THE ways we relate to technological things is a subject which has received increasing academic attention since the early part of the last century. It is also now on the political agenda. The word ‘technology’ is becoming to be seen as something that carries out a function that assists us in our thinking.
A recent gathering at Bletchley Park of top technology companies and international politicians looked to the future, and sought to devise safeguards to uncontrolled AI development. Unregulated rapid development of systems that might replace human decisions and thought is the stuff of science fiction nightmares. It is in the forefront of current politics.
Technology is the application of science. It is a practical craft supported by science, it is not driven by science, but by the effectiveness of what it can do. Science on the other hand is a never-ending inquiry about how the world works. Scientific theories come and go, instruments and equipment are becoming rapidly outdated and redundant. The world of manufactured things or artifacts, is being swept along with scientific development.
Maintenance
Academic attention has turned to an important but neglected topic, one that is not in the spotlights, but one that is certainly essential to technology, and that is maintenance. In other words in an increasingly complicated world, how best should the physical things we rely upon be kept to be useful. That not only includes keeping things running as designed, but adapting them so they cope with changing needs. Utilities, transport systems and communications all need to be kept in service, these sorts of jobs don’t hit the headlines, but they are fundamental and they are often challenging.
The Society for Philosophy and Technology is an independent international organisation that encourages, supports and facilitates philosophically significant considerations of technology. It was founded in 1976 and links many universities around the world. The society’s special interest group invited a small group of academics and practitioners to a workshop at The University of Vienna in October 1 to grapple with some of the dilemmas of maintaining artifacts i.e. the subject of maintenance.
It is a chilling thought that patients with complex medical implants have been unable to have essential power packs replaced because one of the only specialist manufacturers of them has ceased trading. It is not a case of rampaging robots causing harm, but one of economics which is much more insidious and mundane.
Ethics
The leading universities have realised for some time that ethics is not something that can be tacked on to an engineering education, it is a fundamental part of it. Academic research has shown that experiments involving technological things that the public has to rely on, should not be done without consent. This is difficult for individual civil engineers as their profession is intertwined with politics.
Technology is currently seen to be all about innovation, new products and ways of manufacturing things. Optimisation has been overlooked. The difference between technology and engineering is that engineering has a moral purpose to it. Civil engineers will probably find that their ideas of what the word maintenance actually means may change in the not too distant future.
Academic opinion about AI is divided, there is no agreed philosophical definition of it. Is it just a simulation of intelligence, or is there a possibility that some sorts of robots will eventually have human feelings, and will it replace professional judgment?
Those involved with technological education are in for the long haul, they have limited access to politicians or major commerce of the day, theirs is a responsibility to help shape the minds of those who will define the technology of the future.
Dennis Gedge MCInstCES, Consulting Engineer
1 The Workshop Maintaining Artifacts: Technology Time and Human Practice 24-25 Oct 23 at the Department of Philosophy of the University of Vienna was held with the support of funding received from the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under the Marie Sk›odowska-Curie Grant agreement: 897827.