I found it very interesting how all of the chapters that we were assigned to read for this post, chapters 3 and 4 and 9 and 10, were all related to the various methods by which people classify technologies and culture and how they are related to one another. Even though each of the theories was very different from the one previous to it, I noticed that there were a few aspects that carried over into each one.
As I was reading about these different interpretations about how culture and technology are related I realized that I was trying to see which one I could most associated my own beliefs with. I knew for a fact right off the bat that I am in strong opposition to the technological determinism theory. I don’t think it is a rational concept to say that technologies are what dictate the cultural beliefs and values of society. I can’t support this notion based on the fact that all technologies are invented or designed by human beings. These same human beings are exposed to their society and the culture that it evokes. This being said I find it impossible that the technologies invented by these people effect the culture they are being invented to supplement.
I also found myself having problems with some of the aspects of cultural determinism, those in the control theories as well as those in the causality. I was becoming discouraged as to the fact that there was not one set theory that I could fully support and uphold. Then I came to the end of chapter 9 and the conclusion basically summed up exactly how I had been feeling throughout the entire reading. It said, “Throughout the many years of listening to what people say about technology and watching them live out a relationship to it, we can say without hesitation that most people tend to be inconsistent in the understanding of technology is and how it works.” I am one of those people and I can now say that there is not one theory that I can completely support but I feel that a assemblage of various aspects of each would do a good job of describing what I believe to be the relation between culture and technology.
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ReplyDeleteyes, most of what you read (on mechanistic causality, soft determinism, and so on), the authors themselves disagree with. they write about these theories and lay beliefs at length so we can recognize their prevalence and also to debunk them. the final concept (articulation and assemblage) seems to be the position they hold.
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