Abstract
It goes without saying that technical artefacts are used in ways that are considered to be morally good or bad. That the use of technical artefacts has moral significance is not controversial. This moral significance may easily be interpreted as being tied to the moral significance of the ends that humans pursue through their use. But does it also make sense to claim that technical artefacts by themselves, irrespective of the ways they are actually put to use, are morally good or bad? Is it in any way meaningful to maintain that a life saving device, such as a life jacket, is by itself morally good and that some torture instrument, like a thumb screw, is by itself morally bad? Is it possible for technical artefacts to embody values - just as they may be said to embody designs - that make them by themselves susceptible to moral assessment? Or may technical artefacts be considered to have some form of moral agency that likewise would cmake them liable to moral assessment? These questions have been the topic of intense dispute in recent times. In order to come to grips with this controversial issue of the moral significance of technical artefacts it will be necessary to examine in detail the notion of a technical artefact, more in particular the notion of a technical artefact by itself. On the basis of the dual-nature conception of technical artefacts I argue that this notion, and a fortiori that of a technical artefact having moral significance by itself, does not make sense if it is taken to mean a technical artefact separated from human agency. I show that the notions of technical artefacts underlying positions that maintain that technical artefacts are morally neutral (section 6.3) and positions that attribute some form of intrinsic moral significance to technical artefacts without moral agency (section 6.4) are highly problematic. Thereafter I consider Latour’s idea that technical artefacts may be considered to be moral agents in more or less the same sense as human beings (section 6.5). I reject this rather radical proposal. In line with the dual-nature conception of technical artefacts I argue that any reference to technical artefacts by themselves implies reference to human intentionality. This conception of artefacts makes it is possible to avoid getting trapped into either the idea that technical artefacts are morally neutral things, or the idea that they have some form of moral significance independent of human agency. Given that human intentions (human agency) play a constitutive role with regard to technical artefacts, I argue that they have inherent moral significance which, however, finds its origin in human agency (section V.6). Finally, I discuss the moral significance of technical artefacts by looking at their meaning in general (section V.7) and in a specific case (section V.8). For a better understanding of present-day discussions about the moral status of technical artefacts, in particular about their moral agency, I start first with a brief discussion of the problems involved (section V.1) and with a sketch of various issues that lie at the root of the idea of technological agency (section V.2).
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Notes
- 1.
Of course, this issue involves the question what it means to have moral significance in general. This question is usually sidestepped in discussions about the moral significance of technical artefacts. I will do the same, but to give a rough indication, I will take whatever action that affects the well-being or flourishing of human beings in positive or negative ways to have moral significance. The question we are facing here is whether this idea of moral significance can be extended to things, in particular technical artefacts. The question about the moral significance of technical artefacts by themselves then boils down to the question whether technical artefacts by themselves affect the well-being or flourishing of human beings.
- 2.
Note that whether or not human acts, such as lying, are considered to have moral significance by themselves depends on the kind of ethical theory adopted. In utilitarian theories they have not (acts acquire moral significance through their consequences), whereas in deontological approaches they usually have (think of categorical imperatives such as “You ought not to lie”).
- 3.
For a discussion of the varieties of goodness, see (Von Wright 1963b).
- 4.
Whether the new options for action should have been created in the first place, raises itself moral questions that I will ignore here.
- 5.
It is not easy to find outspoken defenders of the neutrality thesis in the literature. Pitt (2000, forthcoming) is an example.
- 6.
For instance, it is not clear at all whether claims about technical artefacts having moral agency by themselves imply claims about them having ends by themselves, or vice versa.
- 7.
Verbeek (2008) argues that it makes sense to attribute a form of autonomy and freedom to technical artefacts.
- 8.
For a discussion of the possibilities of constructing moral artificial agents, see for instance (Wiegel 2007).
- 9.
I do not pretend that conceptions of technical artefacts, in the form presented here, have been explicitly defended in the literature, although I think they are lurking in the background of many arguments against the neutrality thesis. Again my aim is to bring to the fore as clearly as possible assumptions about technical artefacts underlying the idea that they have moral significance by themselves.
- 10.
See, for instance, Latour (2002, p. 156): “Nothing, not even the human, is for itself or by itself, but always by other things and for other things.”
- 11.
For a summary of Latour’s work, see Verbeek (2005, Chapter 5).
- 12.
See also the discussion about social, technical and socio-technical solutions to practical problems in section 2.1.
- 13.
A similar conflation of practical necessity with the moral is to be found in Winner (1985, p. 34). He speaks of “the moral claims of practical necessity” and “moral reasons other than those of practical necessity”.
- 14.
For a discussion of various notions of action used in moral theory, see (Schapiro 2001). Johnson (2006, p. 198) discusses five conditions human behaviour must meet in order to count as action and to be susceptible to moral assessment.
- 15.
Latour is not clear on this point. For instance, he claims that both humans and non-humans can have goals (which he seems to equate with functions) (1999, p. 180) but at the same time denies that purposeful action and intentionality are properties of human beings (1999, p. 192). See also the discussion in Pickering (1995, p. 17–18); Pickering endorses many aspects of actor-network-theory but parts ways with it when it comes to applying the symmetry principle to agency of humans and non-humans. He refuses to accept intentionality in the case of agency of non-humans. Nevertheless he insists on speaking about agency of non-humans. He considers, for instance, a lathe to be (1995, p. 158) “a prototypical device for capturing nonhuman agency: one can accomplish things with a lathe that naked human agency could never accomplish.” I have problems with even such a limited notion of agency. Instead of a lathe, take a lever or a hammer. All that Pickering says about the lathe can also be said about a lever or hammer. Do they have nonhuman agency? I cannot think of any more passive technical artefacts than levers or hammers. They do nothing of, by or in themselves.
- 16.
For an analysis of the gun example similar to Latour’s, see Verbeek (2008).
- 17.
Lurking behind the scenes, here, is of course the problem of the distinction between essential and contingent properties of things. I assume that Latour would also reject this distinction because it is an a priori distinction and essences are constructed in associations or collectives.
- 18.
For the interpretation of actions as meaningful assertions, see Schapiro (2001).
- 19.
For a discussion of other kinds of objections against attributing morality to technical artefacts, see (Verbeek 2005, p. 213 ff).
- 20.
In case by chance there was already a ‘natural’ bump in the road at the right place near the children school and of the right form, intentions are sufficient to turn that bump into a technical ‘artefact’ (no physical action or work is then required; compare the discussion about shells in chapter 4). Nevertheless, the speed bump as a technical artefact is in that case constituted by its physical structure and human intentions.
- 21.
There is yet another reason for putting signs on the speed bump; in Latour’s terms, part of the ‘program of action’ of the speed bump can be delegated to these signs, which means that the speed bumps can be made less steep (to avoid unnecessary damage to cars).
- 22.
This raises the question how a piece of matter, that enters an association with a human being, can co-constitute the human being as a gunman and itself as a gun.
- 23.
From an epistemological point of view, it may be an objective fact for the human being involved that the object is a gun. As Thomasson stresses, the mind-dependence of technical artefacts does not exclude an objective epistemology about them (see section 4.3).
- 24.
For a discussion of how meanings influence human behaviour, see Verbeek (2005, chapter 7).
- 25.
The performance of symbolic functions by physical objects may require features that relate to their physical characteristics; for a discussion of performance criteria for symbolic functions, see (Schiffer 1992, p. 134–135).
- 26.
See also my discussion about the various kinds of solutions to practical problems in section 2.1.
- 27.
Note that many of the examples Latour uses to illustrate his approach are of this nature.
- 28.
See also the discussion in (Pickering 1995, p. 9–20). Hutchby (2001) rejects the idea of technology as text because it cannot explain or deal with the different affordances of technical artefacts, that is, the different possibilities they offer for action. These affordances enable and constrain the possible uses and meanings of technical artefacts.
- 29.
Searle distinguishes between symbolic, deontic, honorific and procedural status functions that may be attributed to objects; see (Searle 1995, p. 99 ff). For a discussion of various kinds of functions of technical artefacts, including semiotic functions, from the point of view of (engineering) design, see (Muller 2001); see also (Verbeek 2005, p. 204–207). Crilly (2010) distinguishes between technical, social and aesthetic functions.
- 30.
What I have in mind here is meaning that is relevant for potential users. It is clear that even in hard core engineering practices a particular design or artefact may acquire a specific meaning for engineers (such as “being a masterpiece”).
- 31.
According to Grice (1989 (1957)) physical objects or phenomena may have ‘natural’ meanings (e.g., smoke means fire) independent of human intentionality. I leave the possibility that similarly technical artefacts may have meanings by themselves (independent of human intentionality) out of consideration.
- 32.
For more historic details about this example, see (Priemus and Kroes 2008). The analysis presented here is different from the one in that paper.
- 33.
As the example of Duchamp’s pissoir shows, meaning may be the prime factor determining the kind to which an object belongs; Duchamp did not use a technical artefact as a piece of art, but made it into a piece of art by giving it that status or that meaning.
- 34.
This conclusion runs parallel to the conclusion we have drawn with regard to the normativity of technical artefacts; see section 4.1.
- 35.
Johnson (2006) comes to more or less the same conclusion but on the basis of a different analysis. She claims that technical artefacts, computers in particular, are moral entities without being moral agents. They are moral entities because they have an inbuilt intentionality which is related to their function. Because of this intentionality, technical artefacts, as opposed to natural objects, belong to the realm of morality. They are not, however, moral agents because they lack the capacity of intending to act.
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Kroes, P. (2012). The moral significance of technical artefacts. In: Technical Artefacts: Creations of Mind and Matter. Philosophy of Engineering and Technology, vol 6. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-007-3940-6_6
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