17. Philosophy in the Service of Things

Chapters in this book

1. Frontmatter i
2. Contents v
3. Acknowledgments vii
4. List of Contributors ix
5. Introduction: Technology and the Good Life? 1
6. I. Philosophy of Technology Today
7. 1. Borgmann’s Philosophy of Technology 17
8. 2. Philosophy of Technology: Retrospective and Prospective Views 38
9. II. Evaluating Focal Things
10. 3. Focal Things and Focal Practices 51
11. 4. Technology and Nostalgia 70
12. 5. Focaltechnics, Pragmatechnics, and the Reform of Technology 89
13. 6. Borgmann’s Unzeitgemässe Betrachtungen: On the Prepolitical Conditions of a Politics of Place 106
14. 7. On Character and Technology 126
15. III. Theory in the Service of Practice
16. 8. The Moving Image: Between Devices and Things 149
17. 9. Farming as Focal Practice 166
18. 10. Design and the Reform of Technology: Venturing Out into the Open 182
19. 11. Nature by Design 195
20. IV. Extensions and Controversies
21. 12. Technological Ethics in a Different Voice 213
22. 13. Crossing the Postmodern Divide with Borgmann, or Adventures in Cyberspace 234
23. 14. Technology and Temporal Ambiguity 256
24. 15. Trapped in Consumption: Modern Social Structure and the Entrenchment of the Device 271
25. 16. From Essentialism to Constructivism: Philosophy of Technology at the Crossroads 294
26. 17. Philosophy in the Service of Things 316
27. V. Postscript
28. 18. Reply to My Critics 341
29. Afterword 371
30. Index 375