Abstract

This article traces the trajectory of Heidegger’s thinking about technology over the course of what is considered to be his early, middle, and late periods. Over the course of the years, Heidegger’s concerns moved from somewhat conventional concerns over the consumerism technology entails, and the damage it causes to the environment, to the more complex position that technicity distorts human nature with an accompanying loss of meaning. The real danger, he said, is not the destruction of nature or culture, nor selfindulgent consumerism, but a new totalizing style of practices that would restrict our openness to people and things by driving out all other styles of practice that enable us to be receptive to realty.