Pope Leo XIV, at the very beginning of his pontificate, has addressed important implications of Artificial Intelligence (AI) technology:

AI, especially Generative AI, has opened new horizons on many different levels, including enhancing research in healthcare and scientific discovery, but also raises troubling questions on its possible repercussions on humanity’s openness to truth and beauty, on our distinctive ability to grasp and process reality. . . . Access to data, however extensive, must not be confused with intelligence, which necessarily involves the person’s openness to the ultimate questions of life and reflects an orientation toward the True and the Good” (Leo XIV, “Message of Pope Leo XIV to Participants in the Second Annual Conference on Artificial Intelligence, Ethics, and Corporate Governance,” June 17, 2025).

In this regard, Pope Leo followed the example of his predecessor, Pope Francis, who, the year prior, had raised similar concerns to a G7 meeting on AI (Francis, “Address of His Holiness, Pope Francis at the G7 Session on Artificial Intelligence,” June 14, 2024). Both popes have indicated the pressing need for the Church to consider and think into the numerous and significant facets of technologies such as AI.

This task leads to a variety of questions: What does it mean to think philosophically (and likewise theologically) into technology? In what ways and to what extent can philosophy shed light on the meaning of technology? What important philosophical points come to light through this reflection on technology? What kinds of examples of technology are especially geared toward such reflection? What might this sort of reflection tell us about who we are as humans, about how we should act, and about being as such? And what type of theological themes can and should inform our understanding of technology? 

As German-American philosopher Hans Jonas has said in this regard:

Modern technology touches on almost everything vital to man’s existence—material, mental, and spiritual. Indeed, what of man is not involved? The way he lives his life and looks at objects, his intercourse with the world and with his peers, his powers and modes of action, kinds of goals, states and changes of society, objectives and forms of politics (including warfare no less than welfare), the sense and quality of life, even man’s fate and that of his environment: all these are involved in the technological enterprise as it extends in magnitude and depth. The mere enumeration suggests a staggering host of potentially philosophic themes. (Jonas, “Toward a Philosophy of Technology,” 34)

In that vein, I offer here an in-depth reflection on the philosophy of technology. This essay will consist of four sections. In section 1, I will articulate main and essential aspects of the philosophy of technology. In section 2, I will look at two paradigmatic case studies, optics and AI, each of which, as considered philosophically in its own way, helps bring to further light and clarity the practice and theory of the philosophy of technology. In section 3, I will look at how technology, philosophically understood, has numerous and important implications for the study of human nature, ethics, and metaphysics. Finally, in section 4, I will reflect on the philosophy of technology from the vantage point of Catholic theology, bringing out particular points of emphasis.

I. What the Philosophy of Technology Is and Does

To offer an initial description, we could talk of technology as referring to the development and utilization, by humans, of various tools and equipment for the sake of achieving numerous and important human-specific goals, ones that are meant to assist with our survival and flourishing (Borgmann, Technology and the Character of Contemporary Life, 40). A tool is thought of as “an artificially designed, inert object interpolated as a means between the bodily acting organ and the extracorporeal object of the action. It is given permanent form for recurring use and can be set aside in readiness for this use. Thus a stick or stone employed as a momentary aid is not yet a tool” (Jonas, Mortality and Morality, 78). As we shall soon see, this is not an exhaustive presentation, nor is it meant as anything like a definition. Rather, it offers a first glimpse of what is meant by technology, philosophically understood.

In one sense, technology has been on the radar of philosophy from the start. Consider, for example, Aristotle’s famous definition of nature as presented in the Physics: “nature is a source or cause of being moved and of being at rest in that to which it belongs primarily, in virtue of itself” (Aristotle, Physics, II, 1). As an essential foil against which to articulate nature, Aristotle likewise discussed such things as “a bed and a coat,” since these, as artifacts and hence not natural, do not and cannot possess such an inner principle of motion and rest (Aristotle, Physics, II, 1). He also brought up the following thought experiment: Suppose that a bed with rotting wood were planted in the ground. If a shoot were to develop as a result, it would do so on account of the wood, as such, rather than the bed, which is an artifact (Aristotle, Physics, II, 1). In short, Aristotle drew here an important and profound distinction between that which is natural and that which is fabricated, that is, the tools, equipment, and artifacts that are the products of technology. Whereas the former can and do grow and act per se, the latter perform their function only because of being made and acted upon by external agents. Hence, Aristotle articulated a basic sense of the being and meaning of technological, or fabricated, entities, especially in contradistinction to natural entities. Although he did not offer a more in-depth reflection on technology as philosophically understood, he did help lay the groundwork, as it were, for such subsequent reflection.

Karl Marx, in his turn, investigated technology from a philosophical perspective, although, as with Aristotle, this analysis was secondary to larger philosophical reflections. Marx talked of how the material conditions of a person’s life were fundamental and necessary to how that person existed, much more so than any abstract or idea-based considerations. Indeed, the person’s mode of consciousness was based on his way of being in and according to such material conditions. Moreover, such material conditions were directly and indirectly informed by the presence and operation of all sorts of technology. After all, according to Marx, it is what we produce and how we do so that constitutes our way of life. Thus, technology was in the orbit of Marx’s philosophy, even if somewhat indirectly (see Marx, The German Ideology). Philosophical analysis and reflection consequently have often addressed technology and technological entities.

Nonetheless, the philosophy of technology, as a distinct and robust field in philosophy, really began to flourish with Martin Heidegger’s essay “The Question Concerning Technology.” With this essay, Heidegger directly made technology itself an object of philosophical speculation and analysis. That is, Heidegger tried to articulate exactly and precisely the essence of modern technology, such that, once this was clarified, it might be possible for us, here and now, to achieve a free relationship to such technology. Employing techniques, terminology, and practices from philosophy—for instance, phenomenological analysis and a discussion of the Greek understanding of the four causes—Heidegger attempted to highlight the nature of modern technology, as well as our human relationship to it (Heidegger, “The Question Concerning Technology”).

Several of Heidegger’s students, Hans Jonas and Herbert Marcuse being two leading examples, picked up this thematic analysis of technology and provided their own contributions to it. Hubert Dreyfus and Don Ihde, drawing from while expanding beyond Heidegger, brought phenomenological analyses to various aspects of contemporary technology, such as computers, AI, and hearing aids. Albert Borgmann, Bruno Latour, and Peter-Paul Verbeek have contributed significantly to the philosophy of technology, doing so in this vein and spirit of continental philosophy. From the perspective of analytic philosophy, leading contemporary names include Mark Coeckelbergh, Maarten Franssen, Deborah Johnson, and Peter Kroes. They have likewise addressed a wide range of topics associated with the philosophical theme of technology.

Despite that diversity, however, the philosophy of technology, in a fundamental and ongoing sense, is a descriptive exercise. Pursuant to its roots in the thinking of phenomenologists such as Heidegger, the philosophy of technology aims to bring to light and greater clarity the reality of technology in its various dimensions, modalities, meanings, and repercussions. Hence, it looks at the various ways in which our current human existence is caught up with technology (from the heightened involvement of, say, “virtual” presence online in and through an avatar to the more remote but still technologically pertinent case of wearing hiking boots on a trail in Glacier National Park). It also articulates the different types of technology and technological instruments that we have developed and employed, ranging from, for instance, a compass to a sextant to a Global Positioning System (GPS). In turn, this philosophy analyzes the different significances of technology; it sees, for instance, what the technology of acoustics is about and why it is important. Finally, it discusses the numerous and potentially deleterious consequences of technology, wrestling with, for example, the hazards to the environment posed by automotive technology. Phrased otherwise, the philosophy of technology addresses issues such as what technology is in its existence and function, how it is present and operative, why technology develops and is intertwined with human existence, and why it matters.

It is important here to clarify the following distinction (as offered by contemporary thinker David Kaplan): the difference between (a) an approach involving philosophy and technology versus (b) the approach employed by the philosophy of technology (introduction to Readings in the Philosophy of Technology). In the former approach, we would pursue philosophical questions (e.g., what does social media tell us, philosophically, about human nature?) while leaving aside and unaddressed any deeper analyses of or reflection on the relevant technology. Social media, in this approach, would be rather incidental to our ultimate concern. The main and ongoing issue is one of human nature. Social media might provide, as it were, a lens by which our human nature comes into clearer focus. However, as with any such lens, it is the object thus brought into view, and not the lens itself, that is our focal point and area of interest. This sort of philosophical gaze, put bluntly, sees through technology or interacts with it only provisionally and incidentally.

The latter approach, that is, the philosophy of technology, however, takes technology on its own terms and as such. Technology here is not thought of as a context, a set of relevant examples, or a lens by which to attend to a deeper issue. The philosophical questions are, instead, geared directly and ultimately toward technology itself. Though questions of ethics, human nature, metaphysics, and the like are, as we shall see, in the general vicinity of the philosophy of technology, they are secondary to and derivative from the primary and ongoing task of articulating the nature and meaning of such technology in a properly philosophical manner. To return to the example from above: the philosophy of technology would ask about social media as such, in terms of its being a particular aspect of contemporary technology. Although ethical and anthropological questions and themes might arise from this investigation, they are not the main concern. Instead, one might ask some of the following sorts of questions: What does it mean that there is a virtual space of human interaction? Does social media, as a technology, involve necessarily a new mode of communication? With social media, is there an inevitable and unavoidable conflation between oneself and one’s manicured presentation? Granted, in pursuing these and other questions, we would touch on numerous other philosophical topics. However, that would, again, be a derivation from our basic and essential attention to this particular form of technology as such.

Hence, and in short: the philosophy of technology takes technology itself as an object of philosophical analysis, discussion, reflection, and articulation. In this regard, it is akin to the philosophy of, say, human nature or the environment, both of which take their co-relative object per se as something to be analyzed, discussed, reflected on, and articulated philosophically (Jonas, “Toward a Philosophy of Technology,” 34).

Nonetheless, it is important to say a few words on the breadth and depth of the scope of the philosophy of technology. Said briefly: any artifact, as an artifact, insofar as it is a product or tool of technology, would be the sort of thing that could fit within the scope of the philosophy of technology (Kaplan, introduction to Readings in the Philosophy of Technology). To give some immediate examples: the computer on which I type this essay, the internet through which I am listening to music, and even the desk on which the computer sits—as well as, of course, the books and pens next to the table, the clothing I am wearing, and the landline phone adjacent to the computer—are all technological items and hence the sort of entities apt to be studied in the philosophy of technology. It is likely important to sit with this point a bit more. We sometimes suppose technology to refer only to the most modern and cutting-edge things that we produce and with which we interact. Understood thus, a computer would be a paradigmatic instance of technology, but my mug seemingly would not. However, this vein of thought is, for the philosophy of technology, an errant one. After all, my mug is manufactured, a man-made tool brought into being intentionally to be used in a certain way. Though obviously much simpler and less complex than my computer, the mug is still a technological item. I can and do use it for various purposes: drinking beverages, of course, is its main task, but I might also employ it in other ways. Hence, I can bring it to the coffee machine in the adjacent room and refill it when feeling fatigued, or, if I am not a coffee drinker but still appreciate the mug, I might make use of it to hold writing instruments.

What we see in such a simple example, furthermore, is that there is a whole and ever-expanding network of connections in and among things, which unfolds and operates as technology develops and is used. “The performance of [technological] objects in general matches the extent to which such objects are ‘incorporated’ into the fabric of human activity” (Franssen, “The Normativity of Artefacts,” 42). Thus, as a means to hold and drink coffee, the mug is connected with the aforesaid coffee maker, which itself runs on the electricity that is powered, ultimately, by the nearby hydroelectric plant. Both the mug and the coffee maker obtain and function within a man-made structure, in this case, the building on the college campus where I work. They both rest on other manufactured items, such as tables and desks. A similar thing is seen when we take the mug as a holder for pencils and pens. In this case, the writing instruments are placed such as to be readily available for use. When I want to access a pen to make notes on a student paper or to jot down ideas in my notebook before class, it is important to have the pens proximate and accessible. What we see in both cases, therefore, is that the technological instrument of the mug, in what it is and how it operates, does so as interrelated to other such items and does so in a patterned and intelligible manner. It is not a random set of connections in which the mug fits but something more like a structured context. It is not incidental or accidental that the mug can function so readily in the manner just described. The fact that its functionality is so readily apparent attests to the further, background fact that there is an overarching context in which and according to which mugs and other tools of technology exist and are used (Heidegger, Being and Time, 97–102).

In the philosophy of technology, consequently, what is addressed is not merely technological tools on their own and as such. Rather, the context in which they are produced, as well as the contexts in and according to which they are subsequently employed, become objects of philosophical consideration. Nonetheless, such multifaceted and complex contexts, especially in their increasing complexification, do not arise in or continue to obtain in a proverbial vacuum. Rather, they are connected intimately to the way we humans exist and behave. Heidegger’s understanding proves helpful here. In Heidegger’s account, technology, especially modern technology, is essentially a way of revealing (Heidegger, “Question Concerning Technology,” 319–20). In other words, for Heidegger, technology is not primarily just this or that piece of equipment, or even this or that way of using such equipment. Instead, technology involves fundamentally and essentially a particular way of encountering ourselves and the world we inhabit. Things are there in our experience differently in accordance with the technology of the time and place in which we exist. For Heidegger, in our current age of modern technology, the world is given in experience as a place whose energy can be accessed and exploited (Heidegger, “Question Concerning Technology,” 320). What this implies, moreover, is that the world we encounter here and now, as it is given to us in our experience of it, is markedly, if not essentially, different from the world as experienced by someone who existed in alignment with a technology of a different time and place. According to Heidegger, the Rhine River, having been dammed to provide hydroelectric power, is now quite distinct from how it would have been encountered by someone such as the nineteenth-century poet Hölderlin. For Hölderlin, the untamed and untapped power of the river, in and of itself, would have stood out in its majesty. For the contemporary visitor to the same spot, the Rhine is inextricably altered in being dammed; it is mainly there as an instance of being a potential source for energy (Heidegger, “The Question Concerning Technology,” 321).

In other words, technology, thus understood, relates to how we experience ourselves and the world around us. But it is not merely the case that technology, from the start, informs our frame of reference. It is also the case that, as this technological frame and the tools ingredient to it intensify, deepen, and expand, then such frames and tools, in turn, profoundly affect our subsequent experience. “Artifacts mediate human experience by transforming perceptions and interpretive frameworks, helping to shape the way in which human beings encounter reality. . . . From an existential perspective, artifacts mediate human existence by giving concrete shape to their behavior and the social contexts of their existence. . . . Artifacts help shape how humans can be present in the world and how the world can be present for them” (Verbeek, What Things Do, 195). Technology is not merely tools or equipment or the contexts of their use; it also involves how we approach and interact with the world.

The term “horizon” is quite pertinent here. A horizon sets the limits of what can be experienced, such that, for instance, we can see the ocean and ships upon it only within and according to the horizon provided by our particular vantage point from the beach. In turn, a horizon informs the meaning and significance of what is experienced and the way that it can be experienced (Husserl, Ideas, 101–2). Consider the example of a soccer game being played on a soccer field. For the players, coaches, officials, and spectators, their focus is obviously on this field. However, they focus and attend according to the game of soccer. That is, spectators are not mainly watching people with odd-looking shoes running on a field of grass that is crisscrossed by white lines. Rather, they are watching players play the game of soccer, and they are doing so informed by and subject to the rules and patterns of the game. Hence, the meaning of what they see is informed by the very game of soccer. It occurs, we might say, within that horizon, rather than being experienced as just a random set of movements (e.g., running, kicking) and objects (e.g., balls) in a meaningless place (this field). In the same vein, the philosophy of technology studies how and in what ways technology informs if not constitutes the horizon of what we experience and how we do so, the frames of reference in which and according to which we relate to the world and act accordingly.

Allow a few more words concerning this horizon of technology. The abundance, robustness, multifaceted utility, and practical ubiquity of technology color, so to speak, what we experience and how we experience it. “With the expansion of our technology, we have, in effect, translated our concepts into artifacts, radically restructuring . .   [the] texture of our ordinary experience” (Kohák, The Embers and the Stars, 12). But what is it about the universal presence of such technology, say electricity, that plays a crucial role in how we view and interact with the world? Electricity is a constantly available resource, something we can draw from instantaneously without effort. In this age of electricity, as we all make use of its amazing potential for numerous and often very good reasons, we also and simultaneously might be led to consider that the world, in a comprehensive fashion, is markedly akin to electricity, that is, readily available, functioning in a similarly systematic and well-ordered fashion, and operating according to our timelines and purposes. As Erazim Kohák points out, the sense of the world informed by technology such as electricity reorders how we perceive the darkness of evening and night, such that it becomes something to be overcome (Kohák, The Embers and the Stars, 34). Electricity is hence not merely a basic and necessary tool of modern technology. It is also something that, in being paradigmatic of such technology, informs how we grasp the world around us. It helps to structure the meaningful horizon of our contemporary experience.

This horizon of technology, moreover, plays a crucial role in the continuation and intensification of that sort of technology, as well as the production and use of correlative equipment. When there is a drive to produce a certain type of technology, such as AI, that drive itself arises from and unfolds in alignment with the horizon of the technology of the age in which we exist. “Technology, as an abstract whole of movement, . . . propels itself . . . into ever-succeeding and superseding novelty” (Jonas, “Toward a Philosophy of Technology,” 34). In other words, what we, here and now, take as most important, most significant, and most necessary is itself an integral, albeit subtle, aspect of our horizon of experience as informed by technology. Speaking metaphorically, we could talk of the proverbial air that we all breathe or the current in which we all swim, given how we exist (culturally, socially, economically, etc.) in this particular time and place. And to take the metaphor further: given the current in which we presently swim, we are pushed along to think about and try to develop ever novel types of computer technology. Since the world we inhabit is now so caught up in computer technology—because so much of what we do and how we do so occurs in and according to such technology—then it makes perfect sense that there will be a corresponding drive to produce and make ever-increasing use of that same technology. We are moved to come up with instruments and methods that improve the realization of the sorts of goals ingredient to this technology. Hence, we are moved to design, fabricate, disseminate, and make widespread use of technological instruments that correspond to and help to achieve goals such as efficiency, the ease and facility of use, the performance of menial tasks often considered drudgery, the increase of the flow of (and access to) information, and the augmentation of various modes of instantaneous communication. After all, computer technology, especially as presently enacted, is concerned with such and other related goals. For example, the internet was developed precisely to facilitate the sharing of information and to render such information readily available. Hence, as that sort of technology becomes more and more dominant and ingrained in life, there will be a simultaneous push to develop and make use of instruments that, at least ostensibly, help to accomplish its goals more readily and swiftly.

One further thing that comes to light as we reflect with and on the philosophy of technology is the fact that human life, in principle, is not separable from technology. Said otherwise: the philosophy of technology addresses technology as inextricably intertwined with human existence. For example, as Hans Jonas makes clear, the development and use of technology, even the most basic tools, is a necessary and unique feature of humanity (Jonas, Mortality and Morality, 78). And, as we have seen, our human way of life is caught up with technology. Peter Kroes offers a helpful articulation of how technology comprehensively and profoundly influences and informs our human existence.

The world in which we live is a world of technical artefacts [sic]. We live our lives in and through them. It is not so much the natural world as well as the technical world that conditions human life. This technical world not only provides us with the means to adapt the physical environment to our needs and desires. Its influence stretches much further into the world of social affairs and into the world of ideas . . . The technical world strongly influences human thinking and doing. (Kroes, <em>Technical Artefacts</em>, 1)

Technology is not, therefore, seen as a distinct reality unfolding on its own apart from humanity. Instead, technology is thought of in relationship with humanity and vice versa. Given the overarching horizon of technology, as well as the seeming ubiquity of technological instruments and contexts, it is impossible for someone to divorce himself entirely from technology. “Those of us who live in the industrially developed parts of the [world] live and move and have our being in the midst of our technologies. We might even say that our existence is technologically textured” (Ihde, Technology and the Lifeworld, 1). Hence, even when someone lives alone in the wilderness, he still brings with him or even makes tools that are technological instruments. Granted, his interaction with technology is different from and likely more limited than the majority of others in his society, and, from that vantage point, he might be able to achieve a new and insightful sense of our current technology. Nonetheless, he is still caught up in the technology of his time and place, even to the extent of trying to distance himself from it. Thus, for instance, Theodore Kaczynski, the Unabomber, even while living in a self-built cabin in the Montana wilderness, even while attempting, through his mail bombs, to prevent further developments of computer technology because he feared its ramifications on human nature, was still acting against and therefore in light of contemporary technology. Phrased otherwise, and to use the metaphor of the horizon, he was not experiencing the world outside of that horizon; rather, while en-framed by that horizon, he fought and railed against it (Heidegger, “The Question Concerning Technology,” 324–28). We, as human beings, not only employ technological instruments but also exist within a framework informed by technology.

Thus, it is integral to the philosophy of technology to address technology insofar as it alters how we humans interact with the world and each other pursuant to the production and employment of the same technology. The example of transportation will be a helpful illustration. The production and distribution of cars led to numerous and multifaceted repercussions. Older and different modes of transportation (e.g., horse-drawn carriages) were rendered obsolete or secondary. Newer, bigger, and more efficient roadways were called for, thus resulting in changes to various ecosystems (Ihde, Heidegger’s Technologies, 6–7). The connections between people in different parts of, say, the United States were likewise changed, insofar as someone living in Montana can now, without too much effort, visit friends and family on the East Coast. Hence, our sense of space and time, and our ability to navigate in and through such, were changed with the automobile. What previously would have been a difficult journey became a road-trip. Intimidating and seemingly impossible distances were rendered traversable. Likewise, the car itself has become an object of social status, something to possess on its own, regardless of how well it performs the function of transportation. In short, how we relate to ourselves, to our country, to each other, and to the natural world, all these modes of relationship and more were changed inexorably with the coming of the automobile and its widespread use over the past 120 years.

Moreover, such intense, comprehensive, profound, and reiterating changes associated with technology obtain in other forms of transportation and their development. Consider the following from Marshall McLuhan:

[There] are psychic and social consequences of the designs or patterns as they amplify or accelerate existing processes. For the "message" of any . . . technology is the change of scale or pace or pattern that it introduces into human affairs. The railway did not introduce movement or transportation or wheel or road into human society, but it accelerated and enlarged the scale of previous human functions, creating totally new kinds of cities and new kinds of work and leisure . . . The airplane, on the other hand, by accelerating the rate of transportation, tends to dissolve the railway form of city, politics, and association, quite independently of what the airplane is used for. (McLuhan, <em>Understanding Media</em>, 8)

Technology, thus considered, is not seen as some value-free reality, exchangeable with any other, such that the end result would still be the same (McLuhan, Understanding Media, 11). Bruno Latour refers to this notion as “the Myth of the Neutral Tool under complete human control” (Latour, “On Technical Mediation,” 32). I could, while hiking, collect water from either one of two streams in close proximity, both of which are clear, clean, and seemingly potable. Granting the salubrious nature of both, it really makes no difference to me which I choose: the end result of having sufficient and healthy water is the same in either case. And I am pretty much the same regardless of which water source I use, granting the above-mentioned similarity. Technology, however, is not of this type. First, technological items are of differing kinds, such that to use one or the other involves different sorts of action with a different sort of meaning. As noted above: the use of a car is significantly and perhaps even radically different from the use of a horse-drawn carriage. Though both are means of transportation, what they do as such means is markedly distinct and not commensurate. Second, and as we have been discussing, we who are caught up with such technology are changed accordingly. As noted above, how we exist and interact with the world is modified significantly on the basis of such technology. As an illustration of this point, consider what Albert Borgmann said about how technology could negatively affect the basic unit of society, the family: “the plight of the family, finally, consists in the absorption of its tasks and substance by technology” (Borgmann, Technology and the Character of Contemporary Life, 226). Whether for good or for ill, or likely for both, we are changed irrevocably as a result of the technology we implement and employ and which structures so much of our human existence.

Technology, as reflected upon philosophically, thus stands out as a multifaceted and complex reality, one that both is influenced by and likewise influences humanity. Technology, on its own and as such, provides rich soil for philosophical investigation and analysis. 

II. Paradigmatic Case Studies

In order to see more deeply into the philosophy of technology, we can examine several paradigmatic cases, which, as thus analyzed, help to illustrate the scope and depth of study for the philosophy of technology. Such cases are not meant as the most important or significant aspects of the philosophy of technology but rather serve as instances that clarify further what the philosophy of technology is all about and how it is practiced.

Optics

The first example to explore in some detail is that of optics. Take the phenomenon of wearing glasses. Glasses are manufactured tools designed to allow a person to visually experience the world in a manner aligned with how he could if he had better vision. In that respect, the tool is there to bring the world to him in his sight. As an initial explanation, we could say it has a mediative function, therefore, operating between the person and the world, such that, through this mediating tool, he can see things again clearly and accurately. The tool, in this manner, is not merely part of either the person or the world but, at first glance, obtains between them in order to facilitate the improved visual relationship of the former to the latter (Ihde, Technology and the Lifeworld, 44). (As we will soon see, however, this notion of mediative function will be modified somewhat.)

In one respect, we could talk of glasses as playing a compensatory role, in that they make up for the lack of visual acuity. Or, in a related but different vein, we could talk of glasses as rectifying, in that they could be said to “fix” someone’s visual experience. Granted, in either case, glasses are importantly different from something like LASIK surgery, which actually works on the eyes of the person in order to heal the impediments that prevented proper seeing of the world. In that case, the surgery and its effects obtain in and for the person, as such. In fact, were the person, for some bizarre reason, to keep his eyes shut for the remainder of his life pursuant to his surgery, that would still not undermine the basic and physical outcome of the surgery. By keeping his eyes closed, he would be unable to capitalize on the capacity for improved sight, but that capacity is now and henceforth still there in and for his eyes, merely because of the surgery, irrespective of his actions or inactions. On the other hand, the improvement to sight rendered by glasses occurs only insofar as the person is actually wearing the glasses, doing so in the right way, and, of course, keeping his eyes open. Hence, it is his visual experience, as such, which is improved and brought to clarity in and by means of the glasses, not his eyes that are so improved. What is augmented is the visual relationship he has with the world, not the physical status of his eyes, as such.

Additionally, we note that, as the glasses function well in this manner, they become somewhat invisible; “they ‘withdraw’ and become the transparency by which we see the world" (Ihde, Technology and the Lifeworld, 48). The person wearing and using the glasses will see through them. The glasses will not themselves become an object of his visual attention. They sort of fade into the background, such that their wearer becomes rather oblivious to their presence on his face. But such is not a mark against the efficacy of the glasses but rather constitutes that very efficacy. The glasses, we could say, fit well with the person and his daily life. They are a tool that is always there, but that functions best without stepping into the spotlight, as it were. The more the visual experience improves, the more the glasses are not on the proverbial radar.

As the glasses function in this receding manner, as they fit so readily and well with the person wearing them, we could note a subtle but important shift in the person’s interaction with the glasses, especially vis-à-vis the world. Originally, we stated that the glasses operate between the person and the world. However, as the aforementioned fit unfolds readily, we could say that the glasses become seemingly an appendage of the person wearing them, such that there is a necessary and profound integration between the person and the tool. In order to grasp this phenomenon more clearly, consider the related case of a hockey player. His hockey stick becomes a proverbial extension of himself as he plays hockey with it. His passing and shooting the puck, his receiving the puck and moving it down the ice, the particular way he performs these and other related aspects of the game: all this and more occurs with him employing his hockey stick, in such a way that the stick is an essential part of his skillful interaction with the puck and his playing the game at an optimal level. His identity and activity as a hockey player are enacted with his employing the aforesaid stick. Remove that same stick and he would not be the same sort of player. Hence, in short, it is the hockey player-with-the-stick who is the one making the two-line passes or shooting to the goalie’s glove side (Matthew Crawford, The World Beyond Your Head, 43–47). In a similar vein, it is the person-with-glasses who now sees clearly and accurately the world around him and who functions much better in that same world. The glasses, we could say, become a proverbial extension of himself, albeit (as noted above) in a mostly invisible and receding manner.

As this improvement unfolds with the receding presence of the glasses, the person is thus able to navigate and operate much better in his daily life. For example, he can now see clearly the signs on the road, doing so much more easily and from greater distances than before. Or, when reading, he makes out the words precisely, readily, and distinctly. Hence, such things as books, text on the computer screen, and notes from his kids all become clear and salient beyond what they were before. The previously apparent “fuzziness” that was present in various aspects of his visual experience in daily life is now overcome or at least mitigated and reduced significantly. According to Don Ihde, glasses are such as “to retranslate the blurred world into a clear and distinct one” (Ihde, Technology and the Lifeworld, 48). That which is available for use and the ease with which such can be used are markedly improved and expanded because of his glasses. In short: it is not only or mainly his visual experience that improves for the person. Rather, and likely more importantly, it is his interaction with the things of his everyday life, his way of being in that everyday life, that is thus improved significantly.

Another example with optics is that of a telescope. What the telescope opens up for its user is not so much the world as it would be in and according to normal visual experience, as it was with glasses. Rather, by means of the telescope, the person can visually experience things that would be otherwise off the proverbial radar and outside the normal range of the visual field. Consider, for instance, when Galileo looked through a telescope and saw, perhaps for the first time in human history, particular aspects on the surface of the moon. Such features were previously inaccessible to human visual experience, but with the advent and use of the telescope, he could come to see such things. The telescope thus expanded the aforesaid visual field, such that new and otherwise unencounterable objects could be present and visually experienceable (Ihde, “The Structure of Technology Knowledge,” 74–75); or, phrased otherwise, the telescope bridges the spatial gap between the observer and what he observes. Speaking metaphorically, it is as if what is physically remote were brought near, so that it, as well as its features and aspects, normally only experienceable insofar as they would be proximate, are now, as a result of the telescope, seeable for the observer. Via the telescope, the moon is seen as if it were much closer than it actually is. This is not to contend that our seeing of the moon through the telescope is somehow errant or imaginary. Rather, it is the case that the way we see the moon through the telescope is akin to, if not in some senses identical with, how we would see it if it were somehow much closer to us than in fact it is.

Another item to note is that the telescope, insofar as it opens up and expands our visual field, is not really tied to everyday life and activity, unlike the case with glasses. The telescope has a more specific and privileged position, which is why, for example, it plays a central role in certain sciences, such as astrophysics. After all, “the scientist can have no recourse above and beyond what he sees with his own eyes and instruments” (Kuhn, The Structure of Scientific Revolutions, 114). It is not a tool that permits a person normal and fluid access to the things of daily life. Rather, it is a tool that permits access to novel and interesting objects for observation, study, analysis, and examination. Granted, a scientist may be wearing glasses while he looks through a telescope. As he does so, what he sees is, say, a distant star previously unseen or at least not seen so clearly. Nonetheless, although the telescope is obviously essential to the visual experience of the star, the glasses are merely incidental. If the scientist were to have LASIK surgery and no longer require glasses, the visual experience of the distant star would not be significantly altered. However, absent the telescope, there would be no such star brought to visual experience and subsequent study, examination, and analysis (Ihde, “The Structure of Technology Knowledge,” 74–75).

The telescope, as it opens up this new possibility of study, is thus a central aspect of science. First, it brings into the field of study novel and interesting objects such as the aforementioned stars. Put in quantitative terms: there are more entities to be examined because of the efficacy of the telescope. But there is also a qualitative alteration that arises as a result of the telescope and its efficacy. We are able to undertake a more in-depth examination of objects; we are able to obtain a more precise and accurate sense of things, as well. Such things become, therefore, subject to in-depth analysis and explanation precisely because their numerous parts and features, as well as their interconnections, are rendered articulate and hence intelligible. Prior vagueness and uncertainty are overcome, permitting access to a sharper picture of things, in a manner that might unlock their proverbial secrets. 

Yet the connection between science and technology is even deeper than just depicted. Reflect on the field of astrophysics, which we noted above briefly. This field could not exist without technological instruments such as telescopes. Like much of “modern science, [it] is instrumentally, or technologically embodied” (Ihde, Postphenomenology and Technoscience, 35). There would not be sufficient objects to study and study well were it not for the presence and operation of such technology. Physics could not branch out into astrophysics without this sort of technology. All this implies, moreover, that the expansion of the field of something like astrophysics is correlative to a concurrent expansion of the associated technology. As we are led to study distant stars and galaxies, the capacity to engage in such study goes hand in hand with a similar development and employment of technology.

For instance, the Webb telescope, designed and manufactured on the cutting edge of optical technology, has led to the visual experience, albeit mediately, of more aspects of the universe, an experience that has also led to some reconsideration of fundamental ideas about the physical universe, including the Big Bang theory. While the Webb telescope is far more powerful than what Galileo employed, the main point still holds, namely, that the telescope opens up the field of study, both initially and subsequently. The very nature of how the universe began and expanded and the structure of its start and development are addressed in a new light on account of the aspects of the universe brought to our experience in and through the Webb telescope. Hence, what we see is that technological instruments such as telescopes are fundamental to the practice and theory of science. To give a quite bland but still pertinent example: lab instruments enable not merely the performance of important tests in, say, chemistry, but also the confirmation or disconfirmation of significant theories in that same branch of science. Thus, we see the innate and necessary connection between technology and science.

AI

Now that we have examined the paradigm case of optics, we can turn to a similarly paradigmatic case study of AI. In the past several years, there has been a seemingly unprecedented development of AI, but it remains difficult to define the phenomenon. AI has been defined as

software (and possibly also hardware) systems designed by humans that, given a complex goal, act in the physical or digital dimension by perceiving their environment through data acquisition, interpreting the collected structured or unstructured data, reasoning on the knowledge, or processing the information, derived from this data and deciding the best action(s) to take to achieve the given goal. AI systems can either use symbolic rules or learn a numeric model, and they can also adapt their behaviour by analysing how the environment is affected by their previous actions. (High-Level Expert Group, “A Definition of AI”)

AI is commonly categorized as either general (or strong) AI or narrow (or weak) AI. Artificial general intelligence (AGI) has as its goal “the understanding and simulation of all human intellectual skills” (Sheikh et al., “Artificial Intelligence”); however, “the current applications considered as AI . . . all fall under the heading ‘narrow’ or ‘weak’ AI. The AI that we are familiar with today focuses on specific skills, such as image or speech recognition, and has little to do with the full spectrum of human cognitive capabilities covered by AGI” (Sheikh et al., “Artificial Intelligence”). AI includes, quite saliently, the development of large language models such as generative pretrained transformers (GPT). Such technology is used in ChatGPT, Gemini, Microsoft Copilot, Claude, and others. With such and other related technology, AI seems to have the ability to grasp the workings of human language and, based on that grasp, then generate, somewhat autonomously, meaningful linguistic communication. This has proven useful for many commercial sectors, including automotive, banking and finance, healthcare and medicine, insurance, manufacturing, retail, and telecommunications (Finio, Downie, and Holdsworth, “The Most Valuable AI Use Cases for Business”). The capabilities of AI are even being used to find and mimic patterns in brain activity in an effort to discover how the human mind works (“AI Reveals How Brain Activity Unfolds Over Time,” Stanford University Human-Centered Artificial Intelligence website; and Sörensen, James, and Kar, “Hierarchical Optimization”). This phenomenon of AI raises interesting and important questions for the philosophy of technology, some of which I will address briefly.

Certain forms of computer technology are understood as “artificially intelligent” based, in part, on the famous Turing Test. Alan Turing, in the 1950s, addressed the issue of how and to what extent we could know that a machine, such as a computer, had indeed achieved intelligence. The term intelligence, as used here, refers to the human (or at least human-like) capacity to perform cognitive tasks such as thinking, learning, knowing, and reflecting. Moreover, an intelligent being, thus understood, is always able to perfect his thinking, learning, knowing, reflecting, and the like. Turing proposed the following “test” for precisely this question. First, a person would interact, in some meaningful way, with two entities, one a person, the other a computer. Moreover, the identities of both are hidden from the first, interrogating person. There is a proverbial screen of ignorance, such that the person cannot directly sense the entities in question. Hence, for example, he might, through typing on a computer, engage in a conversation with something or someone else. Further, said Turing, suppose that, as a result of this interaction, something about the responses during the conversation elicited from the interrogator a belief that this entity that responded seemed to be a person. If the entity were in fact a computer, and if it had sufficiently convinced its “interlocutor” that it was actually a person, the computer, in this case, would pass the Turing Test, such that we could meaningfully ascribe intelligence to it. If the behavior of the machine were of the same sort as the behavior of a person, then insofar as the latter was deemed intelligent, so, too, would be the former (Turing, “Computing Machinery and Intelligence”).

The main upshot of this vein of thought is that, insofar as a computer demonstrates clearly certain features seemingly indicative of human intelligence, then the logical conclusion is the supposition that the computer is “intelligent” or at least exercises something akin to, if not discernibly different from, human intelligence. Hence, the way in which something like ChatGPT can carry on a conversation in a seemingly normal human modality renders the computer technology apparently akin to intelligent human behavior. If this is the case, what would seem to follow is that we are currently engaging and interacting with programs that have intelligence. In that we humans, with our intelligence, have and employ agency, choice, awareness, and cognition, and in that AI computer programs seem to possess and exercise a similar sort of intelligence, then it follows that they would also have and employ agency, choice, awareness, and cognition. Hence, we might be approaching a situation in which AI programs are deemed to be entities with minds and ought to be interacted with according to their status as beings with such minds. Or even a situation in which such programs are, as minded, understood to possess something like dignity, and hence there would be ethical considerations concerned with their proper treatment.  

Such a vein of thought of course leads to serious worries about a future in which, for example, self-conscious computers break free from their initial programming and act on their own, either for or against the benefit of humanity, but do so in a self-generated manner. Scenarios akin to the cinematic tales in The Terminator or The Matrix have thus become somewhat plausible and not merely fantastical. But even if we bracket such intense worries, more mundane ones arise, such as computer programs having sufficient mindedness to take over most human jobs, to be in charge of numerous tasks, and to operate independently of human oversight. Hence, a whole and seemingly increasing set of worries is now very much on the table pursuant to the development and use of AI technology (see Coeckelbergh, AI Ethics).

Nonetheless, as we reflect more critically on AI, we might see that such worries are perhaps unfounded and that, in the end, computer programs, appearances aside, might not even actually have and exercise anything like intelligence in the first place. John Searle has demonstrated rather conclusively, some believe, that programs imitating human intelligence cannot, merely on account of that similarity of imitation, be thought of as possessing understanding or intelligence. Per his imagined scenario, in his own words:

Suppose that I'm locked in a room and given a large batch of Chinese writing. Suppose furthermore (as is indeed the case) that I know no Chinese, either written or spoken . . . To me, Chinese writing is just so many meaningless squiggles. Now suppose further that after this first batch of Chinese writing I am given a second batch of Chinese script together with a set of rules for correlating the second batch with the first batch. The rules are in English, and I understand these rules . . . They enable me to correlate one set of formal symbols with another set of formal symbols, and all that “formal” means here is that I can identify the symbols entirely by their shapes. Now suppose also that I am given a third batch of Chinese symbols together with some instructions, again in English, that enable me to correlate elements of this third batch with the first two batches, and these rules instruct me how to give back certain Chinese symbols with certain sorts of shapes in response to certain sorts of shapes given me in the third batch. Unknown to me, the people who are giving me all of these symbols call the first batch "a script," they call the second batch a “story” and they call the third batch “questions.” Furthermore, they call the symbols I give them back in response to the third batch “answers to the questions,” and the set of rules in English that they gave me, they call “the program” (Searle, “Minds, Brains, and Programs,” 417–18).

Hence, for those outside the room, the following seems to have taken place: a story, written in Chinese, was given to someone inside the room, as were questions about that story. Then, in response to such questions, answers were given, again in Chinese, which answers were entirely correct. It would thus appear, for such outside observers, that the person inside the room understood Chinese. However, that appearance is actually deceptive. In the end, the person is merely following instructions or programs, by means of which he can recognize certain patterns and, based on that recognition, then produce “responses,” which, unbeknownst to him, are answers to questions. The person does not know the meaning of the words he is being given. In fact, he does not even know that they are in the Chinese language. He does not know the context or significance of the story. He does not know that the subsequent batches of symbols are questions. He does not know that the batches he then gives back are answers. In this respect, he has no idea that he is linguistically acting in an ostensibly meaningful manner. His total incomprehension, however, is covered over by the apparent exercise of intelligence. Thus, and analogously, a programmed computer, which is programmed to perform similar formal and pattern-recognition tasks and does in fact perform such tasks, still lacks all understanding of what is being asked, has no sense of the meaning of what is being asked, and is unable to have or express anything like comprehension. It merely carries out, on account of its programming, an interaction with and manipulation of symbols, the meaning and significance of which are completely unavailable for the computer. Thus, from Searle’s perspective, it is meaningless to ascribe anything like intelligence to computer programs, even ones such as AI.

According to Searle, then, it seems to be the case that AI performs a set of algorithmic and formal pattern recognitions; it is programmed to fill in the next most likely thing in the particular context in which it is being used, albeit absent any comprehension of the meaning or significance of this context or what obtains within it. In this respect, AI is not essentially different from the autofill feature in text messages. Granted, the scope of what AI can draw from is much larger and more complex, given its ability to get and make use of data from the internet, and the speed with which it does so is amazing. Moreover, the contexts in which it can be used and the variety of tasks it can accomplish are stunning: it can pen a song about Medieval philosophers, draw a painting in the style of Rembrandt, write prescriptions for a doctor and assist with the diagnosis of a patient, formulate a movie plot, and condense, seemingly instantaneously, pertinent information about a Google search. All these and more attest to rather incredible technological capabilities far beyond what preceded them. However, such a quantitative increase does not (and in principle cannot) bridge the qualitative distinction between the exercise of non-minded tools, such as computers, and the minded activity of human beings. As was shown with Searle’s imagined scenario, understanding as exercised by, for instance, a speaker of a certain language is qualitatively and radically distinct from the programmed manipulation of meaningless symbols. A proverbial abyss obtains between those two.

Hubert Dreyfus also offers reasons to doubt the possibility of genuine Artificial Intelligence, especially the sort that could exercise awareness, agency, deliberation, and cognition. Human intelligence, says Dreyfus, is often exercised in a manner that does not lend itself toward ready or easy formulation according to a specific and articulate set of rules. Dreyfus employs numerous examples of this fact, such as riding a bike or playing speed chess. In such instances, we have and exercise profound expertise and skill, the sort of expertise and skill that results, more often than not, in the performance of precisely the proper activity toward the achievement of the best outcome. But, says Dreyfus, the way in which we acquired such skill, the manner in which we developed it to the point of something like mastery, and the actual enactment of it in a given situation all unfold for us rather intuitively, sometimes indirectly, and likely informally. We do not operate in a robotic manner, following a set formulaic recipe, which can be repeated and reiterated. Instead, we form particular and adaptive habits and patterns of actions, sometimes without even knowing that we are doing so or recognizing how far we have developed them. We exercise such habits, or skills, in the right way for the right outcome, although we cannot subsequently articulate why and how we did so. There is constant and necessary fluidity to our human intelligence and its enactment. Nor, in the enactment of such intelligent and skillful response, do we operate with a prefabricated model or framework that has been implanted in our mind and that explicitly guides and regulates our behavior, serving as a mediator between us and the world. Rather, our intelligence is exercised as we are directly, personally, and experientially involved and caught up in the world around us. In this manner, we neither possess nor implement anything like a program. In addition, we, in exercising intelligent behavior, do so because we care: we care about the outcome of the activity, and we care about ourselves and others involved in the activity. We are not and really cannot be disinterested in the enactment of our human intelligence. Affectivity and emotionality, as well as desires and goals, are integral aspects of how we come to know and how we carry out that knowledge in practice. “The human world [in and by means of which we exercise our human intelligence], then, is prestructured in terms of human purposes and concerns, . . . [which] cannot be matched by a computer” (Dreyfus, What Computers Still Can’t Do, 261).  Our lived, caring, embodied, and invested way of being in the world, radically and qualitatively distinct from what computers do, indicates the fact that computers do not and likely cannot exercise anything akin to human intelligence (see Dreyfus, “Alchemy and Artificial Intelligence” and “Why Heideggerian AI Failed”; and Dreyfus & Dreyfus, “Peripheral Vision”).

Yet there may still be important worries that attend the development of AI technology: When we perform activities such as writing, we, in a basic and necessary way, practice profoundly important human characteristics such as agency, deliberation, responsibility, freedom, creativity, articulation, reflection, understanding, and learning. Indeed, our very way of thinking, qua human, is tied to our writing and vice versa. According to George Orwell, thinking and writing go hand in hand, such that a diminution or perversion of the one will result in a similar diminution or perversion of the other (Orwell, “Politics and the English Language,” 253). We undermine our human minds when we outsource our writing to AI. Hence, the pressing concern is not that AI will, on its own and per se, have and exercise something like a human mind. Rather, the concern is that, by outsourcing our mental activities to AI, we will weaken our own human mental acuity and capacity, thus harming a fundamental constituent of our human nature. In that AI might lead to a decreased capacity to formulate, articulate, and express our own thoughts, then we see a significant and important worry attached to this form of technology.

Indeed, a similar argument could be made about the seemingly more benign case of self-driving vehicles. One of the fundamental aspects of human driving is that the driver must be a responsible person, able to take ownership of his actions and the consequences of his actions. Thus, driving always rests, in a foundational manner, on the free and responsible agency of human persons. Nonetheless, in the case of self-driving vehicles, that obvious and ongoing sense of responsibility becomes blurred if not compromised. The direct, conscious, and responsible agency of human persons is shifted to the background, as it were.

Dr. Matthew Crawford, during an interview discussing his book Why We Drive: Toward a Philosophy of the Open Road, notes that, with self-driving cars, “the demands of skill and competence give way to a promise of safety and convenience” (Matthew Crawford, interview, at 20:35). As Crawford points out, driving is an integral, though obviously risky and potentially dangerous, activity of contemporary humanity. Indeed, thinks Crawford, driving well in the midst of such potential danger is based on and further refines “habits and dispositions” constitutive of human flourishing, such as agency, adaptability, and heightened and contextually responsive awareness (Matthew Crawford, interview, at 16:55). Such habits and skills, however, could be undermined with the advent and expansion of driverless cars: “our skills atrophy from lack of use” (Matthew Crawford, interview, at 21:00). This leads to concerns for a future in which the predominance of such vehicles might weaken our capacity, as a society, to foster the sort of conscious self-accountability that could arise from learning and exercising the skill of driving. In short, thinking in the vein of Crawford, we see the possibility that perhaps driverless cars are a feature of a technological horizon in which and according to which, for the sake of ostensive safety and convenience, we become less obligated (or even perhaps inclined) to exercise such things as self-governance and intelligent responsibility, risking, thereby, a diminution of our own humanity.

III. Implications for the Study of Human Nature, Ethics, and Metaphysics

At this juncture, we can pause and reflect on what has been brought to light concerning technology, especially as philosophically analyzed and discussed. More exactly, what sort of anthropological, ethical, and metaphysical implications stand out based on such an analysis and discussion?

Human Nature

As should be clear, the philosophy of technology, in its articulation of the reality, meaning, and use of technology, constantly touches on issues germane to human nature. One immediate such relevant consideration involves our human rationality. After all, in designing, planning, fabricating, using, and improving technological tools, we go beyond what animals do. The twigs collected by a bird for its nest are not intentionally designed artifacts. Nor indeed are the stones used by apes in the performance of various tasks. The presence and employment of tools indicate a set of cognitive capacities particular to human nature. As Hans Jonas says, the “free nature of tool creation,” resting on the human ability to think and reflect abstractly, is not found in animals, who lack such freedom and capacity for abstraction and reflection (Jonas, Mortality and Morality, 79). Philosophical consideration of tools (i.e., technological equipment) thus allows us to shed light on the meaning and significance of human nature. At first glance, what we see is that the classical sense of humans as rational animals (Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics, I.7) is brought to the fore by a reflection on the reality of technology.

After all, the rational aspect of our human nature is salient precisely because technology is necessarily based in heightened consciousness. Only by being able to separate ourselves from immediate needs and surroundings, only by being able to consider possible, not-yet-existing entities, can we humans contemplate more exactly both what it is that we must or would like to accomplish and the most effective means for doing so. Our human-specific rationality allows us to see what might be in the future and how best to realize that set of possibilities. It also allows us to analyze, critique, and possibly reconsider what we are doing, even while performing a given action, such that, in terms of technology, we can, if need be, recalibrate the design and fabrication of our tools. As Rousseau pointed out, the human drive toward improvement and augmentation of our human condition, what he called “self-perfection,” is tied to our human rationality and awareness, our capacity for “enlightenment and errors” (Rousseau, Discourse on the Origin of Inequality, 25–26). Moreover, this same capacity leads, he thought, to the development and improvement of equipment and tools and the work associated with these. “The more the mind was enlightened, the more industry was perfected” (Rousseau, Discourse on the Origin of Inequality, 47). Thus, as we reflect on the development, increase, improvement, and widespread use of technology, what comes to light is the human capacity for rationality that is an essential, necessary, and fundamental cause of precisely such technology.

But it is not merely our rationality that comes to light in view of technology; it is also and just as importantly our animality or physicality. After all, most of our technological equipment, especially in the past, was oriented toward providing our basic, that is to say, material, human needs. According to Rousseau, as we humans “became more industrious, . . . [we] began . . . cultivating some vegetables or roots,” an incipient agriculture that led eventually to widescale farming and the distribution of land and labor (Rousseau, Discourse on the Origin of Inequality, 52). Agriculture was developed and employed precisely in order that humans could acquire sufficient food to survive. This connection with our physical nature is still the case for much of our technology even today: refrigerators for storing food or stoves for keeping us warm. Even more advanced and complex forms of technology, say, cars and computers, insofar as they play pivotal roles in the accomplishment of tasks that help us survive, connect, albeit indirectly, with our animality and the basic needs constitutive of that animal and mortal nature. After all, it is by driving to work in a car that I obtain the money necessary to purchase the items requisite for my physical survival. The corporeal and embodied aspect of human nature is thrown into relief as we reflect on technology.

Nonetheless, there is a vein of thought in the philosophy of technology that sees technology as a means of transcending our human corporeality. I refer here to the transhumanist movement. First and foremost, this movement aspires toward the possibility of melding humans and computers as the next (potentially inevitable) step in evolution. Its proponents foresee and work toward a future in which there might be no distinguishable difference between humans and computers. They refer to such a point in time as the “singularity.” In such a case, computers will have developed to become indistinguishable from humans and vice versa. In such a future, moreover, human consciousness can be stored in machines, thus freeing us from the limitations and problems associated with the body. Such physical things that could be overcome with this computerized version of humanity would include bodily disease, illness, weakness, and even death. Hence, transhumanism aspires toward the possibility that, through this merging of humanity and computer technology, humans might, in this new computer-like state, achieve immortality. There is also the hope that, again as a result of this merging, all sorts of social problems and issues can be eradicated, such that a utopian existence can be achieved for mankind. We will, in this manner, be freed from difficult, demanding, and dangerous tasks and thereby be granted the opportunity to pursue other interests and desires in a state of heightened and liberated consciousness, not bound by the ostensible shackles of human corporeal existence. Just as humanity, via technology, strives to venture even farther into the universe (think of the attempt to get to Mars), so, analogously, humanity could, via technology, push ever higher into the metaphorical heavens, transcending our usual condition and achieving a potentially god-like status (see Kurzweil, The Age of Spiritual Machines).

However, doing so would mean disregarding and attempting to erase the boundaries and conditions that situate us, fundamentally and essentially, as human creatures. Consider the following from Hans Jonas. He posited that humanity becomes most fully itself by working wisely and well within natural limits rather than trying to transcend them. It is precisely our mortality that allows and inspires us to “number our days and make them count” (Jonas, Mortality and Morality, 98). Moreover, Jonas saw the state of embodiment as central to humanity. As we just noted, he defended the essential importance of mortality for humanity. Yet, “the adjective ‘mortal’ in particular calls attention to the existence of the body with all its crass and demanding materiality” (Jonas, Mortality and Morality, 42). Hence, for Jonas, man, as essentially mortal, is an embodied existent, and humans, as essentially embodied and mortal, should not follow the utopian dreams of technology. “In the end, the principle of responsibility thus joins the principle of hope—no longer an extravagant hope for an earthly paradise but a more modest hope that the earth may continue to be habitable and may permit our race an existence worthy of it” (Jonas, Memoirs, 252). Thus, in contradistinction to transhumanism, Jonas believed that “the real, true, and worthy transcendence for man consists in free and reasoned self-giving sacrifice for the good, even in the face of suffering and death” (Lundberg, “Hans Jonas on Mathematics, Technology, and Human Nature,” 85).

Ethics

Technology is deeply connected to ethics. Deborah Johnson, one of the pioneers in the field of computer ethics, notes:

As a result of technology, we can travel, work, keep records, be entertained, communicate, and engage in warfare in new ways. When we engage in these activities using . . . technology, our actions have different properties, properties that may change the character of the activity . . .  Technology creates new possibilities for human action and this means that human beings face ethical questions they never faced before. Should we develop biological weapons and risk a biological war? Should I give my organs for transplantation? (Johnson, “Computer Ethics,” 66–67)

An obvious example of this connection between technology and ethics concerns transportation. Numerous means of contemporary transportation—cars, airplanes, and ships—by using fossil fuels cause an increase in gases such as carbon dioxide, which contribute to the so-called greenhouse effect and the concurrent increase in the temperature across the globe. In light of this fact, as the philosophy of technology addresses the driving equipment developed and employed in the contemporary world, it also and simultaneously will have to look at the environmental repercussions of such technology. But such repercussions have, of course, a decidedly ethical component (Jonas, The Imperative of Responsibility, 6–7). That is, the possible destruction of the environment, as a result of factors such as greenhouse gas emissions, would mean the loss of something that has immense and perhaps immeasurable value. The environment could be seen as intrinsically valuable, a reality that, per se, is basically good and that, therefore, ought not be seriously harmed or destroyed (Leopold, A Sand County Almanac, 240–241, 261–64). Or the argument from ethics could be made that the environment is instrumentally good, insofar as it is necessary for the continued existence and flourishing of human persons, who are intrinsically good (Baxter, “People or Penguins,” 229–30). In either view, however, the possibility of significant harm to or destruction of an ecosystem or environment is a weighty ethical issue. To give a brief example, the development of electric cars, which might help in the decrease of greenhouse gas emissions and the resultant possibility of environmental harm or destruction, is not merely a technological development but is also one with a potentially important ethical significance. This is not to assert that such cars, in fact, play an important and salient role in the decrease of greenhouse gases and that they, therefore, are ethically superior to other forms of transportation. Instead, the main point is that insofar as various forms of technology, in their production and employment, affect the surrounding environment in different ways and to differing degrees, then the philosophical perspectives on such technology must be concerned also with the associated ethical implications.

Shifting gears to computer technology, we see a different but still important ethical implication of contemporary technology: How should we, as human persons, treat and respond to ourselves and to each other via the internet, through social media, and in virtual spaces? Obvious cases of ethical misconduct in the sphere of computer technology include, of course, online- or cyber-bullying, anonymous trolling, derogatory comments, cancel culture, doxing, phishing, and the like. A deeper issue, one potentially underlying these common phenomena, is that the manner in which we use and interact with computer technology works against the possibility of encountering others and ourselves as persons. In social media, for example, I can hide behind an apparent cloak of anonymity, not wanting to present myself, as such. In the same way, I can take others online as mere personas or online presences, rather than as persons with whom I am communicating. Absent seeing and responding to the face of the other person, absent some sort of in-person and direct encounter, I might be led to relate to that online presence in and of itself. Hence, basic and usual norms governing interpersonal communication might be forgotten or left aside, insofar as I feel myself, via my own online presence, merely reacting against a screen name or “tweet.” The sense of the person as a being with innate and intrinsic value, a being who must always be respected and honored as such, might, it seems, become somewhat blurred, if not lost, as we engage more and more with others online. After all, as Kant says, it is the recognition of the person that leads me to treat him as an end in himself and never merely as a means (Kant, Grounding for the Metaphysics of Morals, 35–36). However, while online, if I do not, at least for the most part, sense myself interacting with persons—if I am not led to be conscious of their feelings, thoughts, emotions, and especially their inherent dignity—then I can more readily fall into the unethical behavior noted above. In sum, the virtual world of computer technology, insofar as it militates against encountering other persons as such, seems to pose particular and pressing ethical concerns in our world today (see Johnson, “Computer Ethics”).

Another ethical issue is that contemporary computer technology might in some ways foster impatience. The internet, for instance, provides a seemingly instantaneous response to numerous and various questions. It also provides the opportunity to access information immediately and learn all sorts of facts, previously off the proverbial radar. Someone can also find and watch almost any TV show or movie he wants, and he can do so without any significant wait or interruption. Of course, there is something amazing about such technology, which affords interesting and significant opportunities. One possible worry, however, is that such instantaneousness will undermine our capacity to wait patiently for the slow development of things in their proper time and place. A good conversation, for instance, grows only in its own way and in its own time, something conversationalists must continuously respect and work with. They must patiently await the growth and flourishing of the discussion, perhaps even regardless of the time frame they had imagined for it. Nonetheless, the sort of natural patience that is ingredient to our interaction with things like conversations might be undermined, forgotten, jettisoned, or weakened in light of an increased and possibly excessive interaction with computer technology. Do I become less patient in general because, in some respects, I get used to the instantaneous gratification afforded by contemporary technology? Not that such gratification is bad per se or should be avoided. Instead, the concern is that the habits of the person involved might be malformed if such instantaneousness unduly influences his sense of things and generates in him a pattern of thought and activity unsuited to waiting, for slowing down, for being with the other until the proper time. After all, as Aquinas says, “patience is said to be the root and safeguard of all the virtues” (ST II-II, q. 136, a. 2).

Metaphysics 

An immediate metaphysical implication of technology, one that we have already seen in brief, concerns the drawing of proper distinctions. First of all, in our age of contemporary technology, we are led sometimes to disregard or blur the divide between humanity and tools, between human nature and what is artificial. As we have seen, transhumanism attests to this blurring, but so do the veins of thought that see AI as human-like. The ubiquity and intensity of current technology, its amazing and unprecedented capabilities, might lead to a failure to distinguish properly between humans and technological equipment. A recent essay on technology expresses precisely this sort of failure: “Humans are always interested in distinguishing natural and artificial entities although there is no sharp demarcation between the two categories” (Borgo et al., “Technical Artifacts,” 217). It might also be the case, as we saw above with transhumanism, that certain technological developments will lead to a blurring of the proper lines between the divine and the creaturely. That is, some future technology might present the possibility that humans achieve a “god-like” status, thus potentially rendering the divine in our image, rather than the other way around.

Another metaphysical implication pertains to the topic of how we come to an awareness of and insight into being.

To be a good metaphysician, at least in the Thomistic tradition, one must move beyond the merely abstract understanding of the meaning of being toward an existential “awakening” to experience what actual existence means in the concrete for the whole person—mind, heart, imagination, feeling, all together. In the light of this intuitive experience one can then take reflective possession of its meaning, generalize it to the whole realm of actual existents, and develop it into the fully explicit metaphysical understanding of being as that which is. (Clarke, The One and the Many, 28)

Thus, metaphysics, as a profound seeing into and articulation of being qua being, ought to commence with some stirring encounter with being. How and where we start metaphysical inquiry is of primary and ongoing importance. Moreover, as Heidegger touched on, we can begin to understand being only by analyzing particular entities in their being (Heidegger, Being and Time, 26). In brief, then, metaphysics ought to be enacted by means of a personal encounter with the depth and meaning of being, which can occur only when the being of a specific something is present, and saliently so, such that it can be encountered and even reflected on, which reflection is both the start and ongoing task of metaphysics. Norris Clarke posited that it is the human person who can best serve as this paradigmatic being—this being that, for the metaphysician, serves as an initial and ongoing prime example that informs his sense of the very meaning of being and how and in what ways it can and should be articulated—able to bring being to initial and intelligible light (Clarke, The One and the Many, 36–37). Hans Jonas, from a different perspective, posited that it was organisms, as such, that could serve as a metaphysical paradigm (Jonas, Memoirs, 198).

Nonetheless, as we noted earlier, our horizon of experience is structured, colored, informed, and deeply influenced by contemporary technology. That which we often sense, interact with, and come to know is some form of technological equipment. How we experience things to be, in their existence and meaning, is often formed by our prior and constant experience of technology. All of which, consequently, might have significant implications on the practice and theory of metaphysics. The easy “temptation,” we might say, is to take artifacts as ontologically paradigmatic, precisely because they are so available, so readily intelligible, and, in their status as technological, so much of a piece with how we grasp the world. “The world of artifacts may make philosophic reflection impossible when it assumes an absolute ontological status. . . . The purpose of electric light is to help humans see, [but] when it comes to blind them to the world around them, it becomes counterproductive” (Kohák, The Embers and the Stars, 24). In essence, then, metaphysics is implicated in technology, especially insofar as the very manner in which and according to which we might commence and then continue with our metaphysical theorizing is informed by the frame of technology that structures our mode of experience today. The task for metaphysics today is to avoid defaulting to a technological sense of things and instead return to a deeper and more personal awareness of other persons and the beings of the natural world. By bracketing off this default technological sense of things, what might be opened up is an ever expanding and ever more profound encounter with “the dearest freshness, deep down things” (Gerard Manley Hopkins, “God’s Grandeur”).

IV. Catholic Perspective on the Philosophy of Technology

As a concluding set of reflections, we can think about the philosophy of technology according to particular themes pertinent to Catholic theology. Of course, numerous facets of technology that pertain to Catholic theology have already come to light—for instance, technology and human nature and the need for human nature with its technology to operate within the bounds of creatureliness, or the ethical implications of current technology, such as the effect computer technology might have on the development and growth of virtues like patience. Nonetheless, there are a few particularly important notions from Catholic theology to discuss in relation to technology.

The first is that technology, from the perspective of Catholic theology, is seen as foundationally good and necessary:

Basic scientific research, as well as applied research, is a significant expression of man's dominion over creation. Science and technology are precious resources when placed at the service of man and promote his integral development for the benefit of all . . . Science and technology are ordered to man, from whom they take their origin and development; hence they find in the person and in his moral values both evidence of their purpose and awareness of their limits (CCC, 2293).

Human persons, composed of body, mind, and spirit, must honor each of these aspects of their human nature, in a manner that fosters the flourishing of each and in turn the flourishing of persons, both individually and collectively. This means, as well, that we humans, theologically understood, are called to live well on earth in a way that fulfills the divine purpose and providence that brought us into being and continues to guide us to the fulfillment of our being (John Paul II, "Address to Scientists and Representatives of the United Nations University," February 25, 1981). In order for us to do so, however, we need to acquire and make use of the goods of the earth, and the fruits of God’s creation become available to us often and mainly through our labor and our tools of technology. Viewed theologically, technology is an integral aspect of the human condition, even in our prelapsarian state. Consider what God says in Genesis chapters 1 and 2: humans are tasked with being stewards of God’s creation and with the cultivation of the land. Such tasks, however, require particular tools—technological equipment—by means of which man’s stewardship and cultivation can be achieved. Even something as basic and simple as wood reshaped to prepare the soil for seeds or to poke holes in the ground into which seeds can be placed qualifies as a piece of technological equipment. Thus, this tilling of the soil in the Garden of Eden would, we might assume, occur by means of technological tools. Granted, the need for more and better equipment increased after the sin of Adam and Eve. Laboring by the “sweat of their brow,” humans had to work harder and longer in order to yield the basic necessities of life (Genesis, ch. 3); thus they needed improved technology. All of this to say, as we, from a Catholic vantage point, reflect philosophically on technology, we see immediately its fundamental and ongoing intertwinement with human existence. Even in the Garden of Eden, whose soil was meant to be cultivated, there was a calling to perform, by means of technology, the sort of labor that helped foster and make available the fruits of creation.

But also, and perhaps more importantly, human beings, as made in the image and likeness of God, are called to exercise our intelligence, will, and consciousness in creative and life-serving enterprises. We are called to creatively participate in the unfolding of the universe, doing so to lift the universe back up to God:

Man’s self-development and self-expression through matter, with technology as his instrument, now appear not just as the satisfaction of some egoistic drive for power and self-affirmation, but as the fulfilling of a much higher and more sacred vocation, the God-given vocation to authentic self-realization as the image of God his Creator. The material world which is to be the object of man’s technological domination is now seen not as some hostile or indifferent power that man has tamed by his own prowess. . . . It is rather both a loving gift and a sacred trust to be used well as its Giver intended, with a sense of responsibility and stewardship to be accounted for (Clarke, “Technology and Man,” 427).

After all, the range of human creativity—enterprises such as agriculture, medicine, art, literature, and philosophy; ways of life such as monastic, married, and priestly; and modes of relating such as loving, kind, compassionate, and selfless—are caught up in our labor and hence our human technology. For instance, facilitating the return to health for an ill person, the central task of medicine, requires many tools of technology. Living out the monastic vocation means enacting prayer and work, which entail the use of books (technology), writing instruments (technology), and a building in which to live (technology). Or reaching out in compassion to a grieving friend can be done through a well-timed phone call, that is, through the use of communication technology. Our foundational survival as well as our growth as human beings—especially our spiritual growth, which presumes that survival—thus require the presence and operation of numerous and various tools of technology.

What we also see here is that technology, from the vantage point of Catholic theology, is seen as a necessary but still instrumental aspect of human life and never as a full end in itself. There should always be some definite and real human good in play when we consider whether and how to develop and implement new forms of technology. Technological novelty or improvement, per se, is never a sufficient reason to bring about such technology (John Paul II, "Address to Scientists and Representatives of the United Nations University," February 25, 1981). In other words, even the augmentation of ease or the possibility of greater access to and dissemination of information, from the perspective of Catholic theology, should not be the ultimate goals of technology. In fact, it might be problematic to pursue goals of this kind, insofar as doing so might harm the common good of human beings together. For instance, dissemination of information can publicize a person’s so-called dirty laundry, subjecting that person to public shame and humiliation, a process, moreover, that often does not move readily toward the possibility of forgiveness and redemption. In short: technology must always be “subordinated to the total good of man,” that is, our good, individually and communally, as persons made in God’s image who are meant to participate in and lift up God’s creation through conscious, free, and creative acts of love, kindness, and worship of God (Clarke, “Technology and Man,” 423).

The theme of good is likewise pertinent. The Catechism of the Catholic Church tells us: “In the beginning God entrusted the earth and its resources to the common stewardship of mankind to take care of them, master them by labor, and enjoy their fruits. The goods of creation are destined for the whole human race. . . . The universal destination of goods remains primordial” (CCC, 2402–3). The Church calls for the universal diffusion and availability of the goods of creation, in a manner that can foster human survival and flourishing for everyone, without exception. Hence, technology, as a necessary aspect of the labor that constitutes the aforesaid stewardship, mastery, and enjoyment, is oriented, in a basic and necessary sense, toward the universal sharing of the goods of creation. This notion of the universal destination of goods consequently provides, as it were, an ongoing theological litmus test for existing and new technologies: Are they such as to work for or against this universal destination? To what extent, and in what ways, do they help with or militate against that universal destination? In other words, from the perspective of Catholic theology, human labor, which involves the development and use of technology, is also caught up in helping to ensure that every single human person, made in God’s image, can enjoy the fruits of His creation, implying, thereby, the concurrent necessity for technology to be oriented likewise. Deviation from that direction indicates a fundamental and perhaps irreparable problem with a particular form of technology.

Nonetheless, as the teaching on original sin makes clear, such deviation is a constant and recurring temptation in our human relationship to technology. In the classical understanding, original sin resulted in the darkening of the mind, weakening of the will, and the disordering of the passions. We, as fallen, often do not see clearly, choose wisely, or feel properly in the various facets of human existence, including, of course, technology. Indeed, the possibility of significant development, unprecedented mastery over nature, profound control over things, and ease and luxury of life—all of which and more appear as potentialities on the horizon of technology—make technology an arena of human life in which the effects of original sin can be played out deeply and destructively. The promises of technological advancement mean that the worse and fallen aspects of human nature can readily become invested in such technology, pursuing pride and power in an unrestricted manner. 

What we see here, as well, is that the Tower of Babel offers a continuous warning about and check against an unfettered drive of technological development and discovery. The attempt to “make a name for ourselves” by constructing a tower into heaven shows the ongoing danger of humanity’s attempting to transcend our creaturely status and take on a God-like status (Genesis, ch. 11). Robert Oppenheimer, after the development of the atomic bomb, was seen as a modern-day Prometheus who stole power from the gods. This metaphor touches on a deep issue, however: that sort of grasp over nature, achieved through amazing technology, might—on account of our finite understanding, our weakened wills, and our disordered passions—actually be too much for us humans to be able to handle well and properly. Consider what Pope Francis stated:

Never has humanity had such power over itself [because of modern technology], yet nothing ensures that it will be used wisely, particularly when we consider how it is currently being used. We need but think of the nuclear bomb dropped in the middle of the twentieth century, or the array of technology which Nazism, Communism, and other totalitarian regimes have employed to kill millions of people, to say nothing of the deadly arsenal of weapons available for modern warfare (Francis, <em>Laudato si’</em>, 69).

All of which is to say: given our postlapsarian human nature, it is important to limit the extent of what we try to achieve technologically. We seem to be called to respect the set and significant boundaries germane to our human nature. When technology fails to acknowledge and respect such boundaries, or attempts to act regardless of them, it is a significant red flag.

A related red flag, also articulated by Pope Francis, concerns the aforementioned notion of the horizon of technology. Here, we have in mind what Pope Francis called “an undifferentiated and one-dimensional paradigm . . . [which] exalts the subject who, using logical and rational procedures, progressively approaches and gains control over an external object” (Francis, Laudato si’, 70–71). Within such a paradigm, we humans might consider ourselves as divorced from nature and able to make unlimited and unconstrained use of that same nature and its resources. We do not deem ourselves a part of or caught up in nature but rather see it as an extrinsic object over which we can exercise mastery and which seems to have little or no intrinsic value as such. This exaggerated sense of the subject-object relation, moreover, bleeds into and influences our social interactions and our mode of enacting economic practices. Pope Francis posited this paradigm as dominating many, if not most, aspects of contemporary life, as a result of which we are led toward what he termed a “throwaway culture,” in which certain beings, even human beings, are left aside, ignored, and devalued, precisely because they no longer serve the purpose of fulfilling the needs of the current culture (Francis, Laudato si’, 15). Hence, thought Pope Francis, we needed to expand and enrich our horizons so that we might see the larger, Christocentric picture of the universe, in which everyone and everything belonged, and nothing would be jettisoned in the name of technological progress (Francis, Laudato si’, 143–63).

This theme of Christocentrism provides a helpful way to close this reflection on the philosophy of technology. There is, from a Catholic perspective, a priestly character to technology that is worth mentioning at the end. The task of cultivating and bringing to greater perfection the fruits of God’s creation is not merely an anthropocentric activity. It is also, and perhaps more importantly, an activity of worship. We hear, in Psalm 24, “the earth is the Lord’s and all it holds, the world and those who dwell in it.” Every deed we do with technology that participates in the unfolding of the goods of creation, consequently, is done under the auspices of God, is done for His glory and not ours. It is, in this respect, an offering made back to God, from whom it originated. To lift up the goods of creation is a priestly sacrifice, a way of honoring and worshiping the God who brought them into being and who is their source and summit. To employ technology to cultivate such gifts, to use them well, to share them universally—all these and other related activities are a primary and ongoing way for humanity to worship God. Phrased metaphorically, the earth is akin to an altar on which, pursuant to human technological enterprise, are placed the cultivated goods of creation, brought to perfection as shared universally and as manifesting and pointing back to their Creator.