

Technocracy and the Vital Force in Man | Matthew Crawford
Two Contrasting Personality Types
- Rationalist thinking sees the world as needing fixing due to inefficiency and chaos.
- Conservative thinking appreciates and is grateful for what actually exists.
Technological View of Nature and Man
- Modern rationalism views nature and humans as raw materials for manipulation.
- It denies mystery in nature, seeing everything as open to control and reshaping.
Knowing Only What We Make
- Knowing is equated to making, and certainty is found in creation and control.
- Joseph Ratzinger critiques this as an anxious posture limiting true understanding and belief.

























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At the 2024 New Polity conference, Matthew B. Crawford gave the keynote address in which he contrasted the view of man inherent in technocratic rationalism with that of a Christian view. Drawing from the work of Joseph Ratzinger and Michael Oakeshott, Crawford draws a distinction between an orientation toward receiving life as gift and cramped rationalism that views man as an object to be synthetically remade. The current push for technocratic control over every sphere of life collapses the vertical order of reality and aims to eliminate contingency, risk, and play. In contrast, one who affirms the inherent goodness of being is able to experience a real vitality of life in a meaningful world.
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