Technology of the Society

Abstract

In this paper we discuss about the social character of technological system based on the Niklas Luhmann's theory of the social system. According to him, the social system consists of communications, moreover, of all communications, and divided into subsystems by symbolically generalized media. We define here technological system as a set of communications characterized by possible/impossible binary code. When we define technological system as above mentioned way, technological system includes not only science-based technologies but also everything that enables us to accomplish something. For instance, any technique that persuades a person may be a technology in this meaning. To what extent, however, are we allowed to call both of them as 'technology' in the same meaning? This problem can be analyzed by introducing various levels of possible/impossible criteria. Another problem may occur in the case of science-based technology. Are there any media mix of the truth/false code that characterizes the science and the possible/impossible code that characterizes the technology? Recently a concept of "social technology" has attracted the attention of many people. It is said that the social technology is not only planned to exceed science-based technology but also to unify various fields of science. We point out here that the tendency to the media mix worried about in the science-based technology might be strengthen in this case. We also discuss a relation between know-how and technological system. We have know-how that enables us to accomplish a variety of things. So we ourselves are bundles of know-how. However, we should distinguish know-how of this sense from technologies that appear in the technological system.