Being and technology

This study sets out to clarify the question of technology and its essence within the thought of Martin Heidegger. It begins by tracing where modern technology comes from, which Heidegger locates in the earliest human encounter with Being understood as physis, along with the ways people orient themselves toward that first showing of Being.

The first part mainly examines the subjective side of this relationship, while leaving the historical unfolding of Being in the background. The author argues that this approach fits the subject matter, since Being in its historical movement conceals itself, and that Being persists in presence only through its absence. Following Heidegger's reading of metaphysics, the work follows how Being's presence in absence shapes the dominant human relations to beingness.

The central concern is the shift from the early Greek understanding of nous or logos and techne to Plato's notion of idea. Tracing this transformation is meant to show how the modern understanding of technology took shape.