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The Social Significance of Telematics: An essay on the information societyLars Qvortrup
[Pragmatics & Beyond V:7] 1984
► pp. v–viii
Lars Qvortrup
[Pragmatics & Beyond V:7] 1984
► pp. v–viii
Table of contents
Author's Prefaceix
Translator's Prefacexiii
Introduction1
1. The Technicalities of Telematics11
2. The Social Significance of Telematics17
2.1. The Significance of Technology17
2.2. Technology: The Study of Human Ingenuity in the Pursuit of Chosen Goals20
2.3. Society's Generation of Alternatives23
2.4. The Future is very Present27
2.5. Technology as Anticipation: Taking Arms against Pure Objectivity29
3. The Tendential Content of Telematics35
3.1. Technology or Economics?35
3.2. Japan: I.T. Development Policy with Material Wealth as its Premiss39
3.3. The Tendential Content of Telematics53
4. The Latent Future Potential Inherent in Telematics63
4.1. Technology: Salvation or Perdition?63
4.2. Against Oversimplification: Towards the Structural Analysis of the Latent Future Potential Inherent in Telematics69
4.3. Traditional Normative Thinking and Its Limitations80
4.4. Anticipative Normative Thinking90
5. Idleness Doesn't Pay!95
6. Participative Grassroots Democracy at the Push of a Button?105
6.1. Vertical and Horizontal Communication106
6.2. Today's Democratic Dilemma112
6.3. Back to the Old Laboratory: Today's Democratic Dilemma in Yesterday's Enlightenment Philosophy118
6.4. Deadlock and Beyond127
7. The Influence of Telematics on Modes of Perception and Morality133
7.1. The Spatial and Temporal Boundaries of Enlightenment Philosophy133
7.2. Practical Criticism Today: Transcending the Bounds of Space and Time in our Physical Environment136
7.3. The Social Environment: From Physical Need Satisfaction Towards Need Manipulation141
8. Telematics, Social Control, and the Blind Self-Deception of Unreflective Tendential Criticism149
8.1. Knowledge is Power?149
8.2. I.T. as Military Technology151
8.3. The ‘Natural’ Opposition153
8.4. Power Old and New: Confiscation v. Self-Castigation154
9. Mediating the Qualitatively New: Some Seminal Examples of Ongoing Social Experiments in Sweden and France159
9.1. Proving the Pudding: All Good Theories are Practically Useful!159
9.2. The Necessity for Enthusiasm162
9.3. Social Experiments with Telematics in France, Sweden and —?164
10. The Only Conceivable Way Forward — Social Experiments with Telematics: Theory, Summary, Practical Guidelines, Conclusion183
10.1 Some Fundamental Points in the Definition of the Theoretical Concept of Social Experiments with Telematics183
10.2. Why and How Social Experiments with Telematics Can and Must Be Carried Out187
10.3. Social Experiments with Telematics as Strategic Praxis in Relation to Utopian Theory194
10.4. Practical Advantages of Social Experiments with Telematics203
10.5. Summary of the Concept of ‘Social Experiments with Telematics’ and Some Concrete Guidelines206
10.6. Conclusion: Advanced Technology in the Service of Mankind213
Notes217
References221
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