For a piece in conversation with Heidegger I wanted to build
a machine commenting on the human relationship to technology. Heidegger mentions
that the only way to truly achieve a ‘free relationship’ with technology is by
questioning it, and I intend this piece to serve that purpose as a commentary and
sow the seeds of that relationship. For this to happen first the essence of
technology must be referenced. It is important not just to question the
relationship in this manner but specifically the essence of technology that
fuels such a relationship. Another important element in deciphering what
Heidegger means by a ‘free relationship’ and the essence of technology is by
understanding the role of the technological relationship in society today. More
importantly, the difference in that role currently, from the role it played in
the past. Whereas earlier societies’ artisans created and crafted technology
through an Aristotelian symbiotic relationship resulting in a “bringing forth”
of the object, current technology is almost exclusively “challenging forth.” It
is exactly this challenging forth through processes of summoning and provoking
that commands the object into a position of “standing-reserve” and, as David I.
Waddington states, consequentially reduces the dignity of the object to a state
of “objectlessness.” However, this method of challenging-forth is innate to
human existence and stems from a natural ‘they’ think. One of my favorite
metaphors utilized by Waddington, in his explanation of Heidegger’s theories,
is the giant sequoia. He declares that even the most profit-driven people of
this world “may become uneasy when forced to watch a tree ‘harvester’ in the
process of liquidating the forest.” This is because, the unaltered tree stands
on its own, “and as such, seems to have a kind of dignity.” This dignity
perhaps results from the object coming into ‘being’ of its own accord and
effort, and maintaining a state of being that is lost when the object no longer
‘stands on its own.’ My machine’s purpose is to, at an agonizingly slow rate,
butcher a standing tree to exaggerate the dignity of the object. The tree, having been harvested from nature (I will
have to go and get one in the wild) is prematurely reduced to an object in
standing-reserve, the sole purpose of which is to be slowly cut in half in
front of an audience. The premature reduced state is reduced almost further in
this respect. The machine itself though serves a different purpose. Heidegger
almost romanticizes the ancient artisan ‘bringing forth’ and object through a responsibility
for the material, formal, final, and efficient causes. I intend to comment on
this ideal form of production resulting in the ‘bringing forth’ of the object
(machine) whose ugly final purpose is to further reduce the object in
standing-reserve to a spectacle for ambivalent onlookers. Is it thus an object ‘brought
forth’ due to the tender, caring, and responsible actions of an artisan? Or is
it simply another machine predictably ‘challenging forth,’ reducing the “sequoia”
to a standing-reserve due to the innate the-they think dominating our society?
No comments:
Post a Comment