Search results

Filters

  • Journals
  • Keywords
  • Date

Search results

Number of results: 2
items per page: 25 50 75
Sort by:
Download PDF Download RIS Download Bibtex

Abstract

The aim of this paper is to analyze the concept of the digital Leviathan as it appears in literature in the middle field between philosophy of technology and social philosophy. The digital Leviathan, beyond the obvious reference to the classic Hobbesian concept, is a continuation of what Antonio Negri and Michael Hardt called ‘the Empire’ and Benjamin Bratton named ‘the Stack’. The key insight, as I argue in this paper, is to look at this digital Leviathan as an ongoing construction process, and therefore in a processual way that allows us to extract important characteristics of this global techno‑political construct. In this text, I point out that the development of the digital Leviathan is centrifugal and devoid of a top‑down plan indicating the target effects or its final shape, which results from its subordination to J.F. Lyotard’s performativity criterion, as well as its totalizing feature. It is also manifested by the fact that its expansion involves us all. I also point out how the digital Leviathan can be a deadly final achievement on the way from Reason, through rationality, to the madness of rationalization. I discuss the consequences that the development of Leviathan has on our ability to think in general, and in particular on the conceptualization of Leviathan itself. I also associate it with an attempt to criticize the utopian mode of thinking, accepting the conditions of ‘non‑place’ (in accordance with the thought of Negri and Hardt), which, following M. Heidegger, detaches us from the place and location that should be the basis of thinking.
Go to article

Authors and Affiliations

Maciej Bednarski
1
ORCID: ORCID

  1. Uniwersytet Warszawski, Szkoła Doktorska Nauk Humanistycznych, ul. Dobra 56/66, 00-312 Warszawa

This page uses 'cookies'. Learn more