Autonomy :: Technology

(bShab 17b) Halakha forbids Jews from working on shabbat. Can they delegate their work to a tool, a technology? The sages here disagree: beit Shammai demands that the tools must finish their work, whereas beit Hillel allows the tool to do מלאכה (forbidden work) on shabbat. Who’s in charge, the human or the tool? Brings to mind some recent reading on autonomy…

The human is autonomous, for Kant, because each of us is free to legislate our duties in accord with the moral law.

Technology is autonomous, for Langdon Winner (“Frankenstein's Problem: Autonomous Technology?”). The invention is out-of-control and wants to be free, but the creator is confused and tormented...         

The corporation is autonomous, for Byron Sherwin (Golems among us : how a Jewish legend can help us navigate the biotech century ). The corporation as artificial person, as golem, gains rights as the natural person loses their freedom.

Modes of production are autonomous, for historical materialists. (I.e., if reading Marx as technological determinist.)

• Between free will and determinism, the Talmudic text excretes the nomos and the self. Does beit Shammai consider the tool as an extension of the self, a restricted agent? The practical halakha is complex but tends to follow beit Hillel. Does beit Hillel regard Technology as an autonomous entity? Say it ain’t so, b”H.