” after WWI another phrase and self-characterization became popular: Germany was framed as a country that compensated with science its lack of resources. This self-description passed more or less unaltered through the Weimar Republic, the NS-State and still is very prominent in present political discourse. Its sources, parallels and political implications are analysed in this essay. The technical achievements of, for example, Haber and Bosch to make a strategically important raw material available in any quantity from "mere air" was seen as a way out of the predicament that foreign powers could block access to important substances at any time. This finds its philosophical counterpart in Arnold Gehlen's thesis of the deficiency of human beings that can be compensated by technology and by way of institutions. The notion of the resource-poor nation that relies on the inventiveness of its engineers finally results in a focus on applied science and technology. 10.48417/technolang.2023.02.09 7.046:330.111.4 History of chemistry Techno-politics Political narratives Material resources https://soctech.spbstu.ru/article/2023.11.9/ 88-96.pdf

RAR RUS 97-115 0009-0004-3914-8624 Peter the Great St. Petersburg Polytechnic University Kesarev Nikita

St. Petersburg, Russia

0009-0006-3398-1353 Peter the Great St. Petersburg Polytechnic University Korochkin Andrey

St. Petersburg, Russia

Tracing the Tracing Apps: A Technical Response to Covid in Cultural Comparison The paper is concerned with studying the tracking apps developed and employed by governments to control the Covid 19 pandemic. Such apps have been implemented by almost all states in the world, however, with different mechanisms. In the present study, three groups of apps are identified, according to their level of control and surveillance (low, medium, high). Apparently, a higher degree of control, as well as the obligation to install them, should correspond to greater efficiency, but it also coincides with greater risk of exposing users' personal data. As much as this assumption tends to be correct, for determining the efficiency or inefficiency of tracking apps, other factors needs to be analyzed. This might be socio-political in nature, such as the public's trust in the actions of governments, or technical, i.e., concerning the actual performativity of such devices. The article also highlights the question of how the use of technology can affect our understanding of freedom and personal responsibility. The international comparison shows, overall, that there are no universals but many cultural determinants. In particular, there is no universal fear of data security that could explain a certain technological design. The study of alternative Covid-tracking applications allows us to see the confluence of ideological, philosophical and technical concepts in the modern world. Their evaluation cannot proceed in isolation from cultural dynamics and value orientations. 10.48417/technolang.2023.02.10 378.147:004.738 Corona pandemic Mobile apps Privacy Trust Responsibility Efficiency and performativity Intercultural comparison of technologies https://soctech.spbstu.ru/article/2023.11.10/ 97-115.pdf

RAR RUS 116-127 The Euler International Mathematical Institute Kurtov Michael

St. Petersburg, Russia

Russia and Europe: The Culture of Breakages and the Culture of Repairs The article uses the method of technotheological analysis to study the differences between the cultures of Russia and Western Europe. The analysis consists in identifying the techno-religious Gestalt, that is, the relationship between the religious background and the things against that background, which is considered as the basis of culture. In order to examine culture in this light, a compact conceptual language can express this unity. Breakages and repairs are such concepts. From a religious perspective, things can break in two ways. There are “this-worldly” breakages which are those that can potentially be repaired: Minor Breakages. And there are “other-worldly” breakages, that is, those that are unrepairable: Major Breakages. Major and Minor Breakages and Repairs form a quadrant of concepts which serve to highlight the specificity of Russian and Western European cultures. Russian culture can be correlated with the culture of breakdowns, the Western European culture is a culture of repairs: They are technotheologically inverse to each other and are in a relation of chiasm. On the one hand, there is a lack of fear of Major Breakage along with the expectation of Major Repairs, with attention to Minor Breakages and no care of Minor Repairs. On the other hand, there is fear of Major Breakages and inattention to Minor Breakages coupled with skill in Minor Repairs and disbelief in the possibility of Major Repairs. This contrast can be exemplified in the thinking of the Russian avant-garde. 10.48417/technolang.2023.02.11 008:7.025 Russia and Europe Breakdowns Repair Gilbert Simondon Technotheology https://soctech.spbstu.ru/article/2023.11.11/ 116-127.pdf

RAR RUS 129-144 Darmstadt Technical University Liggieri Kevin

Darmstadt, Germany

Between Technology and “Humans”: The Idee of an Anthropological Signature in Human-Machine Interactions The problem of todays technology is no longer just the result of an apocalyptic fear, alienation or Promethean shame, but rather that today technology is ‘humanized’ and therefore adapted to human beings. Mobile devices flatter us. They ensnare our bodies, our minds and our egos. The various attempts to describe technology – for instance, as applied natural science, as a means of preparing resources for economic ends, as a neutral system of means or as an expression of the human spirit – no longer impact our approach to technology. For despite the often depicted doomsday scenarios and an empathic pessimism about technology, concrete technology, in both our working livings and our everyday life, is no longer a problem. My paper will examine this asymmetry more closely from a epistemological and a historical standpoint. It will indulge neither in euphoric nor in dystopic descriptions of humans as cybernetic machines or as the victims of technology, but rather as the yardstick and goal of all technology. I will therefore focus on particular (techno-)anthropological positions (Gilbert Simondon, Arnold Gehlen, Hermann Schmidt). Therefore I want to work out how knowledge of the human (anthropological knowledge) and knowledge of technology (technological knowledge) cross-fertilized, complemented and transformed one other. It thus becomes all the more interesting why this confrontation between “human” and “machine” is still described in the classical anthropological terms that were used by Gehlen and Schmidt. The human-machine interface is very different today but it is still discussed in the familiar categories. This is the success of the anthropological signature. The discourse about modern technology and the anthropological foundation of modernity does not call for post-, trans-, or anti-humanistic images, but rather well-known humanistic-anthropological ones. 10.48417/technolang.2023.02.12 1:004.5 Anthropology of technology Human-machine interaction History and philosophy of technology Arnold Gehlen Humanization Ontology Adaption https://soctech.spbstu.ru/article/2023.11.12/ 129-144.pdf

RAR RUS 145-156 0000-0002-6278-6489 University of Groningen Wittingslow Ryan

Groningen, The Netherlands

On the Use of Linguistic Concepts in Design It is conventional to talk about contemporary design norms and practices in linguistic terms, such as in the cases of ‘design language’, ‘pattern language’, and so on. However, the extent to which design is like language is not obvious. Given that observation, my intentions in this paper are to perform an exploratory analysis of the limits of talking about design in terms of its linguistic features. This paper is divided into four parts. The first offers a brief picture of what I take to be the necessary conditions that must be met for something to be properly considered a natural language. In the second part I examine the ways in which design is like language in that design possesses both semanticity and grammaticality. The third part addresses the fundamental question at the heart of this paper: is design literally a natural language, in the sense of satisfying all relevant conditions? To this, I respond in the negative, arguing that design cannot be properly considered a language. Because designed objects are functional, they are necessarily absent the arbitrariness that is integral to natural language. Finally, and given that design is not literally a language, I conclude with a brief discussion of the status of linguistic concepts in design as a productive metaphor. 10.48417/technolang.2023.02.13 7.01 Language Design Grammaticality Semiotics Functions Arbitrariness https://soctech.spbstu.ru/article/2023.11.13/ 145-156.pdf