This paper was published in ``All Things New,'' (1995) a publication of the Student Christian Movement of Canada. It's part of my extra-curriculum, and I'd be pleased to hear your comments (email: horsch@cs.usask.ca).
In this essay, I start from the idea that technology is a tool used to control otherwise uncontrollable factors; these may be social, economic, natural, supernatural, or imaginary. From there I will make the point that, as a tool for control, technology also exerts control on its users, in sometimes subtle ways. Finally, I shall attempt to demonstrate that as technology allows humans to control more and more of our environment, its control over us increases as well.
The conclusion I will draw is not foregone, namely that technology is bad and we should abstain. This would trivialize our predicament, because it is impossible to abstain from technology, in two senses. First, technology we have already acquired cannot be given back; the power of technology is such that only cataclysmic events can oppose it. Second, almost everything we do has some aspect of technology in it, and, being a technological species, we can not prevent ourselves from developing it.
We must be aware of the duality of control that technology induces. As well, to the extent that a technological species may be able to step outside its own nature, we must make the effort to judge the artifacts of our own ingenuity. I mean this not only in the usual sense, that we address ethical issues arising from the potential of technology, but also, and perhaps more importantly, we must address the issue of the extent to which we are willing to be dominated by our own ingenuity.
Let's start by acknowledging that technology is more than just FAX machines and microchips; it is a way of doing things. In recent times, the word ``technology'' has come to refer to the artifacts of recent technological ingenuity. In contrast to this common usage, I will use the word technology a bit more pointedly, as the study and application of technique, usage which corresponds to Ellul (1964) and Franklin (1992). As I present my points, I may refer to the technology of some artifact, in which case I should be interpreted as referring to the techniques that the artifacts embody.
Technology must be distinguished from its artifacts. We often say that television is a technology, whereas, I would say that a television is the artifact of technology. When we watch TV, we are using an artifact of technology, but we are not necessarily being technological; we could just as well watch a tree. The same can be said for telephones, food processors, computers, cars, stereos, or any other gadget or appliance you like. In addition, these examples are all fairly modern, so we must take care not to limit technology only to the modern experience. More ``traditional'' technological artifacts are still used today: wheels, clothing, pottery, plumbing, simple tools, etc.
To identify the artifact with the technology that developed it would be a mistake. For example, it would be misleading to identify the technology of making a clay pot with the clay pot itself; using a computer does not require knowledge of semiconductor physics. If we have a thing, but not the means of making the thing, then we do not have the technology. In this sense, humanity as a collective has technology, but only relatively few individuals have much technology above primitive levels (if your car breaks down, can you fix it? Your TV? If you have never seen a recipe for bread, could you invent one?).
We must not only distinguish between technology and artifact, but we must also observe that the most powerful technologies are not associated directly with any particular artifact at all. Take, for example, the automobile, which is an artifact of several technologies: internal combustion engines, electronics, and materials. But far more remarkable is the technology by which production of automobiles is made possible: factories and assembly lines. The assembly of such terrifically complicated artifacts is facilitated by a methodical and precise breakdown of a process into simple and mechanical tasks. Each task is perfectible, and designed to achieve a certain level of efficiency. Mass production is a powerful and pervasive technology.
Technologies of this kind are plentiful. The methods of science depend on a few simple technologies: repeatable experiments, falsifiable hypotheses, and the control of endogenous variables. That these are technologies is evident, since they form an examinable basis for scientific investigation; without them, or without equally powerful ideas, investigation would proceed much more slowly than it does, and much more haphazardly.
The methods of business organization are also technologies, similar to assembly lines: team work, division of labour and responsibilities provide significant control over the information the company needs to process from day to day. Corporations the size of your favourite multinational would be impossible to maintain, much less achieve, without the management technologies.
The key observation about these "artifactless" technologies is that they make use of other technologies. Assembly lines make use of automation and robotics. A well-organized kitchen uses gadgets and tools to aid the production of food. This last example demonstrates that a common tool, like a knife can be used "technologically" in a way that a television, for example, seems to resist.
At this point, it becomes necessary to address the issue of the pervasiveness of technology. It may seem as if my argument labels everything humans do as "technological." In fact, I do believe that we are far more technological than most of us realize, but not because we play video games, or watch television, or go for hikes in so-called "hi-tech" hiking boots, wearing personal stereos, etc. We are a technological species because of the way we do things, not because of the things we use to do them.
Let us return to look at technologies that do not have a particular artifact associated with them, where we are beginning to see their true nature: control. The more advanced the technology, the more control it exercises over its domain.
Consider the manufacture of some widget, which could presumably be performed by a single artisan. As the task of a single artisan, who controls every step in the process, the product may have a high degree of variability, often by design. This is sometimes seen as a desirable quality, but is usually associated with a high cost of production. For example, a custom-built guitar is valued for its uniqueness as much as its quality; on the other hand, it is hard to imagine taking the same kind of pride in owning a custom-built television.
Now consider the technology of mass production applied to the manufacture of this same widget: the single artisan's entire process is divided into stages: buying the raw material, manufacturing the parts, assembly, packaging. The separation into tasks can be translated into a division of labour - each of several labourers can specialize in one or two of the subtasks, to achieve an efficiency and skill level not realizable by a single artisan. Each labourer is able to control a small part of the process. In addition, the expected quality of the finished product is an external constraint imposed upon each labourer, which, if it is not achieved, will result in a substandard product.
It is easy to generalize about technology and control, once the idea is made clear. For example, the technology of television controls the passage of electromagnetic radiation, from light source to subject to transmitter to receiver to retina. Other aspects of the technology of television are less clinical: programming, i.e., the persuasive control of the viewers' attention; advertising, i.e., the blatant attempt to control the viewers' spending habits. Television even limits the effectiveness of certain ``signals;'' if a point can't be made accessible in a few minutes, the audience will get bored and move on.
Bank machines control the process of banking, by forcing a certain behaviour on their users; there are very few procedural variations that are valid. Bank machines also give control of accounts directly to the user, without the intervention of a teller. It does not seem surprising that the two of these factors explain why some do not use bank machines: they have more direct control, but at a greatly reduced flexibility, inducing the perception of lower tolerance for error, and greater consequences.
It might be argued that technology provides artifacts with a desired functionality, and that the issue of control is a secondary aspect. For example, the telephone exploits the controlled flow of electrons for the primary purpose of communication. It's easy to show that this is a confusion: convenient communication may have motivated the invention of the telephone, but the control of a physical phenomenon facilitates the invention. Conversely, I may be quite motivated to foretell the future, but without control of chaotic systems, or perhaps, without the control of the directed flow of time, my motivation remains unrealized. Therefore, control is both necessary and sufficient for technology; motivation is merely necessary.
We seem to adopt technology because it is available, at first; it provides a measure of control over our environment which was previously unavailable. Later, we continue to use it because we must; either because we have forgotten the old ways, or dare not abandon the new. This transition from availability to necessity, and from control over our environment to control over ourselves, reflects the power that technology holds.
Consider our use of the automobile. With it, we have the means to travel moderate distances with unparalleled autonomy. We run errands and access services which would be inaccessible if the distances were to be traversed by any other mode of transportation. Because of our increased range and autonomy, neighbourhood shops tend lose business to local malls, which lose business to centralized mega-markets. The shift in patronage starts by being the advantage of the few, and reaches a stable point when failure to participate becomes a liability. We have no choice; we must participate, or else be left behind.
The same pattern repeats itself in many ways. Corporations must apply innovative methods of office management as cost-cutting measures. Manufacturers must continually upgrade and improve their methods, or else lose market share to those who do. Economies are encouraged to grow, because some are growing, and the technologies of economic activity (interest rates, tax policies, etc., which are designed to control factors which affect the rate of growth) must be applied in order to maintain the status quo. Labourers must perform to the satisfaction of the standards set by their employers, or lose their jobs, either to other labourers, or to machines.
Computers have exhibited staggering increases in speed and memory capacity since their invention, with roughly constant cost. With each improvement in hardware comes an improvement in software, which pushes the new hardware to its limits. The new software thus encourages improvements in hardware, completing a positive feedback cycle. Before long, the new software won't work on hardware more than a few cycles old. Consumers are trapped within this cycle, by being required to abandon obsolete hardware to run the new software, or vice versa.
It may seem that technology's power over us is just a matter of "keeping up with the Joneses." However, I am not convinced of this, because if it were true, simply abstaining from using a particular new technology would suffice to stall its development. The key point here is that abstention must be unanimous; if it is not, then the immediate advantage is given to those who use the technology. More importantly, the new technology is given a foothold, and its development will proceed with, or without those who have abstained.
So at last we come to the question posed in the title: Is technology out of control? I will point out the ambiguity of the question: if we, as a technological species, are in control of technology, then it is not in control of us (therefore "out" of control). On the other hand, if we are not in control of our own ingenuity, then technology is really in control, and if our predicament is serious enough, it may be out of control.
To answer my own question, then, I shall say that I do not believe that technology controls us absolutely, even if I do believe that we are too easily led into accepting the impositions and necessities of technology. We tend to use technology to solve problems that other technologies create, with a tendency to be short-sighted when considering the costs and benefits. Nevertheless, it isn't necessarily a closed system. Because we can be aware of technology's tendency to create its own rules and structures for control, we can step outside its structures, to reflect and evaluate our situation.
Franklin, Ursula. The Real World of Technology. Anansi Press, Concord Ontario, 1992.