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Unframing Martin Heidegger’s

Understanding of Technology

Postphenomenology and the Philosophy of Technology

Series Editors: Robert Rosenberger, Peter-Paul Verbeek, Don Ihde

As technologies continue to advance, they correspondingly continue to make fundamental changes to our lives. Technological changes have effects on everything from our understandings of ethics, politics, and communication, to gender, science, and selfhood. Philosophical reflection on technology can help draw out and analyze the nature of these changes, and help us to understand both the broad patterns of technological effects and the concrete details. The purpose of this series is to provide a publication outlet for the field of the philosophy of technology in general, and the school of thought called “postphenomenology” in particular. The field of philosophy of technology applies insights from the history of philosophy to current issues in technology, and reflects on how technological developments change our understanding of philosophical issues. Postphenomenology is the name of an emerging research perspective used by a growing international and interdisciplinary group of scholars. This perspective utilizes insights from the philosophical tradition of phenomenology to analyze human relationships with technologies, and also integrates philosophical commitments of the American pragmatist tradition of thought.

Recent Titles in This SeriesUnframing Martin Heidegger’s Understanding of Technology: On the Essential

Connection between Technology, Art, and History by Søren Riis, translated by Rebecca Walsh

Postphenomenological Methodologies: New Ways in Mediating Techno-Human Relationships, edited by Jesper Aagaard, Jan Kyrre Berg Friis, Jessica Sorenson, Oliver Tafdrup, and Cathrine Hasse

Postphenomenological Investigations: Essays on Human-Technology Relations, edited by Robert Rosenberger and Peter-Paul Verbeek

Animal Constructions and Technological Knowledge by Ashley Shew Using Knowledge: On the Rationality of Science, Technology, and Medicine,

by Ingemar NordinPostphenomenology and Media: Essays on Human–Media–World Relations,

edited by Yoni Van Den Eede, Stacey O’Neal Irwin, and Galit WellnerDiphtheria Serum as a Technological Object: A Philosophical Analysis of

Serotherapy in France 1894 – 1900, by Jonathan SimonDigital Media: Human–Technology Connection, By Stacey O’Neal IrwinAcoustic Technics, by Don IhdeA Postphenomenological Inquiry of Cell Phones: Genealogies, Meanings,

and Becoming, by Galit WellnerTechnoscience and Postphenomenology: The Manhattan Papers,

edited by Jan Kyrre Berg O. Friis and Robert P. Crease Design, Mediation, and the Posthuman, edited by Dennis M. Weiss, Amy D. Propen,

and Colbey Emmerson Reid

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Unframing Martin Heidegger’s

Understanding of Technology

On the Essential Connection between Technology, Art,

and History

By Søren Riis Translated by Rebecca Walsh

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Originally published in German as Zur Neubestimmung der Technik: Eine Auseinandersetzung mit Martin Heidegger in 2011 by Narr Francke Attempto Verlag. Published in English by permission of Narr Francke Attempto Verlag.English translation ©2018 by The Rowman & Littlefield Publishing Group

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Names: Riis, Soren, author.Title: Unframing Martin Heidegger’s understanding of technology : on the essential

connection between technology, art, and history / Soren Riis ; translated by Rebecca Walsh.

Other titles: Zur Neubestimmung der Technik. EnglishDescription: Lanham : Lexington Books, 2018. | Series: Postphenomenology and the

philosophy of technology | Includes bibliographical references and index.Identifiers: LCCN 2018023103 (print) | LCCN 2018028505 (ebook) |

ISBN 9781498567671 (Electronic) | ISBN 9781498567664 (cloth : alk. paper)Subjects: LCSH: Heidegger, Martin, 1889-1976. | Technology—Philosophy.Classification: LCC B3279.H49 (ebook) | LCC B3279.H49 R51713 2018 (print) |

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v

List of Abbreviations ix

Preface xi

PART I: THE ESSENCE OF MODERN TECHNOLOGY 1

1 Martin Heidegger’s Question Concerning Technology 3A Question About the Free Relationship 4The Essence of Modern Technology Thought of as Enframing 11The Limitations of Technology 15

2 Modern Technology as the Offspring of Enframing: The Reproduction of Modern Technology 23Under the Rule of Enframing 23The Self-Movement of Physis 32Phenomenology of Enframing 41

3 Toward an Understanding of Essence 63Heidegger’s Concept of Essence 63The Total Mobilization of Beings 71A Matter of Time 80

PART II: TECHNOLOGY IN THE CONTEXT OF ART 89

4 “The Origin of the Work of Art” 91“Out of the Dark Opening” 92The Truth on the Work 101The Truth in the Work 107

Contents

Contentsvi

5 The Truth of Technology 123The Mystery of the Work of Art 123Art in the Work of Technology 132Dangerous Art 146

PART III: THE STORY BETWEEN NATURE AND ART 159

6 The Genealogy of Modern Technology 161Techne vs. Modern Technology 161This History of Metaphysics 164Two Approaches Critiquing Modernity 186

7 Alternative Genealogies 199The Characteristic of Beings 199Biotechnology 205Toward the Origin of Modern Technology 210

8 Adjustment 219A Timely Work of Art 219“Where the Saving Power Is, the Danger also Grows” 227The Other Beginning 235

Bibliography 245

Index 251

About the Author 259

It must become clear the extent to which the critical question, which is the objective of thinking, belongs necessarily

and continually to thinking. Martin Heidegger

ix

The following texts are cited parenthetically in the text by means of abbrevia-tions. Translations have been modified slightly in some cases.

GERMAN ORIGINAL

GA 4 Heidegger, Martin. Erläuterungen zu Hölderlins Dichtung. Gesam-tausgabe, Band 4, hrsg. von Friedrich Wilhelm von Herrmann. Frankfurt am Main:Vittorio Klostermann, 1984.

GA 65 Heidegger, Martin. Beiträge zur Philosophie (Vom Ereignis). Gesam-tausgabe, Band 65, hrsg. von Friedrich Wilhelm von Herrmann. Frankfurt am Main:Vittorio Klostermann, 1989.

GA 29/30 Heidegger, Martin. Die Grundbegriffe der Metaphysik. Welt - Endlichkeit - Ein-samkeit. Gesamtausgabe, Band 29/30, hrsg. von Fried-rich Wilhelm von Herrmann. Frankfurt am Main:Vittorio Klostermann, 1984.

GA 79 Heidegger, Martin. Bremer und Freiburger Vorträge. Gesamtaus-gabe, Band 79, hrsg. von Petra Jaeger. Frankfurt am Main:Vittorio Klos-termann, 1994.

Gel Heidegger, Martin. Gelassenheit. Pfullingen:Verlag Günther Neske, 1959.

HW Heidegger, Martin. Holzwege. 7 Auflage. Frankfurt am Main:Vittorio Klostermann, 1994.

NI Heidegger, Martin. Nietzsche. Band I, 5 Auflage. Pfullingen:Verlag Gün-ther Neske, 1989.

NII Heidegger, Martin. Nietzsche. Band II, 5 Auflage. Pfullingen:Verlag Günther Neske, 1989.

List of Abbreviations

List of Abbreviationsx

PIA Heidegger, Martin. Phänomenologische Interpretationen zu Aristoteles, hrsg. von Günther Neumann. Frankfurt am Main:Vittorio Klostermann, 2013.

SdD Heidegger, Martin. Zur Sache des Denkens. 3 Auflage. Tübingen: Niemeyer, 1988.

SuZ Heidegger, Martin. Sein und Zeit. 17 Auflage. Tübingen:Niemeyer, 1993.

SvG Heidegger, Martin. Der Satz vom Grund. 7 Auflage. Pfullingen:Verlag Günther Neske, 1992.

VA Heidegger, Martin. Vorträge und Aufsätze. 7 Auflage. Stuttgart:Verlag Günther Neske, 1994.

WM Heidegger, Martin. Wegmarken. 3 Auflage. Frankfurt am Main:Vittorio Klostermann, 1996.

ENGLISH TRANSLATIONS

QCT Heidegger, Martin. The Question Concerning Technology and Other Essays. Translated by William Lovitt. New York: Harper & Row, 1977.

PA Heidegger, Martin. Pathmarks. Edited by William McNeill. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1998.

PIA Heidegger, Martin. Phenomenological Interpretations of Aristotle. Translated by Richard Rojcewicz. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2001.

CP2 Heidegger, Martin. Contributions to Philosophy: Of the Event. Trans-lated by Richard Rojcewicz and Daniela Vallega-Neu. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2012.

OBT Heidegger, Martin. Off the Beaten Track. Edited and translated by Julian Young and Kenneth Haynes. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2012.

OTB Heidegger, Martin. On Time and Being. Translated by Joan Stam-baugh. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1972.

DT Heidegger, Martin. Discourse on Thinking. Translated by John M. Andersen and E. Hans Freund. In Martin Heidegger: Philosophical and Political Writings. New York: Continuum International, 2003.

PR Heidegger, Martin. The Principle of Reason. Translated by Reginald Lilly. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1996.

BT Heidegger, Martin. Being and Time. Translated by John Macquarrie and Edward Robinson. New York: Harper & Row, 1962.

PLT Heidegger, Martin. “Building Dwelling Thinking.” In Poetry, Lan-guage, Thought.

xi

This book presents a new and radical interpretation of some of Martin Heidegger’s most influential texts. The unfamiliar interpretations all seek to question and unframe what I have found to be too fast assessments of the concepts and constellations of thoughts surrounding Heidegger’s notion of modern technology. But in order for the radical not to be misunderstood or marginalized, it has been important for to me to connect it very closely with precise findings in Heidegger’s texts. Following this line of thinking, I have chosen to reuse many of Heidegger’s key concepts and to be heretic about the constellations where they are brought to bear. What at first sight might appear as a passive surrender to Heidegger’s terminology turns out to be a critical examination and unframing of his notion of modern technology. The book thus moves slowly from the known into unknown territory, and the first part may even be viewed as a meticulous summary of Heidegger’s famous lecture “The Question Concerning Technology.” In this sense, what later in the book may seem speculative and highly critical has an “empirical textual footing” which is ultimately meant to make the book all the more coherent and conclusive.

It is the underlying thesis of this book that philosophers should work with and try to criticize Heidegger’s thinking where it is at its best, and let others deal with Heidegger where he succumbs to Nazi propaganda. The former is more difficult, but much more rewarding. This approach may leave me with no allies, as its critical philosophical stance provokes many fundamentalist followers of Heidegger and its disregard for Heidegger’s Nazi involvement devaluates the voice of several dogmatic critics. Be that as it may, I main-tain that Heidegger’s impressive work still hides many treasures and strange thoughts to be uncovered, and that we should strive to confront his think-ing in a way inspired by Heidegger’s confrontation with ancient philoso-phers, whom many believed had been exhausted of original philosophical

Preface

Prefacexii

thoughts, but whom Heidegger brought back to life in new and highly relevant contemporary philosophical struggles. Inquiring into Heidegger’s thinking concerning technology is not primarily a historical interest, but a way to explore some of the most alarming and fundamental questions relat-ing to technology today. Against this backdrop, I shall also begin this book by drawing an analogy between Heidegger’s preoccupation with modern technology and Plato’s critique of the sophists. For just as Plato saw the sophists as his main adversaries and warned against the dangers of their undertakings, Heidegger viewed the essence of modern technology as his main antagonist. He felt himself called upon to try to save humankind from its catastrophic consequences. To understand Heidegger’s critical approach toward modern technology, the initial analogy between Plato and Heidegger may be of further help. For Heidegger, the technologies of the modern era posed an alarming threat to adequate thinking, as did the sophists to the awakening of philosophy according to Plato. Just as Plato maintained that the separation of philosophy and sophistry in ancient Greece was crucial for the self-understanding of philosophy, Heidegger viewed the fate of phi-losophy in modernity as a result of the (lack of) confrontation with technol-ogy. The critical discussion with the “other” of philosophy is in this way essential to Plato as well as Heidegger if philosophy is to prevail and fulfill its original potential. At stake in these respective controversies is nothing less than the understanding of truth and the future of humankind. At the same time it is important to see that Plato primarily discussed the danger of the sophists within the realm of the ancient polis, whereas Heidegger views modern technology as a global threat. However, to complicate this analogy between Heidegger and Plato and to point out the importance of inquiring into the essence of modern technology, Heidegger in fact accuses Plato of unknowingly aiding the advancement of modern technology. In other words, Heidegger’s questions and considerations concerning modern technology are not just a subsidiary interest but stand at the center of his thinking and in his view pose an original concern for philosophy as such. Philosophy as defined by its founding fathers has naïvely given birth to what has become the monster of modern technology, which is now mature and threatens to radically change the world.

This initial parallel between ancient sophism and modern technology emphasizes the threat imposed by technology. However, this book in fact argues that modern technology is more harmless and even promising, but also more dangerous than Heidegger readily conceded. Following Heidegger’s understanding of modern technology, it is difficult to learn to appreciate contemporary technologies and to gain room for new and affirmative inter-pretations. His analysis of the essence of modern technology is too biased and restricted. Unlike Heidegger’s framing, this book also argues that the danger

Preface xiii

of technology is not a specifically modern phenomenon, and it is misleading to assume that humans are not able to learn to deal with and experience vari-ous technologies very differently. If we read Heidegger’s texts more criti-cally and unorthodoxly, then we can gain new perspectives on the essence of technology. In this vein, the prolific reverse side of Heidegger’s thinking may become manifest as the rich borderland between technology and art, where the essence of modern technology is associated with artworks, living organ-isms, and where it also becomes comprehensible as historically significant. Approached in this way, we may unframe Heidegger’s influential enframing of modern technology.

This present inquiry seeks to justify three key theses whose development corresponds to the three-part structure of the book. The first hypothesis maintains that Heidegger’s interpretation of the essence of modern technol-ogy is in principle analog to his interpretation of living nature. This analogy highlights what Heidegger takes to be the vast difference between ancient and modern technology, namely that the latter stands out as autonomous and self-reproductive whereas the former needs a craftsman in order to work. In this way Heidegger in fact gives birth to a far-reaching biological interpretation of modern technology. According to the second hypothesis, Heidegger’s conception of modern technology shows a fundamental struc-tural relationship with his view on art that opens up a way to appreciate modern technologies as artworks. The notorious hydroelectric power plant in the Rhine, which Heidegger sees as the incarnation of danger, may also be viewed as an overwhelming artwork. The third and final hypothesis states that Heidegger’s description of modern technology not only allows for one, but several different plausible genealogies of its present state. As we shall see later, this claim connects the first and second theses and shows how Heidegger in fact advances a concept of history as a temporal artwork, which is capable of bringing the essential and perpetual movement of time to a certain pause.

Taken in their entirety, the three theses manifest that Heidegger’s defini-tion of the essence of technology has two sides: one side reveals that the essence of technology is to be found in the work of art, and the other shows that the danger of the essence of technology resides in the ability to conceal the phenomenon of truth behind the subsequent phenomenon of correspon-dence. The latter is dangerous because it fundamentally restricts human freedom and makes human beings incapable of establishing a new beginning, eventually leading to their becoming unaware prisoners of a specific interpre-tation of the world.

These assertions concerning Heidegger and his concept of technology may seem implausible and exaggerated. It is thus important to note from the outset that they manifest new possibilities for interpreting Heidegger’s texts.

Prefacexiv

The book strives to uncover the reverse side of Heidegger’s thinking, high-light previously hidden connections between Heidegger’s concepts, and give clearance for new understandings of technology. By way of critical question-ing, extraordinary thought experiments, allusions and systematic conclusions, Heidegger’s thoughts on technology are presented in new and, at first glance, strange constellations, which are intended to make his ideas seem question-able as well as encourage further research.

In the vein of this investigation traditional concepts of technology are dis-cussed not only critically, but also dynamically, causing them to lose their con-ventional identities and gain new ones at times. This presents the reader with a challenge: she must first decide whether the sometimes unusual findings are to be mainly understood as a critique of Heidegger’s understanding of technology, of the traditional interpretations of Heidegger, or of the traditional concepts of technology. Then she must determine whether these consequences were even intentionally indicated or anticipated by Heidegger himself.

The present interpretation of Heidegger’s texts, which aims at making the abovementioned theses sensible, assumes that a philosopher must not necessarily be read as dictated by him or herself. Following this essential hermeneutic assumption, I do not see Heidegger as the authority of his own texts, and my interpretation sometimes goes against what Heidegger explic-itly writes.1 Such contradictions are not a hermeneutic goal in themselves but must be seen as a result of the grander project, which is to critically rethink and unframe Heidegger’s framing of technology. Heidegger’s own assump-tions, his basic concepts, and phenomenological descriptions of technology allow for other possible interpretations and perspectives than the ones he selects and develops at length in various texts.

Heidegger’s interpretations are often unfolded on a very fundamental level, which means that his thinking often appears very fruitful and open but is at times also rigid and eclectic. His characterization of the essence of modern technology is influenced by the fact that he sets seemingly idiosyncratic limits while removing others in a way that does not always make sense. This book uncovers the implicit lines of reasoning behind these boundaries and, at times, continues these lines of thinking into the terrain of the question-able. For this purpose it is necessary to fundamentally question, repeatedly, Heidegger’s approach and to set aside “the limits imposed by self-evidence” (VA, 24/OBT, 18).

It is also important to be aware of Heidegger’s own difficulties in under-standing modern technology. It would be misleading to believe that if we could only think as Heidegger does the difficulty of the task of determining the essence of technology would disappear. Heidegger is a thinker who has always emphasized and reflected on the moments of questioning, discord, and strife in the realm of thinking: “There is much in beings man cannot master.

Preface xv

But little comes to be known. The known remains an approximation, what is mastered insecure” (VA, 39/OBT, 29). At another point, Heidegger remarks on his own thinking—that enough would be gained if those phenomena he tried to develop would remain “worthy of questioning and thus have remained worthy of thought” (VA, 155/PLT, 158). “Through this [immanent critique], it must become clear the extent to which the critical question, which is the objective of thinking, belongs necessarily and continually to thinking” (SdD, 61; trans. RW). Thus Heidegger’s thinking wins an openness which should also make us skeptical of his own claims: “All proof is always only a sub-sequent undertaking on the basis of presuppositions. Anything at all can be proved, depending only on what presuppositions are made” (VA, 190/PLT, 220). According to Heidegger, philosophy is indeed capable of establish-ing such presuppositions, and this is what also makes philosophy as such questionable and even dangerous. This ambivalence and possible danger of philosophy is also manifest when Heidegger expresses his well-known state-ment that “every authentic philosophy is irrefutable” (GA 90, 215; trans. RW). And in this radicalization of philosophy we also see its fundamental importance, which is hard to overestimate and therefore also calls for a con-stant confrontation.

The following interpretations are not content with conventional periodiza-tions of Heidegger’s thinking. Seen from the matter at stake—that is, in this case, first and foremost technology—Heidegger’s early writings often provide insights that are highly productive for dealing with his thinking concerning technology in his middle and late writings. Dividing Heidegger’s writings per se into, for example, three separate periods is philosophically unsound. If we look more closely at his body of work, these phases may often be subdivided or joined together. Even the most nuanced, systematically motivated, chrono-logical trisection of his work challenges us, presents an anticipation of his thinking, and hides a number of significant links. Further sub-classifications of Heidegger’s work may lead to the isolation of crucial thoughts and may also render his path of thinking meaningless. Those who organize and divide Heidegger’s work into distinct phases determine its meaning and importance, and those who accept such divisions without questioning them, whether vol-untarily or involuntarily, go along with the implicit interpretations.

The present inquiry is more experimental in nature and departs from the matter at stake, namely technology, to test how Heidegger’s various insights and phenomenal descriptions can be used beneficially to reach the goals described above. This means that all such periodizations of his work shall be “bracketed out” in order to show how certain thoughts mutatis mutandis may be connected and divided. In this way, Heidegger’s early, middle, and late writings combined enable the intended criticism and subsequent new provi-sion and description of technology presented in this book.

Prefacexvi

This book contributes to the research insofar as it revises the concept of technology and presents a fundamental analysis and critique of Heidegger’s thinking. Both philosophers of technology, who are concerned with the expansion of modern technology, and Heidegger scholars engaged in under-standing Heidegger’s key concepts will find valuable insights, challenging criticism, and suggestions for further research in the present inquiry.

The book unfolds as a confrontation with Heidegger’s interpretation of technology. References to thinkers and concepts of ancient Greek philosophy are primarily taken from Heidegger, and the references to other thinkers are also made on the basis of Heidegger’s writings and with the intent to under-stand and reconsider his thoughts on technology.

In the center of interest of the present study is Heidegger’s text “The Question concerning Technology” (1954). This text is not only highly relevant when it comes to assessing Heidegger’s concept of technology, it also builds an exem-plary starting point for discussing a number of Heidegger’s early and late writ-ings and for investigating his philosophical legacy. Heidegger published “The Question Concerning Technology” as the first text in his prominent Collection of Lectures and Essays (Vorträge und Aufzätze). The text is based on a talk Hei-degger delivered in Munich over 60 years ago on a November day in 1953, which was probably his most admired public presentation. Heidegger spoke to an audience of 3,000 people placed in a big auditorium and in smaller annexed audi-toria, to which Heidegger’s high pitch voice found its way through the modern technology of loudspeakers.2 Among the prominent listeners were intellectuals such as Ernst Jünger, José Ortega y Gasset, and Hans Carossa. The first part of the present book (chapter 1, section A–C) may be read as an introduction to this famous and highly influential talk, yet Heidegger scholars will also be able to see how the book from the very onset points in a specific direction.

Søren Riis, Copenhagen 2018

NOTES

1. See also Heidegger’s own point: “If we open ourselves up to think about the poetic in Hölderlin’s poetry, then with such an attempt we are not seeking to find out what Hölderlin had himself imagined in the first saying of his poem. No study inves-tigates this and no thinking could contrive this. But let us suppose that this impossibil-ity was possible, thus assuming that we could go back in time and be exactly in the vicinity of Hölderlein’s imagination. This would in no way guarantee that we could think what Hölderlin’s Word poetizes. This is because the Word of the authentic poet always transcends the poet’s own intention and idea [. . .] The Word of the poet and the poetic within him supersede the poet and his saying [. . .] The Word of the poet is never his own or possession” (GA 52, 6; trans. Rebecca Walsh).

2. Morat (2007, 477).

Part I

THE ESSENCE OF MODERN TECHNOLOGY

3

Hardly any other twentieth-century text has been as influential for the interpre-tation of technology as Martin Heidegger’s essay “The Question Concerning Technology.”1 This essay originated from a lecture with the same title, which Heidegger gave at the Technical College in Munich on November 18, 1953. The lecture’s genesis is embedded in a framework which is worth bringing to mind before beginning the systematic critical analysis of the text. Heidegger’s lecture was part of a lecture series held at the Bavarian Academy of Fine Arts titled “The Arts in the Technological Age.” To inaugurate the lecture series, the president of the Academy, Emil Pretorius, stated, “It has become almost impos-sible to speak meaningfully about certain themes, whether political, social, or economical, whether science or art, without positioning them in light of the great critical transformation that the world is completely engaged in.”2 Heidegger’s text on technology is an expression of this critical time. His work is exceptional as it seeks to provide a diagnosis of this age while at the same time pointing to a way out of the crisis.3 The expression “critical” in the brief passage above, with all of its cultural pessimism, already reveals the discourse-horizon within which Heidegger’s thought process moves. And, not least, because of this ambivalent mood and its timely placement in Heidegger’s work, the text “The Question Concerning Technology” is an outstanding point of reference and chronologi-cal focal point in Heidegger’s engagement with technology. This text contains not only significant formulations of his early thoughts on technology but also decisive questions and sketches of further developments in his thought process, and occupies an exceptional position in Heidegger’s body of work itself as well as in philosophical research on technology.4 For this reason, the essay forms the basis of the critical examination of Heidegger’s interpretation of technol-ogy developed in this book. The line of thought and structure of this essay will therefore be explained in the following sections.

Chapter 1

Martin Heidegger’s Question Concerning Technology

Chapter 14

A QUESTION ABOUT THE FREE RELATIONSHIP

In “The Question Concerning Technology” Heidegger seeks to prepare and experience a free relationship with technology. Given these intentions, a guiding thread running throughout the entire text can be recognized, and by following this thread, the text’s programmatic character can be better understood. If this important, initial aspect of the essay is overlooked, it will remain unclear why Heidegger sees the investigation of the essence of technology as connected with the investigation of art at the end of his meditations. In the opening paragraphs of the text he states, “We shall be questioning concerning technology, and in so doing we should like to pre-pare a free relationship to it. The relationship will be free if it opens our human existence to the essence of technology. When we can respond to this essence, we shall be able to experience the technology within its own bounds” (VA, 9/QCT, 3). To “prepare” this free relationship to technology, according to Heidegger, the questioning concerning the essence of technol-ogy must first be understood (VA, 9/QCT, 4). Heidegger sees a fundamental difference between technology in concrete form and the essence of technol-ogy: “Technology is not equivalent to the essence of technology. When we are seeking the essence of ‘tree’, we have to become aware that That which pervades every tree, as tree, is not itself a tree that can be encoun-tered among all the other trees” (VA, 9/QCT, 4). From the very beginning, Heidegger wants to prepare his readers for a way of thinking: not to be focused on the individual aspects and blinded by them, but to move freely beyond them in order to search out the essence of things. Even if one is able to criticize the manifold technical dispositions, is able to consciously welcome them or can use them indifferently, one still moves, according to Heidegger, in the realm of understanding which is dominated by technol-ogy. To achieve a free relationship to technology, an understanding of technology must be disclosed which is not blinded by technical apparatuses.

Likewise, the essence of technology is by no means anything technological. Thus we shall never experience our relationship to the essence of technology so long as we merely conceive and push forward the technological, put up with it, or evade it. Everywhere we remain unfree and chained to technology, whether we passionately affirm or deny it. But we are delivered over to it in the worst possible way when we regard it as something neutral; for this conception of it, to which today we particularly like to do homage, makes us utterly blind to the essence of technology. (VA, 9/QCT, 4)

In other words, in the three types of relationships to technology, the human’s attention is either significantly focused on technology, namely in the case

Martin Heidegger’s Question Concerning Technology 5

of its affirmation or negation, or inattentive of technology if it is viewed as neutral. In any case, technology can still influence humans whether their attention is focused on it or not. Interestingly, Heidegger sees technology as especially powerful in exactly this way—where scrutiny has been forgotten. It is already clear from the beginning of “The Question Concerning Tech-nology” that Heidegger’s critical analysis of technology distinguishes itself from a long line of classical attitudes toward technology, which, for instance, characterize technology as the motor of human freedom, think of technology as independent of the freedom of humans, or hold freedom to be realizable primarily in the absence of technology.5

The possible misunderstandings of the investigation of technology have, however, not yet been cleared aside. The first step on this way to the essence of technology can easily be missed. The “essence” of technology is often understood as underlying technology. From this understanding, the two cur-rent conceptions of the essence of technology were formed, which Heidegger sees as correct but insufficient. In the first conception, we may distinguish between different types of artifacts, but the essence of technology remains as a means to an end. According to the other conception, technology is no longer equated with individual artifacts but is actually understood as a human activ-ity. For Heidegger, the first definition corresponds to an instrumental under-standing of technology; the second expresses, by contrast, an anthropological interpretation of technology. Heidegger connects both views of the essence of technology as he points to their common ground:

The two definitions of technology belong together. For to posit ends and pro-cure and utilize the means to them is a human activity. The manufacture and utilization of equipment, tools, and machines, the manufactured and used things themselves, and the needs and ends that they serve, all belong to what technol-ogy is. The whole complex of these contrivances is technology. [. . .] The cur-rent conception of technology, according to which it is a means and a human activity, can therefore be called the instrumental and anthropological definition of technology. (VA, 10/QCT, 4–5)

The instrumental and anthropological definition of technology is, in Hei-degger’s words, “indeed so uncannily correct” that it “is in obvious confor-mity with what we are envisioning when we talk about technology” (VA, 10/QCT, 5). But why does Heidegger depict it as “uncanny”? For Heidegger the danger in the instrumental definition is to interpret technology with the means of technological understanding without questioning it. This instrumental, anthropological understanding of technology, according to Heidegger, makes the human eager to dominate technology in his dealings with it: he plans the best way to master it, which causes him to become even more entangled in

Chapter 16

technological endeavors without coming any closer to a basic clarification of technology itself. In other words, if technology is represented as a means for acting human beings, then a demand inevitably emerges to get as much control as possible over technology in order to achieve the predetermined instrumental goal more easily.

Heidegger raises the question about what would happen if technology is in fact no mere means to an end—what if the “correct” definition of technol-ogy does not actually unveil its true essence. In order to be able to discuss this question, Heidegger makes a subtle yet weighty distinction between the “correct” and the “true” understanding of something. There is an important pause to make here along Heidegger’s convoluted path to prepare a free rela-tionship to technology, which will prove to be important later. If we focus on what is happening here, the “correct” distinguishes itself insofar as it says something about the real—what cannot be refuted without immediate contra-diction: “The correct always fixes upon something pertinent and whatever is under consideration” (VA, 11/QCT, 6). However, the correct is situated in an encompassing nexus, which cannot be understood through the correct alone. If one refers to human beings, for instance, as bipedal or as mammals, this is correct but does not answer the question about the essence of human beings. This is only revealed through the “true”: “In order to be correct, this fixing by no means needs to uncover the thing in question in its essence. Only at the point where such an uncovering happens does the true come to pass” (VA, 11/QCT, 6). The encompassing nexus that Heidegger searches for can only be uncovered through an understanding of the true. To begin his investigation of technology, Heidegger can orientate himself on the “correct,” because it contains a moment of the true, even if unintentionally. This means, as Hei-degger says, that we “must seek the true by way of the correct” (VA, 11/QCT, 6). Heidegger’s goal is exactly this: to investigate the encompassing nexus in which means and ends are brought to bear.

Means and ends belong to the realm of causality, which is where we must engage with the instrumental, anthropological definition of technology: “The end in keeping with which the kind of means to be used is determined is also considered a cause. Wherever ends are pursued and means are employed, wherever instrumentality reigns, there reigns causality” (VA, 11/QCT, 6). By stepping into the realm of causality, Heidegger places the four classical concepts of causation into his critical discussion of the essence of technology.

For centuries philosophy has taught that there are four causes: (1) the causa materialis, the material, the matter out of which, for example, the silver chalice is made of; (2) the causa formalis, the form, the shape into which the material enters; (3) the causa finalis, the end, for example, the sacrificial rite in relation to which the chalice required is determined as to its form and matter; (4) the


causa efficiens, which brings about the effect that is the finished, actual chalice, in this instance, the silversmith. What technology is, when represented as a means, discloses itself when we trace instrumentality back to fourfold causality. (VA, 11/QCT, 6)

To attain a better understanding of what is manifest in the fourfold causal-ity—through which the essence of technology can be understood more exactly—Heidegger moves further in his investigation and seeks the unity of the four causes, “From whence does it come that the causal character of the four causes is so unifiedly determined that they belong together?” (VA, 12/QCT, 7). Appealing to Greek philosophy, Heidegger explains that the four causes have a common ground in Aristotle’s influential concept aition. This concept is, for Heidegger, best translated with the concept of “indebtedness,” so that the four causes can now be understood through this regress as “ways of being responsible for something else” (VA, 12/QCT, 7). With this modi-fied terminology, Heidegger explains (in conceptual detail) the production of the silver vessel (i.e., “chalice”):

Silver is that out of which the silver chalice is made. As this matter (hyle), it is co-responsible for the chalice. The chalice is indebted to, i.e., owes thanks to, the silver for that out of which it consists. But this sacrificial-apparatus is indebted only to the silver. As a chalice, that which is indebted to the silver appears in the aspect of a chalice and not in that of a brooch or a ring. Thus the sacrificial-apparatus is at the same time indebted to the aspect (eidos) of chaliceness. Both the silver into which the aspect is admitted as chalice and the aspect in which the silver appears are in their respective ways co-responsible for the sacrificial-apparatus [. . .]. But there remains yet a third that is above all responsible for the sacrificial-apparatus. It is that which in advance confines the chalice within the realm of consecration and bestowal. Through this the chalice is circumscribed as sacrificial-apparatus. Circumscribing gives bounds to the thing. Within the bounds the thing does not stop; rather from out of them it begins to be what, after production, it will be. That which gives bounds, that which completes, in this sense is called in Greek telos, which is all too often translated as “aim” or “pur-pose”, and so misinterpreted [. . .]. Finally there is a fourth participant in the responsibility for the finished sacrificial-apparatus’ lying before us ready for use, i.e., the silversmith—but not at all because he, in working, brings about the finished sacrificial chalice as if it were the effect of the making; the silversmith is not a causa efficiens [. . .]. The silversmith is co-responsible as that from whence the sacrificial-apparatus’ bringing forth and resting-in-self take and retain their first departure. The three previously mentioned ways of being responsible owe thanks to the pondering of the silversmith for the “that” and the “how” of their coming into appearance and into play for the production of the sacrificial-apparatus. (VA, 12/QCT, 7–8)

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The difference between the Latin and Greek understandings of the production of the silver vessel in Heidegger’s explanation is above all: the Latin con-cept of causa finalis and its German translation as Zweck (purpose) give the impression of an end or a result, whereas the Greek concept of telos manifests another understanding of production through which the beginning and the completion of production are thought of as co-determining. This distinction leads to a different understanding of the silversmith. Whereas the silversmith is understood in Latin, for Heidegger, as a kind of source of strength that is the impetus of the bringing-forth, the Greek understanding heavily influenced by Aristotelian thought views the silversmith as an integrated moment of the bringing-forth of the silver vessel. It is, according to Heidegger, due to the “consideration” of the silversmith in the Greek world that the vessel and its form were brought-forth in the first place. In this sense it is also the silver-smith who gathers the “three aforementioned ways of being responsible and indebted” (VA, 13/QCT, 8).

Ultimately there is still a third crucial difference between the Greek and Latin terminologies, which Heidegger wishes to point out. This difference also concerns the concept of cause in Greek, which is understood as respon-sibility. Whereas the concept of cause is related to reality, thus belonging to the realm of mutually effective things, the concept of indebtedness belongs to a realm that is much more closely connected to the process of bringing-forth (VA, 14/QCT, 9). According to Heidegger, however, the current moral defi-nition of indebtedness covers up the original Greek meaning of the word and thus obstructs insight into the realm of the essence of causality. Technology is, therefore, easy to misunderstand.

In order to guard against such misinterpretations of being responsible and being indebted, let us clarify the four ways of being responsible in terms of that for which they are responsible. According to our example, they are responsible for the silver chalice’s lying ready before us as a sacrificial-apparatus. Lying before and lying ready (hypokeisthai) characterizes the presencing of something that presences. The four ways of being responsible bring something into appearance. They let it come forth into presencing [An-wesen]. They set it free to that place and so start it on its way, namely, into its complete arrival. The principal char-acteristic of being responsible is this starting something on its way into arrival [. . .]. The common and narrower meaning of “occasion” in contrast is nothing more than striking against and releasing, and means a kind of secondary cause within the whole of causality. (VA, 14/QCT, 9–10)

Heidegger connects “indebtedness” with “starting something on its way into arrival,” which in turn can also be read as a kind of “bringing-forth.” To improve our understanding of indebtedness and take a step closer to the


essence of technology, we must look more closely at what Heidegger means by “bringing-forth.”

It is of utmost importance that we think bringing-forth in its full scope and at the same time in the sense in which the Greeks thought it. Not only handcrafted manufacture, not only artistic and poetic bringing into appearance and concrete imagery, is a bringing-forth, poïesis. Physis is indeed poïesis in the highest sense. For what presences by means of physis has the bursting open belonging to bringing-forth, e.g., the bursting of a blossom into bloom, in itself (en heau-toi). In contrast, what is brought forth by the artisan or the artist, e.g., the silver chalice, has the bursting open belonging to bringing-forth not in itself, but in another (en alloi), in the craftsman or artist. (VA, 15/QCT, 10–11)

We have come to a point that is decisive for Heidegger’s subsequent way of thinking concerning technology. The bringing-forth brings something into appearance—it discloses something that was concealed. Heidegger refers to this process as “the revealing,” which is termed “aletheia” in Greek, “veritas” in Latin, “Wahrheit” in German, and “truth” in English. Heidegger asserts that the bringing-forth, and thus the anthropological, instrumental under-standing of technology, must be fathomed according to the concept of truth if we seek to comprehend its essential nature.

Following the question concerning the essence of technology, we have taken an unusual path for the investigation of technology with Heidegger; we have now arrived at the concept of truth. Starting from an anthropological, instru-mental understanding of technology, Heidegger initially makes an abstract distinction between the correct and the true understanding. Following this distinction, Heidegger turns toward the anthropological, instrumental defini-tion of technology again and attempts to show that this definition of technol-ogy belongs to the realm of causality.

According to Heidegger, causality is not thought uniformly in its Latin linguistic use. This is why we can only approach the essence of technology by referring to the Aristotelian influenced term of causality as “indebted-ness.” The concept of indebtedness could in turn lead to misunderstandings, which is why it is also necessary to interpret the term in accordance with the originary Greek understanding of it. This shows that the indebtedness, and thus the common ground of causality, is to be understood in view of the process of bringing-forth. “Bringing-forth” brings something forth out of concealment and into unconcealment, denoting at the same time the basic sense of the Greek concept for truth, aletheia. In terms of its essence, tech-nology belongs to the realm of truth as revealing. Heidegger concludes his introductory considerations by announcing the second step along his path

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of thinking: “But where have we strayed to? We are questioning concerning technology, and we have arrived now at aletheia, at revealing. What has the essence of technology to do with revealing? The answer: everything. For every bringing-forth is grounded in revealing” (VA, 16/QCT, 12).

To confirm this insight, Heidegger now wants to reestablish the nexus between technology and truth, but from another point of departure which sig-nificantly shortens the distance between the two concepts and allows him to immediately bring the reader into contact with Greek thought. In this second line of thought, Heidegger does not depart from the everyday instrumental, anthropological understanding of technology.

Technology, in this reaffirmation and second run through of the preceding investigation, is derived from the Greek concept techne. In ancient Greek, techne refers not only to handiwork but also to the “Tun und Können” (accomplishment and ability) in the fine arts. For the Greeks, techne belongs to the bringing-forth, “to poïesis; it is something poetic” (VA, 16/QCT, 13). As mentioned, techne also belongs to the realm of truth. This relationship is reinforced by a further meaning of techne: it is also the term for a particular kind of knowing, one which gives information about something and is in this sense also a revealing. As a kind of knowing, techne is a manifestation of aletheia, truth.

Technê is a mode of alêtheuein. It reveals whatever does not bring itself forth and does not yet lie here before us, whatever can look and turn out now one way and now another [. . .]. Thus what is decisive in technê does not lie at all in making and manipulating nor in the using of means, but rather in the afore-mentioned revealing. It is as revealing, and not as manufacturing, that technê is a bringing-forth. (VA, 17/QCT, 13)

From both points of departure in view of the question concerning technology, Heidegger leaves behind the realm of the mere “correct” and reveals to his readers the importance of the realm of truth for understanding the essence of technology. In doing so he removes the question concerning technology from the everyday understanding and seeks to make it meaningful for the human being’s search for freedom in the twentieth century, thus assigning his inves-tigation of technology a central place in philosophy. In keeping with his defi-nition and limitation of technology, Heidegger can now continue questioning and nuancing the understanding of the essence of technology. In question here is whether his former definition of technology is instructive and precise enough, since he started out questioning concerning modern technology but answered with ancient thoughts. “And it is precisely the latter [modern technology] and it alone that is the disturbing thing, that moves us to ask the question concerning technology per se” (VA, 17/QCT, 13–14).


THE ESSENCE OF MODERN TECHNOLOGY THOUGHT OF AS ENFRAMING

Both the essence of modern technology and the essence of ancient techne belong to the realm of revealing for Heidegger albeit in different ways. We get a first impression of the exceptional position of modern technology in Heidegger’s text when the “techniques of the handcraftsman” are compared to “machine-powered technology.” In this comparison, machine-powered technology differs from handiwork technology since there is something else at play in the former—something which is highly dangerous, according to Heidegger. In contrast to ancient techne the revealing of modern technol-ogy places all of nature into an overarching use-nexus of usability and consumability: “And yet the revealing that holds sway throughout modern technology does not unfold into a bringing-forth in the sense of poïesis. The revealing that rules in modern technology is a challenging [Herausfordern], which puts to nature the unreasonable demand that it supply energy that can be extracted and stored as such” (VA, 18/QCT, 14).

Heidegger gives evidence for this unique aspect of modern technology with a series of examples: “A tract of land is challenged into the putting out of coal and ore. The earth now reveals itself as a coal mining district, the soil as a mineral deposit” (VA, 18/QCT, 14; italics SR). Even the field of the peasant appears differently in the age of modern technology: “But meanwhile even the cultivation of the field has come under the grip of another kind of setting-in-order, which sets upon nature. It sets upon it in the sense of challenging it. Agriculture is now the mechanized food industry” (VA, 18/QCT, 15). The “setting-upon” (Stellen) expressed in “to produce” (herstellen), “to set out” (herausstellen), and “to make available” (zur Verfügung stellen) characterizes the particular way that modern tech-nology reveals nature. This “setting-upon” should in no way be understood as static, but rather is conceived of by Heidegger as “ready to use” (Bereit-stellen)—ready to use in order to challenge nature for more energy in other domains. Even Heidegger’s now famous description of the hydroelectric plant in the Rhine can be interpreted in this context in relation to the “ready to use” of the various interlocking technologies, where the goal becomes the means of the subsequent goals.

The hydroelectric plant is set into the current of the Rhine. It sets the turbines turning. This turning sets those machines in motion whose thrust sets going the electric current for which the long-distance power station and its network of cables are set up to dispatch electricity. In the context of the interlocking processes pertaining to the orderly disposition of electrical energy, even the Rhine itself appears as something at our command [. . .]. What the river is now,

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namely, a waterpower supplier, derives from out of the essence of the power sta-tion. In order that we may even remotely consider the monstrousness that reigns here, let us ponder for a moment the contrast that speaks out of the two titles, “The Rhine” as dammed up into the power works, and “The Rhine” as uttered out of the art work, in Hölderlin’s hymn by that name. (VA, 19/QCT, 16)

Modern technology reveals the Rhine when it reduces the Rhine’s own power to the power plant’s tightly connected network of technical appa-ratuses and to its service. “That challenging happens in that the energy concealed in nature is unlocked, what is unlocked is transformed, what is transformed is stored up, what is stored up is, in turn, distributed, and what is distributed is switched about ever anew” (VA, 20/QCT, 16). In the cir-culation of producing (Herstellen) and ordering (Bestellen) of energies, the challenging revealing of modern technology is at the same time concerned with securing and fixing nature in this circle. Nature continually shows itself in this circuit as a kind of reserve that Heidegger terms “standing-reserve,” which can be used as a resource. In other words, nature as stand-ing-reserve gets its position in the technical circulation. Once revealed as standing-reserve, nature is no longer able to resist; the resistance of objects and the independence of nature are lost as both are caught in the undertow of technology in the “objectlessness of standing-reserve” (VA, 22/QCT, 19); both nature and objects are only explainable as an existing function for consumption in their relation to use, ultimately conforming to the circula-tion of ordering and use.

At the same time we have to realize that the position of the human being in the realm of the essence of technology is always twofold: On the one hand, human beings carry out the challenging setting-upon whereby they continue to drive the technical revealing; as orderers and providers they are not merely standing-reserve. On the other, neither unconcealment nor the possibility of revealing are under their control; consequently, they can be challenged by the essence of technology as well.

Wherever man opens his eyes and ears, unlocks his heart, and gives himself over to meditating and striving, shaping and working, entreating and thanking, he finds himself everywhere already brought into the unconcealed. The uncon-cealment of the unconcealed has already come to pass whenever it calls man forth into the modes of revealing allotted to him. When man, in his way, from within unconcealment reveals that which presences, he merely responds to the call of unconcealment even when he contradicts it. Thus when man, investigat-ing, observing, ensnares nature as an area of his own conceiving, he has already been claimed by a way of revealing that challenges him to approach nature as an object of research, until even the object disappears into the objectlessness of standing-reserve. (VA, 22/QCT, 18–19)


The human being is, in other words, a “revealer” actively performing the process of revealing nature; she is a part of the revealing process and is also essentially defined and challenged by the revealing happening. Reality shows itself to her beforehand as revealed; reality always carries a certain meaning for human beings. The ordering revealing is for this reason more than a human work, as is evident in the following: “That challenging gathers man into ordering” (VA, 23/QCT, 19). In the age of modern technology, the human being stands on the threshold between being the one who actively orders and the passively ordered standing-reserve when she is used for a spe-cific purpose, a result of the dynamic of technology.

The specific kind of revealing of modern technology that happens to human beings and influences their acting is now investigated and defined by Hei-degger in more detail. As Heidegger continues to demarcate the revealing happening of modern technology, he resorts to two other basic thoughts. With reference to the two concepts “Gebirg” (mountain chain) and “Gemüt” (disposition), Heidegger shows that the prefix “ge” has the character of gath-ering: That which gives the “Bergen” (mountains) its unified character is captured in the word “Gebirge”; similarly “Gemüt” is the gathering concept for the way in which someone feels. The various ways modern technology reveals the world to human beings as well as challenges them has been char-acterized by Heidegger up until this point with different variants of Stellen (setting-upon). By using the German prefix “ge,” Heidegger summarizes all the particular ways of revealing through modern technology with one word, a term he coined Ge-stell: “Enframing [Ge-stell] means the gathering together of that setting-upon which sets upon man, i.e., challenges him forth, to reveal the real, in the mode of ordering, as standing-reserve. Enframing means that way of revealing which holds sway in the essence of modern technology and which is itself nothing technological” (VA, 24/QCT, 20).

With this strange use of the term Ge-stell (Enframing), Heidegger has achieved two things. First, he has worked the setting-upon revealing of modern technology into one concept, which at the same time anticipates phe-nomenologically the systematic character of the process of revealing beyond mere etymology. Enframing in its everyday meaning (for instance, the word Büchergestell [book case, literally “book frame”]) symbolizes a unified, ordered system of components, or a “gathered setting-upon” of particulari-ties, which determines the relation of the various parts and thus even defines its meaning. Second, Heidegger’s new application of Enframing is not itself something technical, and this gives the term a remarkable accentuation which serves to reflect on the technical process of revealing once more. Heidegger justifies his characteristic style—using an everyday word in an unusual manner, yet still in a way that is similar to the original understanding—by

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claiming that it is a part of the process of thought itself. Plato also used con-cepts in an extremely atypical way.6

With this foundational and comprehensive interpretation of the essence of technology as Enframing, Heidegger can set aside the instrumental, anthro-pological definition of the essence of technology while at the same time cor-recting another difficult misunderstanding.

The merely instrumental, merely anthropological definition of technology is therefore in principle untenable. And it cannot be rounded out by being referred back to some metaphysical or religious explanation that undergirds it. It remains true, nonetheless, that man in the technological age is, in a particularly striking way, challenged forth into revealing. That revealing concerns nature, above all, as the chief storehouse of the standing energy reserve. Accordingly, man’s ordering attitude and behavior display themselves first in the rise of modern physics as an exact science. (VA, 25/QCT, 21)

Heidegger does not see the modern age’s precise, mathematically based natu-ral sciences as the precursor to technology. The essence of technology is not understood when it is interpreted as an applied science, because the path of modern natural science was actually prepared by the essence of technology. Against this reversal, where modern technology precedes the modern age’s natural sciences, Heidegger himself even objects, claiming that it doesn’t immediately correspond to the facts since modern technology first emerged 200 years after the natural science breakthrough of the modern age. However, according to Heidegger, this objection taken in a narrow sense misses the point, because Enframing is not a material artifact but a way of revealing. Furthermore, Heidegger claims that what shows itself later can indeed be earlier with respect to its essence.

The relationship between modern technology and the modern natural sci-ences also behaves in exactly this way. The modern age’s exact natural sci-ences, in particular mathematical physics, are concerned with nature insofar as it is already set up in a calculable nexus; and this enframing of nature is precisely a shape of the setting-upon that corresponds to the challenging of Enframing. In other words, Heidegger unfolds the nexus so that the modern age’s natural sciences already in theory represent reality in a fixed nexus, which shows key traits of Enframing. The ways in which the mathemati-cal sciences represent nature already manifest the work of Enframing. The representing (Vor-stellen), according to Heidegger, is the setting-up (Auf-stellen) of nature, which implicitly occurs with each individual judgment of the natural sciences about nature and for this reason cannot be understood by the natural sciences. The representing of the mathematical sciences is guided


by an ideal which represents nature, or, an ideal to which nature is adjusted (nachstellen), and this ideal is in fact that nature can be ascertained (fest-stell-bar) by way of calculation. In this sense the essence of technology emerges earlier than the modern age’s natural sciences and is reconfirmed by them. Heidegger illustrates this nexus with the unreflected, prefabricated openness toward nature that comes into appearance in the natural science experiment:

Modern science’s way of representing pursues and entraps nature as a calcu-lable coherence of forces. Modern physics is not experimental physics because it applies apparatus to the questioning of nature. Rather the reverse is true. Because physics, indeed already as pure theory, sets nature up to exhibit itself as a coherence of forces calculable in advance, it therefore orders its experiments precisely for the purpose of asking whether and how nature reports itself when set up in this way. (VA, 25/QCT, 21)

Modern science is, for Heidegger, already dependent on the revealed truth of Enframing, that is, it is as theory a doing, which aims at a practical, con-ceptual framing of nature. The essence of modern technology is neither to be conceived of as a human instrument nor an applied science, but as a way to produce (Herstellung) and determine (Feststellung) nature. Only after this framing of the world is it possible for modern science to unfold.

THE LIMITATIONS OF TECHNOLOGY

Though Enframing has been elaborated conceptually, the guiding ques-tion aiming at the unfolding of the essence of technology still has not been completely answered, “if to answer means to respond, in the sense of cor-respond (Entsprechung), to the essence of what is being asked about” (VA, 27/QCT, 23). Heidegger understands correspondence as the articulated answer to his questioning of essence: correspondence doesn’t mean simply yielding to the essence of technology, but one must above all first perceive the demand of Enframing. And, according to the German prefix “ent,” one must “remove” herself from Enframing and experience it in its limitations by understanding it as a specific demand. The response to the question concerning the essence of technology thus consists in the answering of this question in the sense that what is questioned is at the same time delimited.7

The response conceived of here does not occur on its own, quite the contrary. Enframing fundamentally challenges humans to reveal reality as standing-reserve and thus simultaneously threatens to disguise the precon-dition for such a correspondence and block any significant relation to it. According to Heidegger, the only way out of the rule of Enframing is to

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expose oneself to its danger and thus to experience it distinctly. Whether modern humans are in agreement or not, they still find themselves in the realm of Enframing and have already been addressed by it. Human beings must first therefore become conscious of the situation.

Enframing [Gestell] is the gathering together that belongs to that setting-upon which sets upon man and puts him in position to reveal the real, in the mode of ordering, as standing-reserve. As the one who is challenged forth in this way, man stands within the essential realm of Enframing. He can never take up a relationship to it only subsequently. Thus the question as to how we are to arrive at a relationship to the essence of technology, asked in this way, always comes too late. But never too late comes the question as to whether we actually experi-ence ourselves as the ones whose activities everywhere, public and private, are challenged forth by Enframing. Above all, never too late comes the question as to whether and how we actually admit ourselves into that wherein Enframing itself comes to presence. (VA, 27/QCT, 24; italics SR)

Viewed differently, this means that Enframing leads human beings onto a specific path where reality is revealed as standing-reserve. More precisely, “‘To start upon a way’ means ‘to send’ [schicken] in our ordinary language” (VA, 28/QCT, 24). According to the linguistic considerations taken into account by Heidegger as he shaped the word Enframing, he can now char-acterize the gathering revealing of this sending of Enframing as “destining” (Ge-schick). Destining forms in this sense, for Heidegger, the essence of his-tory: Without destining, there is no history. This sending of the human being can occur in various ways, of which Heidegger emphasizes the destining of Enframing; regardless of how the sending emerges, it is to be understood as a type of bringing-forth, because it brings forth a particular way of the human being. In other words, the revealing follows a certain destining, because revealing unveils reality in a certain constellation, which calls for the human being to have a specific focus and prescribes that he “derive all his standards on this basis” (VA, 29/QCT, 26).

Heidegger claims that this predetermined course (Fügung) of human beings is to be understood as a type of fate, but is not carried out with neces-sity: “Always the destining of revealing holds complete sway over man. But that destining is never a fate that compels. For man becomes truly free only insofar as he belongs to the realm of destining and so becomes one who lis-tens and hears [Hörender], and not one who is simply constrained to obey [Höriger]” (VA, 28/QCT, 25; italics SR). In Heidegger’s text, “hearing” is meant as the ability that enables human beings to respond to the demand of Enframing and thus to achieve a free relationship to modern technology.


With this account of the human relationship to destining, Heidegger can continue to explain his understanding of the free relationship to technology. As he already clarified at the beginning of his lecture, his interpretation of freedom diverges from its common meaning as an expression of the human will. Seen in this way, freedom would be mere arbitrariness for Heidegger; freedom in Heidegger’s sense is connected to the revealing and is thus related to truth, as there must be, in advance, an open space within which anything at all can come into appearance. Because freedom is in the background of the process of revealing, it is necessary for the revealing of beings.

Freedom governs the open in the sense of the cleared and lighted up, i.e., of the revealed [. . .]. All revealing comes out of the open, goes into the open, and brings into the open. The freedom of the open consists neither in unfettered arbi-trariness nor in the constraint of mere laws. Freedom is that which conceals in a way that opens to light, in whose clearing there shimmers that veil that covers what comes to presence of all truth and lets the veil appear as what veils. Free-dom is the realm of the destining that at any given time starts a revealing upon its way [. . .]. These sentences express something different from the talk that we hear more frequently, to the effect that technology is the fate of our age, where “fate” means the inevitableness of an unalterable course. (VA, 29/QCT, 25)

Instead of being led blindly by destining and revealing reality in the sense of standing-reserve, freedom places the possibility before humans—the pos-sibility to be attentive to unconcealment in order to see and experience their own essence in this realm. In this realm, the human being can break free from the constraints of Enframing, since there is a “way” here into the open where she can, as the one who contributes to the revealing, partake in the Free and experience it herself. In this sense, human beings can find a free relationship to technology by experiencing themselves in relation to the special open-ness, which precedes each revealing and thus Enframing (it first shows itself through the revealing). Human beings are thus free when they understand and experience themselves as belonging to this open, free realm. This also means, paradoxically, that human beings are free when they experience themselves as bound to the revealing occurrence of beings. On this path, human beings can respond to the essence of technology, namely, as merely one way of revealing among other possible ways. However, human beings may also react passively to the effects of this occurrence. If this is the case, they are unknow-ingly led onto the dangerous path of Enframing.

Destining is that which decides the amount of leeway that human beings have: “In whatever way the destining of revealing may hold sway, the unconcealment in which everything that is shows itself at any given time

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harbors the danger that man may quail at the unconcealed and may mis-interpret it” (VA, 30/QCT, 26). And immediately thereafter Heidegger states, “The destining of revealing is in itself not just any danger, but danger as such” (VA, 30/QCT, 26). The destining of revealing is the epitome of that which endangers humans. The destining challenges forth humans to be driven thoughtlessly by it and consequently to misunder-stand their freedom, to distort the truth, and experience it as derived from “correctness.” This danger is especially acute when destining dominates in the way of Enframing—“it is thus supreme danger” (VA, 30/QCT, 26). If Enframing carves out the way for human beings, then it leaves us entranced by the illusion that the scope of our freedom, the conditions of truth, and thus our very Reality are controlled by human beings. If this is the case, following Heidegger’s interpretation, the human being already obeys the essence of modern technology and negates his own belonging to the free.

As soon as what is unconcealed no longer concerns man even as object, but does so, rather, exclusively as standing-reserve, and man in the midst of objectless-ness is nothing but the orderer of the standing-reserve, then he comes to the very brink of a precipitous fall; that is, he comes to the point where he himself will have to be taken as standing-reserve. Meanwhile man, precisely as the one so threatened, exalts himself to the posture of lord of the earth. In this way the impression comes to prevail that everything man encounters exists only insofar as it is his construct. This illusion gives rise in turn to one final delusion: it seems as though man everywhere and always encounters only himself [. . .]. In truth, however, precisely nowhere does man today any longer encounter him-self, i.e., his essence. (VA, 30/QCT, 27)

Enframing qua destining threatens to determine each human relation to the world, safeguarding and steering it as standing-reserve. Every other kind of revealing which Heidegger unfolds in the sense of poiesis is covered up by it. But this extreme danger of Enframing is not, however, to be understood as an actual emergency situation. At this point of the development of his thought, Heidegger turns his attention to a poet who underwent the needy modern period himself and was at the same time able to experience nature and beings differently from the destining of Enframing. Heidegger refers at this crucial point in “The Question Concerning Technology” to Friedrich Hölderlin. In his hymn “The Rhine,” Hölderlin manages to make the river appear as completely different from the revealing through the hydroelectric power plant. Hölderlin thought that every danger could also open up a way into the saving power. Heidegger cites a passage in the late hymn by Hölderlin titled “Patmos” (1804): “But where there is danger, grows The saving power also” (VA, 32/QCT, 28). As the destining of Enframing appears to be an impasse,


Heidegger uncovers with Hölderlin the possibility of being saved amidst the danger. How does Heidegger envision this way out?

If the danger that results from the destining of Enframing is that it causes human beings to misunderstand themselves and fundamentally misjudge the essence of freedom, then “the saving power” enables humans to relate to the essence “in order to bring the essence for the first time into its genuine appearing” (VA, 32/QCT, 28). Accordingly Enframing must be more than the disguise of truth; it must be possible to experience the saving power precisely where the supreme danger lies. With this insight acquired from Hölderlin, Heidegger again turns to the question concerning the essence of technol-ogy—at this point to show in more detail the relation between the danger of Enframing and the growing saving power.

To understand what is meant by “to fetch something home into its essence” (VA, 32/QCT, 28), Heidegger gives the concept of essence a spe-cial place in his investigation. Until now the concept of essence has been conceived of as the logic of a genus—and now Heidegger has developed the essence of technology against the background of the anthropological, instrumental understanding. In this sense, Heidegger initially situates the concept of essence together with the “whatness” of something. “Is then the essence of technology, Enframing [Gestell], the common genus for every-thing technological? If that were the case then the steam turbine, the radio transmitter, and the cyclotron would each be an Enframing. But the word ‘Enframing’ does not mean here a tool or any kind of apparatus” (VA, 33/QCT, 29). Enframing is not a part of the standing-reserve but is the chal-lenging revealing that first discloses reality as standing-reserve. “Enfram-ing, as a destining of revealing, is indeed the essence of technology, but never in the sense of genus and essentia. If we pay heed to this, something astounding strikes us: It is technology itself that makes the demand on us to think in another way what is usually understood by ‘essence’” (VA, 34/QCT, 30).

Heidegger sees this understanding of the concept of essence in the concepts “house-essence” (Hauswesen) and “state-essence” (Staatswesen). In these examples, essence is conceived of as much more dynamical and is related to a special temporal process; as Heidegger says, in this nexus essence means “the ways in which house and state hold sway, administer themselves, develop and decay” (VA, 34/QCT, 30). Essence is accordingly to be understood as a verb. In order to justify this interpretation, Heidegger points to how the poet Johann Peter Hebel used the term “Weserei’” to depict essence as an action. Heidegger writes, “Wesen [essence] understood as a verb is the same as währen [to last or endure], not only in terms of meaning, but also in terms of the phonetic formation of the word” (VA, 34/QCT, 30). For Heidegger, everything that essences endures and that which essences of technology is

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thus the enduring of Enframing. Based on the words of a third poet, Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, Heidegger discovers the word fortgewähren (granting permanent endurance), within which he hears with Goethe the harmony of währen (to endure) and gewähren (to grant). Heidegger even emphasizes, “Only what is granted endures. That which endures primally out of the earli-est beginning is what grants” (VA, 35/QCT, 31).

It seems, however, quite astonishing that the essence of technology should have exactly this character since Enframing appears to challenge and, accord-ingly, cannot immediately grant anything. Because the challenging revealing of Enframing sends human beings on a certain path, without which there would be no challenging, the challenging yields that Enframing both gives and maintains this path. Heidegger can thus say, “As this destining, the com-ing to presence of technology gives man entry into That which, of himself, he can neither invent nor in any way make” (VA, 35/QCT, 31).

Conversely, the event of revealing also needs humans: destining depends on humans, as revealing also needs human cooperation to reveal the granted path. And it is in this sense that the human being has a part in the event of revealing: “Every destining of revealing comes to pass from out of a granting and as such a granting. For it is granting that first conveys to man that share in revealing which the coming-to-pass [Ereignis] of revealing needs. As the one so needed and used, man is given to belong to the coming-to-pass of truth” (VA, 36/QCT, 32). This mutual dependence expressed in the granting of destining is exactly that which connects the dangerous side of Enframing with the saving side. Human cooperation concerning the granting can connect the human being to truth and freedom, and even bring him into the “highest dignity of his essence.”

The granting that sends in one way or another into revealing is as such the sav-ing power. For the saving power lets man see and enter into the highest dignity of his essence. This dignity lies in keeping watch over the unconcealment—and with it, from the first, the concealment—of all coming to presence on this earth. It is precisely in Enframing, which threatens to sweep man away into ordering as the supposed single way of revealing, and so thrusts man into the danger of the surrender of his free essence—it is precisely in this extreme danger that the innermost indestructible belongingness of man within granting may come to light, provided that we, for our part, begin to pay heed to the coming to presence of technology. Thus the coming to presence of technology harbors in itself what we least suspect, the possible arising of the saving power. (VA, 36/QCT, 32)

The important conclusion to be drawn from Heidegger’s considerations is that the essence of technology can now be understood in its fundamentally ambiguous meaning: On the one hand, Enframing challenges human beings


to uncover reality qua standing-reserve and thus threatens to block their view of the process of revealing. On the other, Enframing is only to be understood as one possible destining of revealing of the real. If the human being manages to see her participation in the process of revealing, then she obtains insights into that which connects her to freedom and truth. Thus Heidegger can say that Enframing also harbors the saving power in itself. The danger implicit in the ambiguity of Enframing can never be immediately encountered, that is, it can never be directly encountered by a technical perspective, which assesses the ontic consequences, says Heidegger. “But human reflection can ponder the fact that all saving power must be of a higher essence than what is endan-gered, though at the same time kindred to it” (VA, 38/QCT, 34). Such an elaborate reflection forms Heidegger’s question concerning technology, that is, his lecture presents such a reflected encounter with modern technology.

Heidegger ends his investigation of technology by drawing attention once more to the ancient epoch in which technology was named techne and was synonymous with the fine arts. The techne was at that time considered to be the revealing “that brings forth truth into the splendor of radiance appearing” (VA, 38/QCT, 34). The intention of the Heideggerian considerations is for truth to appear again through technology: “Yet we can be astounded. Before what? Before this other possibility: that the frenziedness of technology may entrench itself everywhere to such an extent that someday, throughout every-thing technological, the essence of technology may come to presence in the coming-to-pass of truth” (VA, 39/QCT, 35; italics SR). For the truth to be vis-ible by means of the technological apparatus, there must be a critical exami-nation of technology which positively outlines the essence of technology and negatively demarcates it from the essence of other beings. For Heidegger, such a critical examination must start from the realm of essence kindred to it, but which at the same time resists it: “Such a realm is art. But certainly only if reflection on art, for its part, does not shut its eyes to the constellation of truth after which we are questioning” (VA, 39/QCT, 35). In this realm, where art and modern technology collide, and where we investigated Heidegger’s guiding question, technology is difficult to comprehend; and art is liberated from its outward, aesthetic aspects. The essence of technology now shows itself as concealed and as sent to be a saving power, because it not only points to the open interaction between unconcealment and concealment but is also able to “send” humans to their demise. “The closer we come to the danger, the more brightly do the ways into the saving power begin to shine and the more questioning we become. For questioning is the piety of thought” (VA, 40/QCT, 35).

How “pious” Heidegger’s question concerning the essence of technology actually is—if it strives to carve out a path leading to a liberating relationship

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to modern technology—will be investigated in the following. To address Heidegger’s understanding of the essence of technology more thoroughly, we will take this exposed place as our starting point: the open and cryptic ending of Heidegger’s essay.

NOTES

1. See also: “Most philosophers of technology would probably agree that, for good or ill, Martin Heidegger’s interpretation of technology, its meaning in Western his-tory, and its role in contemporary human affairs is probably the single most influential position in the field” (Scharff and Dusek 2003, 247).

2. Bayrischen Akademie der schönen Künste (1956, 9; italics SR, trans. RW). Compare to Heidegger’s remark about the series of lectures: “I only touch on a few questions here. Of these are the many diverse questions facing us today. In the next days you will hear many important things and that is in terms of very different aspects: not in the presumptuous sense of ready-to-use solutions to the pressing prob-lems, but in a modest sense in which the problems will be shown and marked with urgency. This shall at the same time rouse us to an ongoing reflection, and rouse each person who can hear and wants to hear to become urgently concerned about what is at stake. Only when we are aware of this, have become very conscious of it, do we have the strength to encounter the changeable with the correct inner ability to change” (Bayrischen Akademie der schönen Künste 1956, 10; trans. RW).

3. This ambivalent relation to his own era was a lifelong concern for Heidegger. It is expressed concisely in a letter from 1966 to his student Eugen Fink. Heidegger writes, “The existing style of philosophy and its validity will presumably disappear from the field of vision of humans in the technical world-civilization. But the end of philosophy is not the end of thinking. This is why the question becomes press-ing, whether thinking will accept the challenge standing before it and how thinking will fair over the course of time. [It is my wish] You want to be of assistance in first making this emergency visible—the emergency in which thinking is compelled by the boundless power already in the technical sciences” (Heidegger, Die Grundbegriffe der Metaphysik. Welt—Endlichkeit—Einsamkeit 1984, 535; italics SR, trans. RW).

4. What is more, this text precedes all of the other texts in the volume Vorträge und Aufsätze, which Heidegger himself prepared for publication.

5. Cf. Dessauer (1927); Mumford, The Myth of the Machine (1967); and Ortega y Gasset (1947).

6. See also: “We, late born, are no longer in a position to appreciate the signifi-cance of Plato’s daring to use the word eidos for that which in everything and in each particular thing endures as present. For eidos, in the common speech, meant the outward aspect [Ansicht] that a visible thing offers to the physical eye. Plato exacts of this word, however, something utterly extraordinary: that it name what precisely is not and never will be perceivable with physical eyes” (VA, 23/QCT, 20).

7. See Entsprechen in Grimm (1862, 628).

23

UNDER THE RULE OF ENFRAMING

The overall structure of “The Question Concerning Technology” and Heidegger’s fundamental ideas about technology have been presented sys-tematically in chapter 1. The novel terminology that sets up Heidegger’s analysis of technology, however, makes it necessary for the reader to view the text within a larger context. The full scope of the text’s groundbreaking character and the fundamental concepts developed within it cannot yet be understood in their entire challenging potential; more distance and extensive consideration are necessary.

Heidegger’s thoughts concerning his guiding question about the essence of technology appear to develop logically: he begins with the everyday under-standing of technology; he then uses this basis to develop his fundamental concepts, while at the same leading the reader onto a specific path. Using a method that can be termed, in Heidegger’s own words, “the step-by-step inquiry that pursues the subject matter,” Heidegger guides the reader through the different stations of the text (WM, 271/PA, 207). Not without reason, as we shall see in the following, Heidegger connects the act of questioning with the “piety of thought” found at the end of his essay on technology: “For questioning is the piety of tho

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