Culture and Technology

This course is tailored for technology students eager to deepen their understanding of their field’s core principles through self-reflection and critical thinking in English. Students will be introduced to technology from a range of perspectives, including culture, philosophy, society, and even religion.

Topics explored will include: the influence of culture on technological discoveries and their use; the implications of how techniques are used, misused, or abused on our way of life and the environment; whether understanding and knowledge built on mechanistic problem-solving, means-ends reasoning, and verifiability are always the most effective forms of thought; the extent to which technological achievements reflect the laws of nature; and whether technological progress inevitably leads to the creation of virtual worlds – and how risky that might be.

Topics

1. The nature of science and technology

2. Science, techniques and culture

3. Philosophy and technology   

4. Human beings and mass society 

5. Society and technology 

6. Nature and technology 

7. Mind and machines

8. Reality and virtuality 

Texts 

Teaching About Technology: An Introduction to the Philosophy of Technology for Non-Philosophers, by Marc J. De Vries (2005)

The Question Concerning Technology, by Martin Heidegger (1954)

Man against Mass Society, by Gabriel Marcel (1962)

The Technological Society, by Jacques Ellul (1964)

Mind over Machine, by Hubert Dreyfus (1986)

The Metaphysics of Virtual Reality, by Michael Heim (1994)