Tragedies of Technology: An Exploration of Such Narratives

Summary Technologies such as AI, autonomous drones, gene-editing tools, and climate engineering are profoundly transforming human life in the third decade of the 21st century. Experience of previous technological leaps points to ambivalent effects that at times may be considered “tragic.” This paper examines the relationship between technology and tragedy, contributing to the fields of technology ethics, technology assessment, and the philosophy of the human-environment relationship. The relationship between technology and tragedy is double-edged. On the one hand, technology can serve to eliminate tragedy, e.g. by ensuring safety by design, albeit never with guaranteed success. On the other hand, tragic experiences of technological consequences may result from the discrepancy between initial expectations and actual outcomes. A technological consequence is often framed as “tragic” if it was initially associated with high expectations of existential improvement (first necessary condition). Furthermore, a consequence can be labeled “tragic” in perspective only. Tragic is a personal or cultural narration, experiences that a technology’s promise of progress is at least partially reversed to produce the opposite (second necessary condition). As elaborated in this paper, tragic consequences can manifest in two ways: First-order tragedy refers to direct reversals of intended effects (e.g. a technology designed to alleviate hunger exacerbates it). Second-order tragedy involves gradual qualitative changes in life, such as diminished human agency or reduced participation – as if humankind were to become “part of a techno-economical system” and lose the freedom to shape life. This is the “tragic of the machine”. Ultimately, some “tragic technologies” narrations may also reflect the one-sided projection of experiences of tragedy onto technology.