The Essence of Technology (p. 3 - 12)
In this section, Heidegger discusses the idea of questioning technology to be free. He concludes that the essence of technology is that it is a way of revealing.
Why should we question technology? (p. 3 - 4)
Questioning technology is a way of thinking which allows us to have a free relationship with it. Why do we want to have a free relationship with technology?
The reason is because a free relationship with technology will open our eyes to the true meaning of technology. To begin, let us examine what is the essence of technology is.
What is defined as the essence of a thing is the trait or quality which defines the thing. However, the essence is not the thing itself which can be encountered among all other things.
Similarly, the essence of technology is not all the technological things we see around in our daily lives. It is important to find out what the essence of technology is, as not knowing the essence of technology makes us unfree and chained to technology.
The least ideal viewpoint to take is to regard technology as something neutral, which most people do today. It makes us utterly blind to the essence of technology.
What is technology? (p. 4 - 5)
To begin our search for the essence of technology, let us begin with the current definition that most people agree with today:
technology is a means (instrumental definition of technology);
and a human activity (anthropological definition of technology).
This is known as the instrumental and anthropological definition of technology.
In the modern context, this definition is applicable - modern technology is a means to solve our own problems. Every technological solution depends on us manipulating technology in the proper manner. As such, many problems today such as pollution and overconsumption are attributed to our own mismanagement of technology.
The instrumental definition of technology is correct, but it does not uncover the essence of technology. Having the correct definition is not enough. We have to look deeper into instrumentality.
To understand more about the instrumental definition of technology, we have to look at causality.
The four causes (p. 6 - 7)
For centuries philosophy has taught there are four causes:
Cause
Description
Material cause (causa materialis)
The material; or matter out of which a thing is made
Formal cause (causa formalis)
The form; or shape into which a thing enters
Final cause (causa finalis)
The end; or accomplished state of a thing
Efficient cause (causa efficiens)
Brings about the finished thing
What technology is, when represented as a means, discloses itself when we trace instrumentality back to the four causes.
At this point, one may ask: When does the the word "cause" actually mean?
Cause (p. 7)
What we know as cause today stems from the Latin word causa and the verb cadere, which implies that the cause is the that which brings something about. What the ancients deemed as the cause is known by the Greeks as aition, that to which something else is indebted. In this framework, the efficient cause is not the most important cause. Rather, each of the four causes are equally co-responsible for the entity.
For a long time we have been accustomed to representing cause as that which brings something about. The causa efficiens, but one among the four causes, sets the standard for all causality. The four causes are ways of being responsible for something else.
How the Greeks understood the four causes (p. 8 - 9)
Cause
Description
Material cause (causa materialis)
The matter (hyle) co-responsible for the thing
Formal cause (causa formalis)
The aspect or eidos co-responsible for the thing
Final cause (causa finalis)
The telos, or the achievement of the desired thing and eidos of the thing which is co-responsible for the thing
Logos
Co-responsible for bringing together the other three causes, resulting in the appearance of the thing
The four causes are co-responsible for the thing that lies ready before us.
The four ways of being responsible bring something into appearance. They let it come forth into presencing. We can term the idea of starting something on its way into arrival as an “occasioning” or an “inducing to go forward”. The verb “to occasion” is the essence of causality thought as the Greeks thought it.
Bringing Forth (p. 10 - 11)
According to Plato in Symposium (line 205b), every occasion for whatever goes forward into presencing from that which is not presencing is poiēsis, is bringing-forth. It is important to note that bringing-forth is not only handcraft and artistic creation.
Physis also, the arising of something from out of itself, is a bringing-forth, poiēsis. An example is the blooming of a blossom.
In contrast, the creation of the silver chalice is an example of bringing-forth by another, in the craftsman or artist.
The effect of the four causes is thus bringing-forth.
But how does bringing-forth happen, be it in nature or in handwork or art? What is the bringing-forth in which the fourfold way of occasioning plays?
Occasioning has to do with the effect of something coming into appearance through bringing-forth. Bringing-forth brings out a thing from concealment to unconcealment (revealing).
Revealing (p. 11 - 12)
Another way we can express the idea of bringing-forth is the word “revealing”.
The Greeks have the world alētheia for revealing. The Romans translate this with veritas. We say “truth” and usually understand it as the correctness of an idea.
Every bringing-forth is grounded in revealing.
Bringing-forth gathers within itself the four modes of occasioning (causality) and rules them throughout.
Within the domain of causality belongs end and means, as well as instrumentality.
Instrumentality is considered to be the fundamental characteristic of technology.
If we inquire, step by step, into what technology, represented as means, actually is, then we shall arrive at revealing.
Technology is therefore no mere means. Technology is a way of revealing.
It is the realm of revealing, i.e. of truth.
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