The Religion of Technology
The Divinity of Man and the Spirit of Invention
-
- $12.99
-
- $12.99
Publisher Description
Arguing against the widely held belief that technology and religion are at war with each other, David F. Noble's groundbreaking book reveals the religious roots and spirit of Western technology.
It links the technological enthusiasms of the present day with the ancient and enduring Christian expectation of recovering humankind's lost divinity. Covering a period of a thousand years, Noble traces the evolution of the Western idea of technological development from the ninth century, when the useful arts became connected to the concept of redemption, up to the twentieth, when humans began to exercise God-like knowledge and powers.
Noble describes how technological advance accelerated at the very point when it was invested with spiritual significance. By examining the imaginings of monks, explorers, magi, scientists, Freemasons, and engineers, this historical account brings to light an other-worldly inspiration behind the apparently worldly endeavors by which we habitually define Western civilization. Thus we see that Isaac Newton devoted his lifetime to the interpretation of prophecy. Joseph Priestley was the discoverer of oxygen and a founder of Unitarianism. Freemasons were early advocates of industrialization and the fathers of the engineering profession. Wernher von Braun saw spaceflight as a millenarian new beginning for humankind.
The narrative moves into our own time through the technological enterprises of the last half of the twentieth century: nuclear weapons, manned space exploration, Artificial Intelligence, and genetic engineering. Here the book suggests that the convergence of technology and religion has outlived its usefulness, that though it once contributed to human well-being, it has now become a threat to our survival. Viewed at the dawn of the new millennium, the technological means upon which we have come to rely for the preservation and enlargement of our lives betray an increasing impatience with life and a disdainful disregard for mortal needs. David F. Noble thus contends that we must collectively strive to disabuse ourselves of the inherited religion of technology and begin rigorously to re-examine our enchantment with unregulated technological advance.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Perhaps the most persistent view of the relationship between science and religion in modern culture is one of conflict. Noble, professor of history at York University, Toronto, sets out in this book to resolve that view by demonstrating the compatibility of science and religion. Noble begins by indicating the intimate relationships between science and religion in both preoccupation and language: "Artificial Intelligence advocates wax eloquent about the possibilities of machine-based immortality and resurrection." In his first section, titled "Technology and Transcendence," Noble narrates the history of Western religious response to the mechanical arts to show the ways in which the focus on the divine likeness of humankind became an end for both religious and scientific activity to achieve. Here he points to alchemists like Paracelsus and Cornelius Agrippa, scientists like Isaac Newton and natural theologians like Joseph Priestley as examples of scientists and religionists who combined science and religion in quest of human perfectibility. In a second section, "Technologies of Transcendence," Noble examines the contemporary conversation between science and religion and points to some of the darker sides of the quest for transcendence and perfection through science in the advent of atomic weapons and genetic engineering. Through clear and precise writing, Noble provides a lucid guide through the history of the relationship between science and religion.
