[ecrea] New book: Exceptional Technologies

This post is to promote my new book, /Exceptional Technologies: A 
Continental Philosophy of Technology/, which came out last week. The 
book draws on my long-term research in philosophy of technology, and is 
available in a number of formats. Full details can be found here: 
https://www.bloomsbury.com/uk/exceptional-technologies-9781350015616/


Here’s the blurb, followed by some endorsements:


A discussion of the rapidly growing field, from a thinker at the 
forefront of research at the interface of technology and the humanities, 
this is a must-read for anyone interested in contemporary developments 
in Continental philosophy and philosophy of technology.


Philosophy of technology regularly draws on key thinkers in the 
Continental tradition, including Husserl, Heidegger, and Foucault. Yet 
because of the problematic legacy of the 'empirical turn', it often 
criticizes 'bad' continental tendencies - lyricism, pessimism, and an 
outdated view of technology as an autonomous, transcendental force. This 
misconception is based on a faulty image of Continental thought, and in 
addressing it Smith productively redefines our concept of technology.


By closely engaging key texts, and by examining 'exceptional 
technologies' such as imagined, failed, and impossible technologies that 
fall outside philosophy of technology's current focus, this book offers 
a practical guide to thinking about and using continental philosophy and 
philosophy of technology. It outlines and enacts three key 
characteristics of philosophy as practiced in the continental tradition: 
close reading of the history of philosophy; focus on critique; and 
openness to other disciplinary fields. Smith deploys the concept of 
exceptional technologies to provide a novel way of widening discussion 
in philosophy of technology, navigating the relationship between 
philosophy of technology and Continental philosophy; the history of both 
these fields; the role of imagination in relation to technologies; and 
the social function of technologies themselves.

*
*

*Endorsements:*


“In /Exceptional Technologies/, Smith offers a completely new take on 
philosophy of technology via the tradition of transcendental thought in 
continental philosophy. He shows us how usual notions of contemporary 
philosophy of technology, usually conceived as wedded to the empirical 
turn, can be revitalised when technology is thought in relation to the 
transcendental. By using the example of exceptional technologies – such 
as failed inventions, artworks with impossible aims and other 
marginalised technologies – Smith has produced a book that is 
insightful, exciting, entirely compelling and a must read for anyone 
interested in staying at the cutting-edge of philosophy and media theory 
in the contemporary era.” – Timothy Barker, Senior Lecturer in Digital 
Media, School of Culture and Creative Arts, University of Glasgow, UK.


“Dominic Smith offers a timely study, just when the popular empirical 
turn in technoscience studies is beginning to feel more constraining 
than liberating. He presents no "reification of Technology" of the sort 
empiricists oppose. Instead he recommends a transcendental analysis of 
“general conditions” in technoscientific life whose presence is just as 
empirical as any artifact's. What makes /Exceptional 
Technologies/ original and noteworthy, however, is Smith's discussion of 
“exceptional” (i.e., failed) technologies. Precisely as exceptional, he 
argues, they are uniquely effective reminders that generally accepted 
conditions are what typically go unnoticed when we are happily 
preoccupied with concrete technologies that work.” – Robert C. Scharff, 
Emeritus Professor of Philosophy, University of New Hampshire, USA.


“In this important contribution to the philosophy of technology, Smith 
engages with some of the most interesting topics in media and 
technology, from photography, to the Internet, and even the humble sheet 
of paper, that most helpful technology for the writing of philosophy. 
Advocating for a renewed sense of the transcendental, Smith focuses on 
the conditions of possibility that structure and define any given 
technology, both successful technologies and failed ones, hypothetical 
devices and impossible ones. Such marginal or paradoxical exceptions 
come to define what technology is, and, most importantly, what 
technology might become.” – Alexander R. Galloway, Professor of Media, 
Culture, and Communication, New York University, USA.



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