The Technological Society - with Ted Lewis
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- Опубліковано 16 чер 2024
- I sit down with Ted Lewis to discuss the work of Jacques Ellul and his views, on technology, Christianity, civilization, and transpersonal agency.
Ted Lewis is Executive Director of the International Jacques Ellul Society. Full bio: restorativechurch.org/about-t...
International Jacques Ellul Society: ellul.org/
The Ellul Forum: ellulforum.weebly.com/
List of books shown on screen:
- The Technological Society, by Jacques Ellul
- The Secular City, by Harvey Cox
- The Empire of Non-sense, by Jacques Ellul
- The Humiliation of the Word, by Jacques Ellul
- The Ellul Forum
- I See Satan Fall Like Lightning, by René Girard
- The Space Trilogy, by CS Lewis
- The Technological Bluff, by Jacques Ellul
- The Technological System, by Jacques Ellul
- The Abolition of Man, by CS Lewis
- Presence in the Modern World, by Jacques Ellul
-
Timestamps:
00:00:00 - Preview
00:01:15 - Intro music
00:01:40 - Introduction
00:02:40 - Jacques Ellul's warning
00:05:40 - Ellul's influences
00:06:56 - Biblical images of the city
00:09:03 - Ellul's suspicion of imagery
00:10:45 - Reconciling the word and image
00:12:41 - Ellul: Principalities and powers
00:19:10 - Symbol and the lie
00:24:55 - The positive Image in Scripture
00:31:34 - Ellul now: The Technological Bluff
00:37:26 - The Tower of Babel
00:41:10 - That Hideous Strength phrase
00:43:12 - The divine council
00:50:50 - Ted's work and advice in the modern world
00:56:17 - Closing words
-
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My intro was arranged and recorded by Matthew Wilkinson.
"The Technological Society with Ted...."
Got my hopes up.
doubt you're gonna be getting the "nature good, society bad" tract from anyone hosted on this channel.
when I saw the second chapter from the end was labeled, "Ted's work and advice in the modern world", I just assumed they'd be talking about other Ted 😅
We inhabit a world we have built for our machines, and we labor for their health and embodiment.
That’s a good way to put it 👌🏾
Great comment. Incredible actually.
More so we contort and mutate ourselves to "adapt" to the unnatural ways they operate. To the point now that we face loosing all agency of our own and handing it off the the AI. It's a sickness.
100%
Our machine gods, made of the same materials and agencies/principalities of yore, demand sacrifice of our humanity.
Indeed. I just want to run away.
Reading Ellul is what broke me of my false belief in unfettered technological progress and for that I am very grateful to him.
I love how Ted is explaining "symbol" to Jonathan and he just sits there and takes it. 🙏
A humble man.
Perhaps he's explaining it to the audience to give a ground to what he's saying?
@@willismcgee5216yes, the best podcasters understand that they aren't the only two in the conversation, and they are good at making us think we are just a fly on the wall
“Repetition is not redundancy” ❤
😂😂😂
That awkward moment around 34:00 where I realize that they’re describing a perennial problem in software development that is manifesting in the permanent proliferation of new tools that solve the same old problems, but with new layers of abstraction that didn’t make anything easier and actually made it harder to get to the core of some problems.
what do you think is the solution?
Deploying software on different hardware -> docker -> need what's running in containers to work together -> kubernetes -> setting up what's running and how it's running -> helm -> ???
For all those reading this: the woman at the well at Samaria became Saint Fotini, who became a Saint and witnessed Christ to Nero along with her son and her siblings. It is an amazing story.
You don't plaster your own face on all your content like many a narcissist these days (including many of the people you talk to, I might add).
Keep on the path, keep the message pure, hold the Truth above all else, and the seed will be planted in very fertile soil indeed. Good work.
Jacques Ellul was one of the most profound and brilliant interpreters and critics of the scientific and technological society and radically secularized modernity. He was prophetic in many respects in seeing the negative aspects of what at that time almost universally believed to be good and progressive. We now are suffering some of the negative consequences of these shallow unsophisticated, crude, naive, simplistic, overly linear, expansionist false and dehumanizing mechanistic materialistic ideas regarding progress. Anybody who wants to understand the increasingly technocractic techno utopian order (of every type whether liberal capitalist centrist, fascist or Marxist communist), that we live in today needs to deeply immerse themselves into Elluls understanding of this new reality and artificial, synthetic, illusory, abstracted out of touch with physical reality environment that modernity has made. In other words this is how the post modern age arrived to leave us all in a state of mass delusion, confusion, and virtual reality hallucinations.
You have greatly deepened our family’s faith, Jonathan. Thank you!
Jonathan! Idk if you'll see this but I want to say thank you! From the bottom of my heart I appreciate and am grateful that you do the work you do. I have come to christianity through your work. Thank you!
"The Technological Bluff" is a very readable follow up to the earlier book, written towards the end of Ellul's life. His study on Propaganda is another classic. Beside "The Humiliation of the Word", "Reason for Being", a meditation on Ecclesiastes, is recommended among his theological works. Finally, his introductions to the early works of his friend Bat Ye'or show his prescience concerning the rise of Islam in the 20th century and the threat inherent toward The West, soon to become blatant. Very much a prophetic figure and shatterer of modern idols.
what is encouraging, is that we seem to go through this cycle every 100 years.
there is a lot of literature on how to deal with what we think of as modern problems, but they are really really old problems.
war started in europe almost exactly as the final ww2 veterans have died. coincidence?
'nothing new under the sun'
Thank you for this conversation. Thank you, Jonathan, for diving into a man with whom your relationship is 50/50. Thank you, Ted, for pointing out that The Abolition of Man and the trilogy are the books for our time.
I'd like to recommend the book "Technology as Symptom and Dream" by Robert Romanyshyn as a fascinating exploration of linear perspective and its effect on the human psyche vis a vis our developing technological world.
"Technological"? "Society"? "Ted"?... Got kinda excited for a minute there!
The linguistic work is so valuable. Symbol. Parabol. Diabol. Latin put it all out there.
29:30 to 31:00 is a beautiful explaination of authority, glory, and legitimacy of the Nations. Nations AND the Church especially. I love the way you put that together Jonathan.
Wonderful explanation of the right relation between Church & State
17:00 The dark irony of accusing something of being “satanic” is to participate in the principality of accusation itself. Perhaps that’s one reason Ellul treads carefully in this area (as we all should).
So true. Christians should be aware and wary of carelessly uttering and commenting accusations.
That is a really interesting point to ponder. Do we have any strong examples of godly accusations?
@Mamothrept a Bible teacher told me just yesterday that the first time the word satan appears in the Bible is when God's angel appears to Baalam. The angel says to Baalam, "I have come to you as an 'adversary'." The word for adversary is (stn, שטנ) (the last letter of the Hebrew word (on the far left) should be the final form, but my keyboard wouldn't accommodate, so sorry). So that is an interesting fact, and an important one too. You can decide what all it could teach us.
@EmilyTodicescu my point is that being "a" satan in the biblical sense is not always a bad thing. Nevertheless, we should indeed be circumspect and tread lightly when acting as one.
@@eveningprimrose3088 Thank you for pointing that out. At first glance it appears accusation does have at least some valid moments, although it also seems very rare.
Great conversation. Thank you both.
Great stream. Thanks.
Fabulous conversation. What a confluence: Johnathan, Ted, and Ellul!
Whoa crazy synch, Auron Macintyre just did a stream on Ellul. I'd never heard of this guy, and he's suddenly on top of my reading list.
Heard of him in the Illuminatus trilogy
Great interview with J Ellul.
It's convenience that makes us surrender to the machine to the extent now that we only believe what's convenient for us.
I heard a Catholic priest say once that the antidote to the smartphone is adoration of the Eucharist. I attended recently a 40hr adoration, where I attended 2 x one and half hour slots, and without me realising the connection, I had not looked at my smartphone for nearly 3 days.
Sweet! New books!
❤👍✝️ I'm at beer number 4. The talk is working on me.
Love the Tech Society book and this conversation.
Bro! Thank you for bringing the book back into print. I have a copy of it 59 pages in rn.
Wow. The realisation of the Agency affecting the whole world down to the individual level exemplified during covid is an eye opener. That exact thing happened here in New Zealand to the point of my 12 year old sister was banned from her athletics club for not getting the jab, yet this WAS NOT mandated! Individuals acted like the state and enforced rules around of what they were being told to do. Incredible.
Yes my family protested this My Father even got a news reporter to ask our prime minister at the time if she was aware of the kids being banned from sport and she had no idea and seemed surprised that people were enforcing it... lol
This is likely the way forward for the church. Once we have shared our stories, we can begin to share together in the story God has for us. Sharing stories is a way for us to transition out of the divisiveness that has characterized the old form while simultaneously building capacity for the transition to the future form.
What are you on about?
I think Babel illustrates very well what happens to all human endeavors that don't involve God. They fail because of human frailty, specifically lack of humility. The changing of the language is just an outer manifestation of the inner fracturing that takes place without humility. I love how this video ends by pointing out the way to overcome this is to build relational trust on a micro level.
Conversation about technology and society is greatly needed. Technology’s impact is vastly understated in political/religious discourse. I can’t help feeling Jon is taking a position of defending a liberal traditionalist view of modernity. If that’s the case, what are you conserving? What we are now is very far from how we were created and most Christians hold a view that man was originally created perfect. Furthermore, worshipping individual liberation essentially removes the ability of humans to say no technology even if it in the end just changes us. That’s the problem with liberal traditionalists/conservatives and why liberalism is nearly idolatry.
Hi, your videos are amazing, i really wanna share this, am i allowed to translate into Ukrainian and post on my channel (of course with giving credits to you?) I won't use your video, I'll only retell your text in my language
Thanks
"technological bluff" is such a good concept. i would normally just say, unintended consequences.....
what can possibly go wrong with handing all our power, attention and agency over to a fragile top down power?
this reminds me of the hegelian dialectic, in that, technology solves some problems but it creates more problems than it solves, so it has to solve those problems too, and before you know it you have an atheist technocracy dictatorship of technology, which is what the nazi and soviet states were. where the false god, is the state, and the human is but an insect.
Lewis is awesome and understandable for the mere Christian
Dear family have you read," the inescapable love of God"? It is heart enlarging, heart warming, mindblowing and greatly enables us to walk in the spirit.....which is Saving Love
Thank you will be looking for this book
I don’t know what church father said it but those last remarks reminded me of the saying, “if you understand the cross, you understand all things.”
Christ bless ☦️
"He who knows the mystery of the cross and tomb, also knows the essential principles of all things" - St. Maximus the Confessor
You spoke of facts written in fiction in order to get the point across. This made me think of a very pertinent book recently released, called Earth Fall by Stuart C. Best. Absolutely nothing but fact written in fiction form. If only more were able to see the horrors the next few years will bring on the whole world.
Indeed!
The words "dialogue" and "honest conversation" have both been ruined by Critical activists in academia and workplace training. These terms now mean verbally abusing the person who engages in wrongthink until they submit. Whenever I hear someone say, "We need to have an honest conversation about ...", I know they mean, "I need to yell at you about...". I have the same reaction to the word "dialogue" unfortunately.
A critique of Ted Kaczynski would be interesting.
Technopoly by Neil postman is very relevant here
Where can I learn more about "principalities"? I want to understand how a principality gains control over a country or city.
By seducing Humans to act and be contrary to God.
What books would you recommend to get more into philosophy and symbolism?
I began to have insights several years ago from reading the prophetic literature of the Bible that when Jesus returns, and before or with the commencement of the Millennium, the world will go back to a low-tech environment. I think we will be agrarian again and much more connected to the natural world. No more fast, mechanized travel and immediate, electronic communication, etc.
i think the world will faction, into self sufficient, versus, a highly ordered technocratic top down dictatorship, these two factions will war, and then we will be back to traditional
Jonathan, can you please do a symbolic analysis of Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood?
That would be so awesome! I second this request.
Is there any mention of "Anti-Tech Revolution" (2016) in this conversation?
If so, will someone please share a timestamp?🤞
Much appreciated.
That's why to me it was never based on theology, Ideology, technology, or whatever people choose to want to think
I cannot wait for the encounter between Ellul and JBPeterson.
I’m curious as to what the meaning of “mainline denominations” is. As in US’s mainline? Like Protestant?
Episcopal, Lutheran, Methodist, Presbyterian - older denominations that dominated the church world in America. The opposite of them in America now is the rock and roll and latte non-denominational mega-church.
@@ButterBobBriggs Mainline is also used as an opposite to Confessional, in that sense 'mainline' means conformed to the 'mainline' of society/culture.
In Southern America the Roman Catholics could be considered 'mainline'; but in English language areas it's primarily the Anglican/Episcopal/Presbyterian/Methodist traditions (all those born/formed on the island of Great Britain).
I think the ELCA are lumped in there because of their communion with the Church of England, but in the Germanic lands the distinction is traditionally 'state church' or 'free church' rather than 'mainline/evangelical' or 'mainline/confessional'; yet that just tells about their relationship with the government rather than a theological/cultural leaning
Stop assuming that I am christian cause I mentioned many time, I am not. You can read the Bible as much as you want, the storey is just like any other literature but the only difference is, this one is for doing the final chapter of the parables of two nobles that brings the eastern and western culture back into full circle. It's reconciliation of the names. Then you can decide yourself and judge cause when you keep misjudging things because you guys didn't have no clue why there is a need for closure.
Just listened to an episode of Auron and his guest covered this author as well.
PB: 34:33 People now belive the purpose of life is to live a life of pleasure and opulence and that collecting money should be the sole purpose of life
Can I ask whether you all are in the same place as I am in now? I find it is already very disorientated with so many people asking me stuff.
Almost thought the title card read “With Ted Kaczynski” 😅
Kaczynski read Ellul. Draw your own conclusions.
wouldn't it be hilarious if the more advanced AI becomes, the more it resembles Uncle Ted
Why am I reminded of our sin-nature and Smokey Robinson singing, “just to see her” at the same time?
(Who asked you Bon Jovi?!)
🤷♂️
🙏
the image of the holy Jerusalem, nothing is destroyed, but given up to a higher order.
for example, a nation is not destroyed to create a world regime, but rather, nations give themselves up to a higher authority (not a terrestrial authority).
Indeed seems jung found the nail is it made of glass
Does anyone there Cook?
34:00 Positive feedback loop of utilitarian LH connecting nicely to too much silly optimism
👍
I love how artificers are biblical. The Bible is so big an influence for table -top games
Who allows thirst beyond parched into delusion to know rule over self.
Unfortunately, they have also ruined the word "story." Only people in favored identity groups (deemed oppressed) are allowed to share their stories, and they are allowed to make sweeping generalizations from them ant no one can challenge them. People in disfavored identify groups (considered oppressors) are not allowed to refer to their own stories (their "lived experience"), because as members of disfavored groups, they are not seen as having anything worthwhile to say and are actually not considered proper humans at all. Their stories represent nothing but a threat to the oppression narrative.
A few years ago, I would have loved to hear of people sharing their personal stories as a basis for dialogue. Now, unfortunately, that sentence bristles with red flags.
Yeah if you guys too fre gi oaont the house with the pool across my mom's place. Also di check the structure of my mom's high fence. It really seems that on the structural and engineering side, it does look like it's hiding something. 😮😊
Yeah we dan if course have tea lunch dinner nad sike activities. But we still have the treasure hunt. Given that they still havent sikve da vinnci code is sifficiently reflective of the 4 horsemen also you didn't know is from Lord of the Ring?
As soon as I heard "what you might call a dialectical perspective", my eyes glazed over.😫
Jonathan could you make a video about the role of a woman in a Christian Orthodox marriage? Are we supposed to work for example? Can your husband demand of you to work? What are we supposed to do when it comes to children etc
Shoutout to Christian Anarchism, that's my schtick!
The band if brotherhood, is from the Cantonese period film of fighting for justice and a group of fighters all was let down and stio believing in the kaw until they get revenge. So befoe they dicthats. They will promise each ither that just in caee anyone shiuld not return, remember to help make sure thwir wife and kids are taken care kf. But usuakky they don't marrry them but if course some will. So uts not like a must because they eant to shiw choices people can kake and dibt frequently want to iver emphasis thise unimportant stuff. Yeah the griuo of men wil oir a small bowl if wine and each will prick their fubgwr ad let a few drops get jnto the wine and theb take turns to tmdrink frim same bowl
I’m not totally bought in and convinced of Christianity so why is it an idol when it’s a pagan thing but it’s integrity when it’s a christian image?
I lean more Protestant, so I can’t give you a detailed apologetic on the Christian use of icons. However, I’m fairly confident that it doesn’t involve necromancy, in contrast with the pagan traditions (which seem to be steeped in necromancy). I would suggest looking up “the opening of the mouth ritual” in the context of the ancient pagan traditions to support this position.
Christians don't worship Icons. Simple really.
To me MONEy is just a means to an end. You. Don't necessarily need to grow grow grow cause it's not human. And it's only the financial system that grows. Actually it is too narrow of a thing to measure.
You Go checkout the Papa can you hear me by Streisand. Hope you get the message. And definitely man shares sane questio😢that want to ask you christians whether there is such a thing as righteous men. The first one to sin was Adam so gone case subsequent men. You should have focus on righteous or women that sacrifice their life for the son and daughters that they bore. They also can take lots of shit yet still find that no matter what also still will have love for them. That's why it's just so horrible that when you all came to collect ke or fetch me, they only focus on 1 person not the whole group. Terrible. That's where I also got cultural differences. I think not cultural alone but lack thoughtfulness. Actually you guyschwd been coming in and out many times, but mostly it is online not on the ground. And each time is to get my money. So even until now, it's the same. So I guess you won't change. Its😢not even genuinely care. Bht the rabbi were fine. I meant tyise that speak calmly bit the pushy lines that seems to be more lost and wanting to try make out what is it they had on their hand or which word they want clarified.. even the keyboard became like this is because of this case. So irritating to type on it
Funny, cause the whole issue was he helping you guys to avoid going wring way or avoid hitting a bad understanding of why i. Still around here. The story akready got dragged oater than necessary. Yeah there is two separate strain of human group. Same in surname and living truky separate life but,cits a small world. So also ended up same place.
I thought Ted Lewis was a 1920's band leader...... oh. wait, Tom Holland.....'>......
I understand now why graven images, offend God, because the heathen communicate with graven image
french thinkers are the most tortured souls, i swear. the concept of agency isn't that hard to map as long as you use yourself as the drawing board.
Wait, could you elaborate on what you mean and the context?
french thinkers grapple with things like subjectivity and meaning, or largely have for the last hundred years or so. they're tortured because their philosophy is based on a paradox: you must understand me, you will never understand me. this is mostly because the people who started this french deconstructionist existentialist movement were gay pedophiles: see foucalt and sartre.
transpersonal agency is the answer to their question, but it's a phenomenological answer and not a semantic answer. phenomenology requires you to trust yourself, which they can't do because 1.) they're still enlightenment thinkers and 2.) they're gay pedophiles.@@ValerieEdna.A
In Jesus Christ the lion lays down with the lamb.
Hello, yiu say we don't allow discent😂
We have to admit that there is an immeasurable distance between all that we read in the Bible and the practice of the Church and of Christians.
Jacques Ellul
Thats eby i find it funy wheb they say when wa the ronan here. I tikd them whtger they understood Romanization or not because its a way we refer to archetype of many style man can come in. Us like yuu guys labeling people T B V si yours us too liited. Human have many ways of reoresentjg or nit want to represent yourself besides thise few letters
And its toi kessu when you guy's go chabge the address or made new onces. Ut seems people iver exaggerated the problem as i dint think you need a whie new layer to have a okace just yourself. Yeah kuat havesmae levek oof map in latead of acting lie its a huge problem and cant see the kights of day omg
I bet you if you arent putting neon signs making ut jarringly obvious. Well actually i already knew. So got scolding. Hello giu have uiur iwn School there? I guess if tat how yii want we can stop you
Oh please. If course wealth important. But same like knowledge. Jut uf you are not making good use of it. Or use your knowledge for something better, I will just pass. I will priorities what I want first not up for you to do this and di that. If you intend to do that, g dibd soke dumb one to push around. Gosh. You still do the keyboards thing it's irritating
Pageau get off your high horse and realize peterson exposure isnt going to take you to new heights. You're a supporting cast member barely mentioned in the credits.
Damn bro, you've got some resentment building. Better turn the valve before the pressure builds and you explode 😅
@@goob-hm3jw I'm good bro
@@GrantBerger-jc7ks I know, right? Sometimes all people can see is a man standing in a barren field and they forsake him for lack of fruits. Little do they know that hundreds of thousands of seeds are sown beneath his feet. 🤷
There is often a point.
@@goob-hm3jw I didn't know there was a cult following in here
For over a decade now, I have thought of Ellul's Technological Society as the most important book I have ever read. He is far more interesting and honest than Heidegger, and more penetrating than Mumford. I like Marcuse a lot, but Ellul is more philosophical. Marcuse cannot free himself from the Marxist faith in technology, even in One Dimensional Man, his best book. Ellul sees technology as it really is, a completely destructive force. His message is bleak. We have already been so transformed by technology (like Haraway's cyborgs) that there is no real going back. We must bear honest witness to the power of technology and wait for better days.
Wonderful explanation of the right relation between Church & State
Wonderful explanation of the right relation between Church & State