Whenever you want to explain differences, you can be criticized for essentializing something. Now, if we translate this into Chinese, does it mean that modern technology means the end of Xíng’érshàngxué 形而上學, the theory of (or the study of) what is above the form? Does it mean the end of dao? When we think in this way, we immediately see that something is not right, that something is incompatible when we understand translation as a search for equivalence. But he also considers modern technology as something that marks the end of metaphysics. (Of course, a Hellenist could attack Heidegger by saying he doesn’t understand ancient Greek sufficiently, but that’s another question.) So, Heidegger is trying to understand technē in relation to the unconcealment of Being. For the Greeks, the term technē has a rather different meaning. The reason I dialog with Heidegger is that he was trying to understand what technē is for the Greeks, which is not only about technics, cultivating techniques, or making things. Heidegger is someone I dialog with-and because Heidegger was a Nazi, some people accuse me of being on his side, but this is a kind of sickness or illness of our time. And as I said before, “what is above the form” was adopted by Japanese scholars to translate “metaphysics.” This kind of translation has caused a lot of misunderstandings, especially today. In the I-Ching we read that what is above the form is dao, and what is below the form is qi. One is dao, the “way,” and the other is qi (器, to be distinguished from 氣, liberally “gas,” conventionally translated as “breath” or “energy”). If we cannot directly translate the term “technology” into another equivalent-技術 jìshù or 科技 kējì-what can we do? How can we deal with this? And can we find some other categories that will allow us to identify the nuances that distinguish different modern understandings of technology? So what I try to do is identify two categories in classical Chinese philosophy. This was the first question I tried to tackle in The Question Concerning Technology in China (2016). Today we are left asking: What are these differences, and how can we really account for them? It’s crucial to try to speak to this now. In terms of modernization, we were so hurried to find equivalence that we actually ignored difference. We may have the illusion that there are actual equivalencies between these terms and European terms, but there are not. And it’s the same in Japanese, where 技術 gijutsu is used to translate “technic,” and so on. So, for example, “technology” or “technic” can be translated as 技術 jìshù in Chinese, or “technology” translated as 科技 kējì. And we still tend to think that there are correspondent or equivalent words for European terms in Chinese or Japanese. Starting in the nineteenth century, when East Asia opened the door to European countries, there was a kind of rush to find the equivalents of European terms. The word “metaphysics,” for example, is translated into Chinese as 形而上學 Xíng’érshàngxué, or “that which is below the form.” This translation was done by Japanese philosophers before it was adopted by the Chinese. Many terms translated from Western languages-German, Latin, French, English-were first translated by Japanese scholars into kanji and then exported to China. How do you translate? And this is an issue that persists throughout the whole process of modernization. And it just makes me wonder: In China, what’s the word for “technology”? What’s the etymology? And does it have the same breadth as the Greek term, or does it have a different compass? How do you even translate the word “technology” into a non-European language? It has been edited for length and clarity.īarry Schwabsky: In your book you remind us of the fact that the Greek word technē refers both to what we today consider technique or technology, and to art-that art is included under the same word. This conversation about Yuk Hui ’s book Art and Cosmotechnics (2021) took place at the e-flux Screening Room on March 23, 2023.
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