The After Dinner Scholar

The Ancient and Modern Challenges of Technology--Heidegger’s ”The Question of Technology” by Dr. Glenn Arbery

If you ask any philosophy student which philosopher is the most challenging to understand and read, chances are she’ll say, “Martin Heidegger.”

Despite the difficulties inherent in reading Heidegger, as this year’s Wyoming School of Catholic Thought considered issues surrounding technology, we read his 1953 essay “The Question Concerning Technology.” Heidegger, who lived from 1889 to 1976, witnessed a great deal of technological change, much of it extremely harmful. What did it all mean?

Dr. Glenn Arbery guided the participants in the Wyoming School in a give-and-take conversation about Heidegger’s essay with these words.

The Ancient and Modern Challenges of Technology--Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein by Dr. Tiffany Schubert

As Robert Walton and his ship attempted to find a route to the North Pole, they discovered on a small ice flow a dog sled with an exhausted passenger, a man named Viktor Frankenstein.

Mary Shelley’s 1818 novel Frankenstein or, the Modern Prometheus tells a cautionary story about technology. Using all the scientific learning and technology he could muster, Viktor Frankenstein literally and figuratively creates a monster—a monster he fears and who pursues him to the death.

Dr. Tiffany Schubert gave this introduction to Shelley’s novel to the Wyoming School of Catholic Thought as we considered The Ancient and Modern Challenges of Technology.

The Ancient and Modern Challenges of Technology--Gulliver’s Travel to Laputa by Dr. Tiffany Schubert

In addition to being an Anglican priest, Jonathan Swift had a special gift for satire. "Satire," he wrote “is a sort of glass wherein beholders do generally discover everybody’s face but their own; which is the chief reason for that kind reception it meets with in the world, and that so very few are offended with it.”

Writing amid the scientific and technological advancements of the early 1700s, Swift was less than convinced that the progress was actually progress and in Gulliver’s Travels he included a voyage to the flying island of Laputa where science and technology come under his satirical gaze.

Dr. Tiffany Schubert gave this introduction to Gulliver’s adventures on Laputa.

The Ancient and Modern Challenges of Technology--Bacon’s ”The New Atlantis” by Dr. Paul Giesting

Francis Bacon famously noted that, “Knowledge is power.” And the knowledge of science that then leads to the knowledge of technology brings enormous power.

In his book The New Atlantis, published in 1627, the year after his death, Francis Bacon imagines being lost in the Pacific Ocean and landing in an unknown country, one filled with scientific and technological marvels.

Dr. Paul Giesting led the participants in the 2023 Wyoming School of Catholic Though into a discussion of Bacon’s work with this introduction. The text to The New Atlantis can be found here.

”Nature and Nature’s God” with Dr. Daniel Shields

…[W]hatever is in motion must be put in motion by another,” wrote St. Thomas Aquinas at the beginning of his Summa Theologiae, “If that by which it is put in motion be itself put in motion, then this also must needs be put in motion by another, and that by another again. But this cannot go on to infinity, because then there would be no first mover, and, consequently, no other mover; seeing that subsequent movers move only inasmuch as they are put in motion by the first mover; as the staff moves only because it is put in motion by the hand. Therefore it is necessary to arrive at a first mover, put in motion by no other; and this everyone understands to be God.”

This proof of God’s existence is the first of five that Thomas presents at the beginning of the Summa. And while that seems simple and convincing to most of us, many scholars are certain that the proof is not at all convincing insofar as it relies on Medieval physics and cosmology.

 In his new book, Nature and Nature’s God: The Scientific and Philosophical Validity of Aquinas’ Proof of an Unmoved Mover Wyoming Catholic College philosopher Dr. Daniel Shields argues that those scholars should take another look at Thomas’ argument.

The Ancient and Modern Challenges of Technology--Early Moderns by Dr. Paul Giesting

In the early 1990s—a mere thirty years ago— America Online was launched into cyberspace and the Hubble Telescope was launched into outer space. These have changed our lives. And it’s an odd parallel to two technological advancements from the Middle Ages—one from 1436 and another from 1608.

In 1436, German goldsmith Johannes Gutenberg invented a printing press with movable type. In 1608, an unknown person invented the telescope, an idea that spread as a result of printing and was quickly picked up by Galileo who built his own, studied the heavens, and had his revolutionary findings printed by printing press.

At the Wyoming School of Catholic Though this past June, adult learner listened to this introduction to Early Modern science by Dr. Paul Giesting.

Readings:

• C.S. Lewis, The Discarded Image, Chapter 1
• Johannes Trithemius, De laude scriptorum, extracts
• Francis Bacon, Novum organum, Aphorism 129 of Book I
• Galileo Galilei, Sidereus nuncius, abridged
• Johannes Kepler, Dioptrics extract from the preface
• Elizabeth Eisenstein, The Printing Revolution in Early Modern Europe, pages 206-212

The Ancient and Modern Challenges of Technology--Genesis and Exodus by Dr. Jim Tonkowich

Genesis 1 tells us, “God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them.”

As the college’s 2023 Wyoming School of Catholic Thought considered “The Ancient and Modern Challenges of Technology,” the Scriptures proved a vital guide to invention and evaluation.

At the school, Dr. Tonkowich gave this introduction to seminar discussions of Genesis 1-11 and Exodus 25-40.

The Ancient and Modern Challenges of Technology--”Prometheus Bound” by Dr. Virginia Arbery

Now have we journeyed to a spot of earth
Remote-the Scythian wild, a waste untrod.
And now, Hephaestus, thou must execute
The task our father laid on thee, and fetter
This malefactor to the jagged rocks
In adamantine bonds infrangible;
For thine own blossom of all forging fire
He stole and gave to mortals; trespass grave
For which the Gods have called him to account,
That he may learn to bear Zeus' tyranny
And cease to play the lover of mankind.

Those words set the scene at the beginning of Aeschylus’ play “Prometheus Bound.” It’s the god Prometheus who stole fire from Hephaestus and gave it along with the technology to use fire to mortals, a race Zeus, newly crowned as chief god, intended to destroy.

Dr. Virginia Arbery gave the 2023 Wyoming School of Catholic Thought this introduction to our seminar conversations about “Prometheus Bound.” You can find the text of the play here.

The Ancient and Modern Challenges of Technology--Ancient Greek Wisdom by Dr. Pavlos Papadopoulos

In the Phaedrus, Plato wrote about writing that, “it will create forgetfulness in the learners’ souls, because they will not use their memories, they will trust to external written characters and not remember of themselves.”

It seems almost beyond believing that as we worry about technologies such as artificial intelligence and smart phones, Plato considered and rejected the new technology of writing things down on paper. It’s evidence that for millennia, we humans have been inventing new things and debating about whether or not they are or are not useful—or even safe.

At the 2023 Wyoming School of Catholic Thought, the college’s adult week, Dr. Pavlos Papadopoulos gave us this introduction to our readings from Sophocles, Plato, Aristotle, and Plutarch.

Readings:

1. Sophocles, Antigone 334–375
2. Plato, Phaedrus 274c–275e
3. Plato, Laws 796e–800b
4. Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics 1.2
5. Aristotle, Politics 1.4, 2.8, 7.11
6. Plutarch, Marcellus ¶¶14–19

The Ancient and Modern Challenges of Technology--Introduction: Hephaestus by Dr. Glenn Arbery

Hephaestus was the Greek god of technology. Unlike Zeus, Apollo, Athena, and the others who were unspeakably beautiful and strong, Hephaistos talks in Homer’s Iliad about “my own brazen-faced mother, who wanted to hid me, for being lame.”

Wyoming Catholic College recently held our adult learning week, The Wyoming School of Catholic Thought. Our topic was “The Ancient and Modern Challenges of Technology.”

Dr. Glenn Arbery, the college president, opened up the week with these words about Hephaestus and techne from chapter 18 of The Iliad. The book can be found here.