The Gods and Technology is a careful and original reading of the principal statement of Martin Heidegger's philosophy of technology, the essay Die Frage nach der Technik ("The question concerning technology"). That essay is a rich one, and Richard Rojcewicz's goal is to mine it for the treasures only a close reading of the original German text can bring out. Rojcewicz shows how the issue of technology is situated at the very heart of Heidegger's philosophical enterprise; especially for the late Heidegger, the philosophy of technology is a philosophy of Being, or of the gods. For Heidegger, technology is not applied knowledge, but the most basic knowledge, of which science, for example, is an application. The ultimate goal of this study, and, as Rojcewicz writes, of Heidegger's thought, is practical: to find the appropriate response to the challenges of the modern age, to learn to live in a technological world without falling victim to the thrall of technological things.

Table of Contents:
Preface Introduction Part I. Ancient Technology The four causes as obligations, as making ready the ground The so-called efficient cause in Aristotle Abetting causality as a reading of Heidegger Letting, active letting, letting all the way to the end Producing, bringing-forth, nature Manufacture and contemplation Bringing-forth as disconcealment Disclosive looking Technology and truth The Greek concept of techne Ancient technological practice as poiesis Part II. Modern Technology Ancient versus modern technology Modern technology as a challenging: the gear and the capacitor Modern technology as an imposition Modern technology as a ravishment Modern technology as a disposing “Disposables” Ge-stell, the “all-encompassing imposition” The essence of modern technology as nothing technological Science as harbinger Science as mediator Causality; modern physics The novelty of modern technology Part III. The Danger in Modern Technology Asking about and asking for Sent destiny, history, chronology Freedom Hastening Doom The danger The highest danger The occultation of poiesis That which might save The sense of essence Enduring Bestowal The essence as something bestowed Bestowal as what might save The mystery The constellation Transition to the question of art Part IV. Art (Metaphysical) aesthetics versus (ontological) philosophy of art Art as most properly poetry Art and the history of Being Art and technology Questioning Part V. Detachment Contemplation; Detachment (Gelassenheit) Openness to the mystery, autochthony, lasting human works Conclusion: phenomenology; improvisation on the piety in art Notes Cited Works of Heidegger Bibliography of Major Secondary Studies Index