Technology and the Lifeworld in Miguel Baptista Pereira

Abstract

The aim of this article is to address several technology-related topics in the work of Miguel Baptista Pereira, a Portuguese twentieth-century philosopher. This chapter does not claim to offer a complete analysis of this subject-matter in his work. It is based on three core articles of his, and it is hoped this will offer a good introduction to his views in this domain. In addition to providing a brief biography and an overall view of his varied research work, this chapter identifies the common ground on which Pereira’s built his view of the technological world, based on these three articles. That common ground is the notion of lifeworld, in which Pereira finds a counterpoint to technology. The lifeworld is the ethical and foundational locus of human life, and is endangered by modern technology. This view is closely tied to the phenomenological tradition and the work of important twentieth-century philosophers. In his appeal to the humanities and social sciences, i.e. the tradition of non-calculation, as the only disciplines that can protect the lifeworld from modern technology, we may discern definite activist intent in his work and, although he belongs to a tradition, he has his own singularities. These are more than enough to give him a prominent place in a history of philosophy in Portugal and to help to build a corpus for a Portuguese-language philosophy of technology.