Jacques Ellul: The Technological Bluff (1990)
Filed under book | Tags: · critique, critique of technology, entropy, genetics, radio, technocracy, technological society, technology, telematics
This poignant critique of modern society shows how we have mistakenly allowed technology to fool us into thinking about all of our problems in terms of technical progress. This technological bluff, Ellul claims, deprives us of active adaptation to and criticism of technical growth.
The author argues that “an easily distracted consumer society is caught up in a rapidly developing, uncontrollable technological system. … Everyproblem generates a technological solution; computers breed ever larger, morefragile, and vulnerable systems. But the solutions raise more and greater problems than they solve. … Responsibility, contemplation, civility, and spirituality suffer.” (Choice)
Published by Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing, 1990
ISBN 080280960X, 9780802809605
436 pages
Key terms:
Minitel, telematics, Le Monde, Third World, technopolis, genetic engineering, independent local radio, technocrats, videotex, microcomputers, entropy, Testart, Jacques Ellul, gross national product, Nomenklatura, artificial intelligence, University of Bordeaux, technostructure, vitro fertilization, Paris
PDF (updated on 2012-8-11)
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Amen. I wonder how the church has fallen into this trap. As a former music director, I worried that all the new possibilities for using cameras, recordings, microphones during worship had become more important than the message of the gospel. Hmm, food for thought….