Considering the key mediating role that smartphones play in everyday life, a postphenomenological analysis to better understand how we have power over these devices, how these artefacts empower and simultaneously can overpower us, seems highly relevant. This article will show that in order to engage in such a much-needed postphenomenological analysis, one will first have to address three fundamental, methodological challenges. The first challenge is brought forth by the personalized interface of smartphones, hindering postphenomenologists to unravel the so-called multistability of the device through variational analysis, which typically is an anchoring point in their analysis. The second challenge is that the networked ontology of smartphones disrupts the ideal-typical hermeneutic relationship end-users have with their smartphone. The third, closely related challenge comes with the general focus of postphenomenology on the everyday life, first-person experience of users which leaves many, significant stabilities hidden behind the smartphone’s interface. The hypothesis of this article is that some people may actually be in a position to look beyond the interface of their smartphones. Their every-day life experience of the smartphone differs from the experience of most smartphone owners because, amongst others, they are imbedded in a macroperception which allows them to bring to the fore what the design of the artefact may hide for others. However, our current postphenomenological lens is not equipped to catch these people with their deviating first-person experiences. This article will turn to critical constructivism to refocus the lens and identify these people. In order to then also include this variety of experiences in the postphenomenological analysis, I will suggest that postphenomenologists should not merely depend on already existing empirical research but also start collecting these experiences themselves by engaging in for instance interviews and focus groups with these identified people. Looking for the friction between these particular, deviating phenomenological experiences and the standard perception, should help us to establish where and how overpowering smartphones shape everyday life.
This project aims to examine the reception of the Western philosophy of technology in China. This process has undergone developmental phases of initiation, transition, and prosperity in China. Specifically, this article analyzes translations of Western works, critical receptions of disciplinary themes and topics, and the Chinese reception of the Western philosophy of technology in terms of the continental–analytic divide. This study originally argues for the theoretical and practical reasons underlying this reception and the subsequent influences. The Chinese reception of the Western philosophy of technology is theoretically related to ancient and modern intellectual traditions in Chinese history and culture. From a practical perspective, the phasic characteristics of the exchange and reception of the Western philosophy of technology correlate with Chinese political, economic, and societal changes. The Western philosophy of technology has greatly influenced Chinese philosophical views on technology and inspired developments of the Chinese philosophy of technology. This article argues that the Chinese reception of the Western philosophy of technology is critical based on principles of openness and caution, which mirrors the Chinese spirit of seeking truth from facts for technological practice. Therefore, Chinese scholars place the Western philosophy of technology in the Chinese context to encourage favorable developments of the Chinese philosophy of technology. Based on the family resemblance and critical reaction, the philosophies of technology in the West and China are cooperatively and competitively enhanced through intercultural exchange and critical reception. Finally, this study predicts new trends regarding Chinese interest in the Western philosophy of technology.
This paper considers the particular ways in which the familiar letter (for thousands of years the predominant means of communicating over distance) and twenty-first century technologies like the Internet differingly shaped and shape our experience of distance and presence. It follows Heidegger, Dreyfus, and Borgmann in critiquing the kinds of experience and action the Internet makes possible, and—by way of Benjamin’s concept of “aura”—argues that while mediated communication over distance might have never been easier, faster, or cheaper, this increase in our effective power comes at the cost of a diminution of the affective power of the messages carried.
While Michel Foucault’s significance as a social theorist is undisputed, his importance as a technological theorist is frequently overlooked. This article considers the richness and the range of Foucault’s technological thinking by surveying his works and interviews, and by tracking his influence within Actor-Network Theory (ANT). The argument is made that we will not fully understand Foucault without understanding the central place of technology in his work, and that we will not understand ANT without understanding Foucault.
Philosophers of technology are not playing the public role that our own theoretical perspectives motivate us to take. A great variety of theories and perspectives within philosophy of technology, including those of Marcuse, Feenberg, Borgmann, Ihde, Michelfelder, Bush, Winner, Latour, and Verbeek, either support or directly call for various sorts of intervention—a call that we have failed to heed adequately. Barriers to such intervention are discussed, and three proposals for reform are advanced: (1) post-publication peer-reviewed reprinting of public philosophy, (2) increased emphasis on true open access publication, and (3) increased efforts to publicize and adapt traditional academic research.
