Ethics in Technology: a Philosophical Study

Excerpt

There are not many books that try to combine the broad concerns of philosophy of technology—looking at the broad cultural, social and historical significance of technology for human life—and attention to ethical issues raised by technological innovations and how these latter challenge the assumptions and approach of mainstream ethics and political philosophy. Heikkerö’s book is therefore a welcome attempt that tries to fill this gap and asks the very important question ‘how to think about [normative] ethics in a technological world’ (p. 2). He tackles the job with a mixed strategy: he both raises (and later addresses) some theoretical and practical questions, and he offers fairly in-depth reconstructions of the work of three major thinkers. The philosophers selected for in-depth analysis are Hans Jonas, Albert Borgmann and Larry Hickman, because they have not only taken seriously the ethical challenges posed by the ascent of technoscience, but also cast these issues into a broader discussion of how technology has transformed the human condition. This transformation is both an alteration of the material world and of the way in which human beings experience the world. Then Heikkerö goes back to his initial questions and (largely drawing from his three thinkers of choice and partly developing his own insights and criticism of the three philosophers) he draws conclusions and proposes solutions. Before describing a little more in detail the content of the book, let me make some general remarks about its strategy and structure. I think that writing ambitious and broad ranging books is worthwhile even though it brings with it risks, and forces authors to make choices open to challenges and criticism. Questions of framing, selection, method and accuracy of the details and empirical grounding are always bound to emerge. Every opinionated reader or reviewer would have written a different book, but until they actually write it and give us something actually superior, it cannot be seriously argued that their preference is better than the existing book. So I will not question Heikkerö’s approach, because it seems sensible enough and has produced a timely and needed book. Other perspectives and guiding questions could inspire alternative takes on this important topic, and I hope that Heikkerö’s book could be seen as an encouragement to take up the challenge and write such books. Yet, I wonder if nowadays broad ranging and multidisciplinary work of the kind attempted by Heikkerö are not better suited for a team of authors bringing to the enterprise the necessary in-depth knowledge of different areas, and forcing each other to see their deeper and unquestioned assumptions, to challenge their methods and to forge concepts and interpretations they can all accept and work with. In fact, I believe that this kind of collaboration is necessary if the ambition is to develop a genuinely interdisciplinary approach. Heikkerö states such an ambition (p. 9), but in the end, he only manages to make some gestures towards multidisciplinarity (i.e. drawing from different disciplines), but falls short from providing the methodological and conceptual hybridisation and integration required by genuine interdisciplinarity. …