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109 7 Ihde and Technological Ethics Paul B. Thompson Between Philosophy of Technology and Technological Ethics Practitioners of technological ethics, if the term may even be used, have labored to carve out a modicum of philosophical turf. Against them on the one side are those who argue that there is just ethics, the philosophical study of norms for human action. For them, human actions are amenable to ethical reflection and judgment, and this is not changed by whether they make use of tools and techniques or not. On the other side are a few who have seen technology as inimical to ethical purposes, possibly as something like original sin or alternatively as an inexorable natural force that defies any ethical steering at all. The turf between these views is occupied on the one hand by people who think that it is possible to make fairly broad generalizations about the ethical significance of modern technology, and on the other by those, such as myself, who tend to focus on specific ways in which specific technology has modified particular forms of human agency, while making no broad generalizations about technology and moral problems. Though simplistic, this analysis suggests four possible stances within (or against) technological ethics. First is the view that there is no such thing: technology is not in itself ethically significant. On this view, the use or development of technology is a form of human action that takes on whatever ethical significance it might have solely in virtue of being the kind of action that it is. Second, there are the dark views of technology. Here technology attains philosophical significance as a metaphysical force unto itself, possibly as a distortion of human purpose and meaning, and often autonomous. Even when the failing is ultimately a human one, as in the case of Martin Heidegger’s influential essay “Die frage nach technologie,” technology is associated with a world gone wrong, and the philosophical task is to reveal the source of evil or error. 110 Paul B. Thompson The third and fourth stances are poles of a gradient. At one end are very general theories of technological ethics, theories that posit ways in which technology or technical practice as a whole can and should be made more ethical. But technology as whole can be readily broken down into general types of technology, though the typology might be done in different ways. Here biotechnology, energy technology and information technology might be thought of as distinct fields, each with distinct ethical problems. Alternatively, the breakdown might emphasize a distinction between large technological systems, on the one hand, and isolated tools and techniques, on the other. But one can be even more specific in one’s approach, and as one reaches the opposite pole of the gradient, one is examining ethical issues associated with open source code or adult cell mammalian cloning with no expectation that these issues generalize to other areas of technical practice at all. Though he has rarely addressed normative themes in his writing, Ihde’s philosophy of technology bears on all four of these broadly characterized stances in technological ethics. First, Ihde’s challenge to the conventional view of technology as applied science is also an implicit challenge to the philosophical attitudes that give rise to the view that technology raises no new or unique ethical questions. Second, Ihde’s adaptation of postmodern themes can be read as an implicit endorsement of dark views, and especially of those that call for a check on technology’s alleged tendency to lead us away from those aspects of being and praxis that are most crucial for understanding moral purpose. However, Ihde has often distanced himself from such strongly negative views of technology, suggesting that a more plausible reading of his postmodern critique might be more in line with someone like Langdon Winner, who challenges us to think more philosophically about technology in general. The fourth stance, the ethical analysis of specific tools and techniques, returns to work undertaken early in Ihde’s philosophical career. Stance I: The Denial of Technological Ethics As used here, “technological ethics” is inclusive of any view that finds technology and technical innovation to pose philosophical questions that bear on normative topics. Such views are relatively uncommon among twentiethcentury academic philosophers. One obstacle to technological ethics has been the view, hardly ever argued explicitly, that technology is just applied science. Science was thought to be largely a...

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