The philosophy of technology is a developing field of thought which analyzes the roles technologies play in our society and our lives. Thinkers approach this topic from a wide variety of perspectives, address a number of topics, and consider technology’s general character and its many particular cases.

            We begin with an exploration of the general positions often taken within discussions of technology, including utopian, dystopian, and instrumentalist views. This includes an analysis of Martin Heidegger’s influential account of our technological situation. His pessimistic view is a constant reference point of the field. We’ll continue with Michel Foucault’s work on panopticism and the construction of selfhood through our technologies.

            In addition, we will consider several “social” accounts of technology, in which theorists such as sociologists and anthropologists explore how disagreements in society have shaped contemporary designs. From there, the course will move into political accounts of technology, exploring the views thinkers such as Donna Haraway, Andrew Feenberg, and Langdon Winner. Their works draw out a number of political issues, including the ways technologies contribute to the mechanisms of democracy and governance, and to the ways we conceptualize ourselves and others. 

            In the next section of this course, we analyze human bodily relations to technology, technology’s capacity to influence our actions, and how these issues bear on technology design. And we conclude with a section on ethical accounts of technology, including the works of thinkers such as Peter-Paul Verbeek, Shannon Vallor, and Albert Borgmann. Ideas from their works and others will help us to consider the ethics of design, and how technology shapes moral decision making and personal character.