Gestures

Beyond Machines (but Still within the Phenomenology of Gestures)

10 Beyond Machines (but still within the Phenomenology of Gestures) Work presumes that the world is not as it should be and that it can be changed. Such hypotheses present problems. Ontology is concerned with problems of the way the world is, deontology with the way it should be, and methodology with the means of changing it. These problems are intertwined. We cannot know that the world is not as it should be without knowing how it is, nor can we know that the world is as it is without knowing how it should be. We cannot know that the world is not as it should be without knowing that it can be changed, nor can we know that it can be changed without knowing how it is. It follows, then, that there can be no ontology without deontology, no deontology without ontology and methodology, and no methodology without ontology and deontology. In illo tempore, at the moment human beings began to work, these three aspects of work were not separated. Ontological, ethical, and technical aspects of magic, although visible to us, were not distinguishable to the magician himself. The exact moment when the tri-partition asserts itself is the moment when history, in the strict sense of the word, emerges. History can be understood as an unfolding of this of this tri-partition. During its first phase (antiquity and the Middle Ages), history emphasizes the way the world should be; that is, people work to realize a value—ethical, political, religious, practical, in short, “in good faith.” During its second phase (modernity), it emphasizes the discovery of being in the world; that is, people work epistemologically, scientifically, experimentally, and theoretically, in short, “without faith.” During its third phase (the present ), it emphasizes methods; that is, people work technically, functionally, efficiently, strategically, and cybernetically, in short, “in great doubt,” “in Beyond MaChines 11 despair.” During the first phase, the prevailing questions are directed toward purpose (for what?); during the second, toward causes (why?); and during the third phase, the prevailing questions are formal (how?). So history offers us three models for work: classical (engaged) work, modern (research) work, and contemporary (functional) work. Most people don’t work. They serve as tools in the work of others. In their alienation, they have no wish to know how the world is or how it should be, and the idea of changing the world does not even occur to them. They participate only passively in history; they put up with it. As far as the working minority is concerned, it is always and everywhere engaged, researching and functional at the same time, for these three moments of work intersect. The three phases of history proposed here are only schematic, and the three models of work are never realized in pure form. But they serve a purpose, and they are adequate models, for they open a perspective on the so-called crisis of values. Before we analyze this perspective, we need to get one commonsense prejudice out of the way, namely, that people work to “satisfy needs.” In this way, we become “animals,” and so need certain things to survive. These things can be quantified, for example, in calories. If work were a tendency to strive for the satisfaction of these needs, we could speak of setting goals for work: one works to meet the needs, and after that, no more. But it’s not like that. Animals don’t work but meet their needs without changing the world. The Swiss, for example, work far beyond the point of satisfying all biological needs and think nothing of excess. Work is, then, a gesture, an unnatural expression of the effort to realize values and to devalue realities. The three models of work open up the following perspective: in prehistory (magical work), the values were unquestioned; in the classical and medieval periods (engaged work), a decision had to be made between values; in modernity (work as research), the question of values lost its force; in the present (the time of technical work), the question of values has become nonsensical. This is the framework to be analyzed in what follows. In prehistory, values were unquestioned, because a value is a standard of measure, and to be able to question measurement, one must be able to stand apart from the thing to be measured. Only the thing to be measured 12 Beyond MaChines using values is...