“Culture has become a system of defense against technics. This defense appears as a defense of man based on the assumption that technical objects contain no human reality. We should like to show that culture fails to take into account that there is a human reality in technical reality and that, if it is to fully play its role, culture must come to incorporate technical entities into its body of knowledge and its sense of values. Recognition of the modes of existence of technical objects should be the result of philosophical thought, which in this respect has to achieve what is analogous to the role it played in the abolition of slavery and in the affirmation of the value of the human person. The opposition established between culture and technology, between man and machine, is false and is not well-founded; what underlies it is mere ignorance or resentment. Behind the mask of a facile humanism it hides a reality that is rich in human efforts and natural forces, a reality that constitutes the world of technical objects, mediators between nature and man.”

—  Gilbert Simondon

Source: Du mode d'existence des object technique (1958), p. 1 (http://www.academia.edu/4184556)

Adopted from Wikiquote. Last update June 3, 2021. History

Help us to complete the source, original and additional information

Do you have more details about the quote "Culture has become a system of defense against technics. This defense appears as a defense of man based on the assumpti…" by Gilbert Simondon?
Gilbert Simondon photo
Gilbert Simondon 3
20th century French philosopher 1924–1989

Related quotes

“Instead of starting from the individuality of the technical object, or even from its specificity, which is very unstable, try to define the laws of its genesis in the framework of this individuality or specificity, it is better to invert the problem: it is from the criterion of the genesis that we can define the individuality and the specificity of the technical object: the technical object is not this or that thing, given hic et nunc but that which is generated.”

Gilbert Simondon (1924–1989) 20th century French philosopher

Du mode d'existence des object technique (1958)

Edsger W. Dijkstra photo

“We can found no scientific discipline, nor a hearty profession, on the technical mistakes of the Department of Defense and, mainly, one computer manufacturer.”

Edsger W. Dijkstra (1930–2002) Dutch computer scientist

1970s, How do we tell truths that might hurt? (1975)

Bruce Schneier photo

“Technical problems can be remediated. A dishonest corporate culture is much harder to fix.”

Bruce Schneier (1963) American computer scientist

Visa and Amex Drop CardSystems, Schneier, Bruce, 2005-08-15, Cryptogram newsletter, 2006-09-08 http://www.schneier.com/crypto-gram-0508.html#16,

Philippe Starck photo

“I try to rediscover why that object exists at all, and why one should take the trouble to reconsider It. I don't consider the technical or commercial parameters so much as the desire for a dream that humans have attempted to project onto an object.”

Philippe Starck (1949) French architect and industrial designer

Starck (1996) in: Graphis: International Journal for Graphic and Applied Art (1996) Vol 7; Vol 52. p. 7

Leonid Kantorovich photo

“A solution of newly appearing economic problems, and in particular those connected with the scientific-technical revolution often cannot be based on existing methods but needs new ideas and approaches. Such one is the problem of the protection of nature. The problem of economic valuation of technical innovations efficiency and rates of their spreading cannot be solved only by the long-term estimation of direct outcomes and results without accounting peculiarities of new industrial technology, its total contribution to technical progress.”

Leonid Kantorovich (1912–1986) Russian mathematician

"Mathematics in Economics: Achievements, Difficulties, Perspectives," 1975

José Baroja photo

“Without underestimating the virtues of technical, specialized and necessary education, we cannot accept an education that eliminates the other dimension of human knowledge, that which motivates us to be more cultured, more human, deeper, more emotional.”

José Baroja (1983) Chilean author and editor

Source: Perú Informa. Interview. https://www.peruinforma.com/entrevista-cultural-al-escritor-chileno-jose-baroja/

Vitruvius photo

“The fact is that pictures which are unlike reality ought not be approved, and even if they are technically fine, this is no reason why they should offhand be judged to be correct, if their subject is lacking in the principles of reality carried out with no violations.”

Vitruvius book De architectura

Source: De architectura (The Ten Books On Architecture) (~ 15BC), Book VII, Chapter V, Sec. 4

Jean-François Lyotard photo

“The body might be considered the hardware of the complex technical device that is human thought.”

Jean-François Lyotard (1924–1998) French philosopher

Source: Thought Without a Body? (1994), p. 291

Andrei Sakharov photo

“Three technical aspects of thermonuclear weapons have made thermonuclear war a peril to the very existence of humanity. These aspects are: the enormous destructive power of a thermonuclear explosion, the relative cheapness of rocket-thermonuclear weapons, and the practical impos­sibility of an effective defense against a massive rocket-nuclear attack.”

Andrei Sakharov (1921–1989) Soviet nuclear physicist and human rights activist

Progress, Coexistence and Intellectual Freedom (1968), Dangers, The Threat of Nuclear War

Ernesto Che Guevara photo

“The peasant must always be helped technically, economically, morally, and culturally. The guerrilla fighter will be a sort of guiding angel who has fallen into the zone, helping the poor always.”

Ernesto Che Guevara book Guerrilla Warfare

Source: Guerrilla Warfare (1961), Ch. II: 1. The Guerrilla Fighter: Social Reformer

Related topics