The abstract character of modern technological relations

This thesis engages with and develops theoretical frameworks and concepts for understanding the relationship between technology and social relations. I argue that technologies substantively contribute to constituting the form of the cultural and structural relations they mediate, including relationships to nature. In particular, a social theoretical framework will be developed which distinguishes more and less abstract levels of technologically mediated social relations. In Part 1, I outline a methodological framework and series of conceptual distinctions for understanding and analysing the relationships between technology and society, and for clarifying some themes and debates in the literature on the philosophy and sociology of technology. In Part 2, I consider more closely the work of four substantive theorists of technology: Marshall McLuhan, Langdon Winner, Martin Heidegger and Albert Borgmann. In Part 3, I turn to a number of case studies of the ways technologies shape the form of social relations: firstly, comparing manual, mechanical and electronic technologies (including the clock, steam engine, railway, automobile, telephone, radio, television and internet); and secondly, comparing organic, chemical and genetic forms of agricultural production and modes of engagement with nature, focusing in particular on genetic engineering and the new biotechnologies. In the Appendix, I briefly outline a framework for comparing different paradigms of scientific knowledge and practice in terms of their more or less abstract character and level of engagement with the world