What exactly is the "Neutrality" of technology?

[Sy Borg]

Nice topic idea. Makes for a change from the usual.

How can tools be neutral when they are created with specific purposes in mind? The "guns don't kill people" line has always been a nonsense propagated by the NRA, funded by arms company millions, so as to protect their commercial interests. They are just like tobacco, alcohol, junk food and fossil fuel companies - engaging in a little opportunistic parasitism until people twig on to the game.

Guns don't kill people, yes, but people with guns kill a lot more than people without guns. That's why they use guns. Otherwise, they might pick up, say, a blender and take it into the street in order to vent their postal tendencies.

An object is only passive in terms of action (over time) but it is far from passive in terms of form (in space). So, if you wish to blend a cake mix, then you will not be prompted to reach for a gun but a blender. If you wish to kill people, then you won't reach for a blender but a gun, because function is implied within form (a point noted by others here).

Physical morphology can be underestimated by those who place the reason for all things on intent (with no room for passive actors or chance). However, our physical morphology is why we are here chatting on a forum rather than, say, digging holes in the backyard to bury our favourites bones for later use.

[chewybrian]

An object is only passive in terms of action (over time) but it is far from passive in terms of form (in space). So, if you wish to blend a cake mix, then you will not be prompted to reach for a gun but a blender. If you wish to kill people, then you won't reach for a blender but a gun, because function is implied within form (a point noted by others here).

Just don't reach for a person to use as a weapon or a cake mixer, as their existence precedes their essence, and the outcome might surprise you.

[Sy Borg]

What's existence and essence got to do with it?

PS. I can see the obvious danger of contracting typhus from squirrels. Lethal indeed.

[Karpel Tunnel]

Tools are neutral: When given the two possible outcomes of "smash face" and "lie on ground" the tool will be no more inclined to either outcome. However, the functionality of the tool is very sub-neutral. A hammer is very much more useful and functions substantially more effectively in situations where things need to be hit. It is in its proper form. Algorithmic system interacting sequences, or codes, are very not neutral. These will always act a certain way in a certain environment without fail until acted upon by an outside force. They will also always act. When face with the "whether to do" of an inappropriate YouTube video, hammer does not even respond, it has too little functionality to be anything relative to the situation. However, a YouTube algorithm is already predesignated to be inclined towards a certain outcome and will take prompt corrective action against this content. It is not neutral because it was designed to act and to target in certain manners. Code is not neutral.

Yes. Tools are also not neutral because humans are not neutral. If you give a specific tool X to humans, it will fit in with human tendencies, leading to certain outcomes. Hammers can be used as weapons, but overwhelmingly they are good for their fairly neutral to good purposes. People needing a weapon suddenly might grab a hammer, but even this would be often as a defense also.

I really want to use the example of crystal meth. A chemical tool. Might be a stretch for some. Crystal meth is highly addictive especially for people who had terrible childhoods.

It is the complicated system of the tool and the potential tool users AND the culture they are in that leads to certain tools being not neutral.

[chewybrian]

What's existence and essence got to do with it?

You were pointing out, indirectly, that essence preceded existence in the case of the gun or the blender.

[Sy Borg]

What's existence and essence got to do with it?

You were pointing out, indirectly, that essence preceded existence in the case of the gun or the blender.

Okay. Cheers. I think that physical forms are underestimated. The idea that guns, spears or a flick knives are neutral objects without obvious potentials is an odd one, given the obviousness of the situation. Still this is a time when the obvious is being questioned, even the shape of the Earth.

People can be so focused on the impression they make that they forget about being truthful.

[Intellectual_Savnot]

All this proves is that neural input changes our neutrality due to recognition of function nothing about the actual disposition of a tool. The tool might have non neutral effects but that does not make it a non neutral entity

[Intellectual_Savnot]

Can we agree? Essence: neutral. Existence: non-neutral. that would be great.

[Karpel Tunnel]

All this proves is that neural input changes our neutrality due to recognition of function nothing about the actual disposition of a tool. The tool might have non neutral effects but that does not make it a non neutral entity

That is one way of interpreting the 'neutrality of an object'. But usually in these kinds of discussions the neutrality is part of an argument that the object is a neutral catalyst in the system of object/users. And often implict or stated is that the users are malleable in some sense. That humans can be anything, so if adding a tool's availability to a society or group leads to negative effects, this has nothing to do with the tool.

But we are not just random conscoiusnesses who could have any values and patterns of behavior.

I think it is useful to say that tool are positive or negative, given what we are, currently, always, in general, etc.

A little bit like an arsenic shot (as in alcohol shot) is not a neutral drink. If it is sitting on the moon, fine. But it's not a neutral drink. The word 'tool' means that the object will be used by humans.

A very compact nuke with a big red button on it is not a neutral toy in a daycare.

It's not simply a moral issue or that, hey, there are all sorts of ways humans could use it, so it is neutral.

In fact however given the nature of the daycare kids, this is not a neutral tool or object.

And it would not be a neutral one in any daycare, anywhere in the world, regardless of culture or morals or the goodness or naughtiness of the kids there.

It is not that one is saying the object in isolation has negative qualities or bad intentions, but that in fact is a hallucinated situation. The objects are not in isolation from agents PLUS the agents have tendencies and are not random or completely malleable entities.

[Intellectual_Savnot]

I get it. All must be defined relative to everything else that is defined. A tool is definably not neutral relative to its user, it has a task that it is to be inclined towards the completion of.