“Technique has penetrated the deepest recesses of the human being. The machine tends not only to create a new human environment, but also to modify man’s very essence. The milieu in which he lives is no longer his. He must adapt himself, as though the world were new, to a universe for which he was not created. He was made to go six kilometers an hour, and he goes a thousand. He was made to eat when he was hungry and to sleep when he was sleepy; instead, he obeys a clock. He was made to have contact with living things, and he lives in a world of stone. He was created with a certain essential unity, and he is fragmented by all the forces of the modern world.”
― Jacques Ellul, The Technological Society
The term technique, as I use it, does not mean machines, technology, or this or that procedure for attaining an end. In our technological society, technique is the totality of methods rationally arrived at and having absolute efficiency (for a given stage of development) in every field of human activity. Its characteristics are new; the technique of the present has no common measure with that of the past.
― Jacques Ellul, The Technological Society
In his Substack post What did Jacques Ellul mean by Technique?, Samuel Eastlund adds a fourth foundational element to the three mentioned in Ellul’s “technique” definition above:
“Technique is one of the spiritual powers (Col. 1:16, Eph. 6:12) which controls the modern world, which people give their allegiance to and which keeps them in bondage.”
Eastlund continues . . . “As David Gill puts it in his comparison between Ellul and Francis Schaeffer, ‘What is significant and ominous today is that technique itself (rationality, artificiality, efficiency) has become universal, autonomous, and self-automated’. One of the gods of the modern world is efficiency; it is a presupposition of the way we do things that the more efficient something is, the better it is. This becomes obvious when engaging in a discussion about Technique with those not already opposed to it.”
*David W. Gill, Jacques Ellul and Francis Schaeffer: Two Views of Western Civilisation, p. 11
I’m becoming a neo-Luddite of sorts. I have a particular dislike for the dissociative and diminution effects of the digital age and particularly as technology modifies the means of relating to ourselves, to those around us – to our world.
During childhood in the 50s and into the 60s, I received information, or better, life in continuously variable physical quantities. I stayed outdoors until it was dark. I rode my bike everywhere. I played with kids – German, Italian, Mexican, Polish and others – on my block. I walked to the library to look up things. With my allowance in hand, I ran to the Five and Dime to see what I could buy. I read the Sunday comics on the front room floor. I watched Howdy Doody, Captain Kangaroo and Lassie on a B&W rabbit-eared tube-filled box. I played 45s on a turntable in my bedroom. I played table games with friends from school and the neighborhood. I attended church. I listened to AM radio on a transistor radio. I learned to play the trumpet.
In high school I played my horn in the band and orchestra, ran cross country and track, studied French for four years and got into the NHS my senior year. During the summers I worked and took summer school courses. I wasn’t a spectator.
My analog life was harmonized within the perceived analog universe of light, color, sound, force, wind, rain, and seasons. And like a camera and cassette recorder, my analog brain captured a continuous stream of organic information from the real world. I was my own screen saver . . . and social media and Google search.
Those were times before “technique” “penetrated”, “modified”, and atomized life into efficient bits and bytes. Technology didn’t dominate. Like the phone on the wall and the record player, objects were just another thing among many others. Objects were there to serve, not dominate. I could dial down interest in a thing, walk away, and move on to the more interesting organic things.
In contrast to 0’s and 1’s trying to emulate analog life and the annoying apps with their prompts, pop-ups, and passwords, analog times seemed natural, unintrusive, and rather hassle-free. Digital technology, as it relates to human interface, comes across as contrived, pushy as a foot-in-the-door salesman and damn frustrating in its effort to achieve maximum efficiency. Add dismissive of your concerns.
In contrast to the soulless 0’s and 1’s programmed to contain life like the characterless pre-fab concrete industrial buildings that contain employees, my childhood was a multi-dimensional free-range human life. I lived life at the speed of life and not at the speed of sound.
Come to think of it, I never swore until I started dealing with computers, hand-held and otherwise, and software. And, even with growing up with talk of a U.S. and Russia nuclear war, I was never alarmed about my times and my country until the rise of That Hideous Strength the technocratic state. The spirit of the age could be felt in the analog times, but now I sense that the spirit of the age is oppressive through digital technology means.
Consider that technology may have “penetrated the deepest recesses of the human being”. The signs of spiritual oppression include
- a fixation on depression
- confusion
- fear, anxiety
- isolation
- compulsive thoughts, feeling and behavior
- abnormal medical problems
“If I find in myself desires which nothing in this world can satisfy, the only logical explanation is that I was made for another world.”
― C.S. Lewis, Mere Christianity
*****
You live as long as I have (70 yrs.) and you see how technology has modified human existence. Human interaction, for instance.
Every morning I work out at the fitness center in the complex where I live. I arrive 5:30 AM. I am usually the only one there at that time.
As is her habit, a young woman comes into the fitness center about an hour later. She walks over to the treadmill looking at her phone the whole time. She has not once looked up and looked over at me to acknowledge me. She’s in a world of her own.
*****
To be sure, I am not a technophobe. I have worked as an engineer for most of my life. I am currently working on improving substation communications for a large utility. I see good uses of technology every day including the recent NASA test: diverting of an asteroid. Technology has its place as a servant of mankind and not as its master.
*****
Well, I’ve given my thoughts. What’s your relationship with digital technology? Has it penetrated and modified your life and to what limit?
Does technology – 4K UHD TV, autonomous vehicles, 5G, etc. – deliver organic value to you? Do the bells and whistles of new technology make life more meaningful?
Are you OK spending time on passwords and renewing passwords and renewing passwords and two-step authentication and One-Time Passcodes. Are you OK paying for cyber security and renewing cyber security and VPNs and renewing VPN software and updates and updates and updates?
Are you worried about being hacked?
Are you worried about your livelihood being held for ransom?
As I am writing this, I received a text message alert from my employer: Cyberattack Impacting Critical Infrastructure. IT Security team received numerous ransomware alerts. The system that hosts the virtual servers in our environment was compromised. It was apparent someone had actively taken over the system and changed the credentials to block access. All systems were shut down at headquarters and offices with data centers.
Of course, normal business is affected. Production has slowed to almost a halt. The “fix” will be expensive. Modern technology with its propensity for “technical efficiency and systemization” can also be used for disruption, chaos and loss of income.
How do you find interfacing with machines? Does an App give you a sense of control, of power, when you punch in inputs and the device ‘replies’ with a programmed message to your commands?
Are you OK being an input to an algorithm?
Do you get the sense using a digital device that you are being programmed and used by it?
Are you OK giving out your digital ID and having your data mined and surveilled by Big Tech, Big Brother, and China?
Are you OK with software tracking your online patterns and then using the data to manipulate and increase your engagement with a product or service?
Are you OK being monitored online night and day? Have you watched The Lives of Others?
Are you wondering if you said something ‘wrong’ online and the FBI will show up at your door?
Are you OK with digital cops? Researchers experimenting with concept of a ‘digital cop’ (wnd.com)
Are you OK with Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, etc. censoring your speech based on a politically-biased algorithm?
Do you find interfacing with machines to be off-putting, alienating, impersonal?
Are you OK spending most of your day interfacing with a device? Looking at a screen?
Do you prefer dealing with devices instead of people?
Are you OK dealing with Chat Bots when you have questions?
Can’t get enough of CGI?
Will you accept becoming an AI product of an algorithm in the post-human world of transhumanism?
Would you be OK with an implanted microchip vaccine passport?
Would you be OK with transhumanists replacing eternal “life in the ages to come” with digital immortality?
Will you be OK with digital currency and the monitoring and control of your finances?
Are you OK with a global technocracy that monitors your behavior and arbitrates your social credit score?
Are you OK with RFR (Radiofrequency Radiation) affecting your body, your brain?
Check this out: Well Being: Dangers of 5G – by Robert W Malone MD, MS (substack.com)
Adverse effects observed at exposures below the assumed threshold SAR include non-thermal induction of reactive oxygen species, DNA damage, cardiomyopathy, carcinogenicity, sperm damage, and neurological effects, including electromagnetic hypersensitivity. Also, multiple human studies have found statistically significant associations between RFR exposure and increased brain and thyroid cancer risk. Yet, in 2020, and in light of the body of evidence reviewed in this article, the FCC and ICNIRP reaffirmed the same limits that were established in the 1990s.
Are you OK with technology reconditioning your children?
Here is one parent commenting on Decade at Bernie’s – by Chris Bray – Tell Me How This Ends (substack.com)
Who is Jacques Ellul?
What do you think of the following quote (a screen capture from the video):
-Willem H. Vanderburg: “The Life and Work of Jacques Ellul” (2012)
Informed dissent:
The Calm COVID Truth of Dr. Joe Ladapo (substack.com)
Video: Moderna CEO Admits COVID Is Like Seasonal Flu, Only Vulnerable Need Jabs – Summit News
How to Use Ivermectin to Protect Against the Covid Vaccines – Brightwork Research & Analysis
“The Boundary is Children” – by Robert W Malone MD, MS (substack.com)
Homeschooling Options and State Exemptions for Childhood Vaccines (substack.com)
Two top cardiologists implicate COVID vax in all unexplained heart attacks since 2021 (substack.com)
Dr. Robert Malone: The CDC Voted Unanimously to Recommend the Covid-19 Vaccine for Children as young as 5 AND the CDC will provide ‘sneaky’ liability protection for Big Pharma vaccines. The CDC won’t protect you, it will protect itself and its cohorts.
Road map to Control:
In 2016, domains for government vaccine passport websites were registered by the same person. Some of these are in current use now.
“Develop EU guidance for establishing comprehensive electronic immunization information systems for effective monitoring of immunization programmes.”
Well, isn’t that special:
Video: Bill Gates Says European Energy Crisis Is “Good” – Summit News
Musk’s Dangerous Vision for Twitter (substack.com)
Uniformed Consent:
An in-depth look into the Covid 19 narrative, who’s controlling it, and how it’s being used to inject an untested, new technology into almost every person on the planet. It’s not about the virus. It’s about the vaccine. Problem reaction solution. Slogans slogans slogans.
Ch-ch-ch Changes Not:
The way of the wicked:
Disturbing video from Texas drag show for kids… – CITIZEN FREE PRESS
Take down the WEF:
What is the World Economic Forum? (takedownthewef.com)
REVEALED: The ‘Public Figures’ Attending the 2022 World Economic Forum in Davos. (thenationalpulse.com) Note: A pdf of the full list of attendees is located at this link.
Malthusiasts:
Thomas Malthus believed that so-called “positive checks” (such as plagues and starvation) and “preventive checks” (such as birth control measures and delayed marriage), worked to keep population growth and food growth in balance.
The Left, as prompted by the Davos/WEF elites, are similarly concerned about population growth. That is why they promote the “positive” checks of pandemics and the “preventive checks” of abortion, homosexuality, and mutilating children in the name of affirmation.
In An Essay on the Principle of Population, neo-Malthusians [the authors] tells us what they think is required to make their anti-growth philosophy work:
“organized evasive action: population control, limitation of material consumption, redistribution of wealth, transitions to technologies that are environmentally and socially less disruptive than today’s, and movement toward some kind of world government”
– Paul Ehrlich, Anne Ehrlich, and John Holdren, Ecoscience: Population, Resources, and Environment (San Francisco: W. H. Freeman and Company, 1977), p. 5.
Two-time loser Stacy Abrams is a neo-Malthusian. She holds the view that misery or vice are necessary equalizers between growing population and the means of subsistence:
What the WEF of her!
Kingdom Venturers 