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Inverting a Techno-Political Trope: On The Hubris of Neo-Luddis (Part Two)
(Editor’s Note: This article is Part Three of a series. Read Part One and Part Two.)
[easyazon-image align=”left” asin=”B000VM4P9Y” locale=”us” height=”160″ src=”http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/41mlV3t79IL._SL160_.jpg” width=”120″]The dichotomy between knowledge and device, between technology and methodology, doesn’t have a stable ontological ground in the first place. What is technology but embodied methodology, and methodology but internalized technology? Language is just as unnatural as quantum computers in geological scales of time. To make technology a necessary prerequisite is to miss the end for the means and the mark for a lark. The point is that we are trying to consciously improve the state of self, society and world; technology has simply superseded methodology as the most optimal means of accomplishing that, and now constitutes our best means of effecting our affectation.
The original Luddite movement was less against advancing technology and more about the particular repercussions that specific advancements in technology (i.e. semi-automated looms) had on their lives and circumstances. To claim that Neo-Luddism has any real continuity-of-impetus with the original Luddite movement that occurred throughout 1811-1817 may actually be antithetical to the real motivation underlying the original Luddite movement – namely the liberation of the working class. Indeed, Neo-Luddism itself, as a movement, may be antithetical to the real impetus of the initial Luddite movement both for the fact that they are trying to impose their ideological beliefs upon others (i.e. prohibition is necessarily exclusive, whereas availability of the option to use a given technology is non-exclusive and forces a decision on no one) and because they are trying to prohibit the best mediator of Man’s ever-increasing self-liberation – namely technological growth.
Support for these claims can be found in the secondary literature. For instance, in Luddites and Luddism Kevin Binfield sees the Luddite movement as an expression of worker-class discontent during the Napoleonic Wars than having rather than as an expression of antipathy toward technology in general or toward advancing technology as general trend (Binfield, 2004).
[easyazon-image align=”left” asin=”B007N9217Q” locale=”us” height=”160″ src=”http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/41k35CEProL._SL160_.jpg” width=”92″]And in terms of base-premises, it is not as though Luddites are categorically against technology in general; rather they are simply against either a specific technology, a specific embodiment of a general class of technology, or a specific degree of technological sophistication. After all, most every Luddite alive wears clothes, takes antibiotics, and uses telephones. Legendary Ludd himself still wanted the return of his manual looms, a technology, when he struck his first blow. I know many Transhumanists and Technoprogressives who still label themselves as such despite being weary of the increasing trend of automation.
This was the Luddites’ own concern: that automation would displace manual work in their industry and thereby severely limit their possible choices and freedoms, such as having enough discretionary income to purchase necessities. If their government were handing out guaranteed basic income garnered from taxes to corporations based on the degree with which they replace previously-manual labor with automated labor, I’m sure they would have happily lain their hammers down and laughed all the way home. Even the Amish only prohibit specific levels of technological sophistication, rather than all of technology in general.
In other words no one is against technology in general, only particular technological embodiments, particular classes of technology or particular gradations of technological sophistication. If you’d like to contest me on this, try communicating your rebuttal without using the advanced technology of cerebral semiotics (i.e. language).
References:
Binfield, K. (2004). Luddites and Luddism. Baltimore and London: The Johns Hopkins University Press.
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About the author
Franco Cortese is a Futurist, Author, Editor, Poet and Speaker. He writes for several publications including Institute for Ethics & Emerging Technologies, H+ Magazine, and Immortal Life Magazine. He is on the coordinating committee for Zero State, and is an Adviser for Lifeboat Foundation. He is also a supporting member of the World Future Society, Humanity+, the Institute for Ethics & Emerging Technologies, Foresight Institute, Immortality Institute for Unlimited Lifespans, London Futurists, Zero State, British Longevity Society, Mormon Transhumanist Association, Turing Church, Immortalist Society, Healthy Life Extension Society and the Methuselah Foundation.
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