Existence and Knowledge

Existence and Knowledge

Heidegger's ethical confrontation with technology

Document Type : Research Article

Author
Seyyed Mohammad Mahdi Mousavimehr
Assistant Professor, IRIBU, Iran.
10.22096/ek.2026.2062377.1594
Abstract
With the growth of technological influence and the emergence of its effects on human life, examining the relationship between technology and ethics has become important. Heidegger has approached this issue with an existential conception of technology and with his own ethical perspective that is different from the common method. This article, using a documentary and analytical-descriptive method, pursues the issue of what existential ethics means in Heidegger's thinking and what components it has. Basically, perhaps the use of the term ethics in Heidegger is not very justified, but in a way it can be said that in his view, ethics was more of a kind of spiritual thinking within the framework of ontological perception and something opposite to calculative thinking. In existential thinking, the components of authenticity, spiritual thinking, releasement, and poetry are present, which invite us to actively deal with technology. Existential ethics allows technology to be present in our lives but does not dominate us, which of course is different from managing the adverse consequences of technology, for example in environmental fields. Although Heidegger's interpretation has been able to clarify the neglect of non-material matters in Western thought, this interpretation does not express the relationship between technology and ethics in a mystical sense from a religious perspective.
Keywords
Technology
Heideggerian Ethics
Existential Ethics
Spiritual Thinking
releasement
Poetics
Subjects
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