Read the given passage and answer the questions that follow. Critical theory of technology is a political theory of modernity with a normative dimension. It comes from a tradition extending from Marx to Foucault and Habermas which says that advances in the formal claims of human rights take centre stage. Marx attributed this trajectory to the capitalist rationalisation of production. It is prevalent in every modern political system. This trajectory arose from the problems of control over a disempowered and deskilled labour force; but everywhere it is organised — be it Foucault's prisons or Habermas's public sphere — the same pattern prevails. Technological design is shaped by this pattern as the material base of a distinctive social order. In accordance with the notion of thought, critical theory of technology regards technologies as an environment rather than as a collection of tools. We are surrounded by technologies that determine our way of life. The theory builds an approach on the lessons of these histories. In this respect, they are comparable to laws and customs. These institutions said to represent those who live under their sway through privileging certain dimensions of their human nature. Laws of property represent the interest in ownership. Customs like parental authority represent the interest of childhood in safety and growth. Interests, such as these constitute the version of human nature sanctioned by society. The concept of nature suggests an alternative. The reference here is, of course, not to the nature of natural science, but to the lived nature in which we find ourselves and which we are.
- ATechnologies form the environmental context and shape the contours of human society.
- BNature decides the point at which society loses its capacity to control history.
- CThe romantic conception of nature referred to by the passage is the one that requires theoretical legitimacy.
- DIt is not human nature, but human culture that is represented by institutions such as law and custom.