Technology and Justice

by George Parkin Grant

George Grant—philosopher, conservative, Canadian nationalist, Christian—was one of Canada's most significant thinkers, and the author of Lament for a Nation, Technology and Empire, and English-Speaking Justice. Admirers and critics of the author will welcome these compelling essays about society's traditional values in a technological age.

Genres: Philosophy, Politics, Nonfiction, Technology, Anthropology, Cultural, Essays

133 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1986

About the author

George Parkin Grant was a Canadian philosopher, professor, and political commentator. He is best known for his Canadian nationalism, political conservatism, and his views on technology, pacifism and Christian faith. He is often seen as one of Canada's most original thinkers.

Academically, his writings express a complex meditation on the great books, and confrontation with the great thinkers, of Western Civilization. His influences include the "ancients" such as Plato, Aristotle, and Augustine of Hippo, as well as "moderns" like Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel, Friedrich Nietzsche, Martin Heidegger, Leo Strauss, James Doull, Simone Weil, and Jacques Ellul.

Although he is considered the main theoretician of Red Toryism, he expressed dislike of the term when applied to his deeper philosophical interests, which he saw as his primary work as a thinker. Recent research on Grant uncovers his debt to a neo-Hegelian idealist tradition, Canadian idealism, that had a major influence on many Canadian scholars and Canadian political culture more broadly.

Reviews

[Danny Druid · Rating 4 out of 5]

Four out of five stars. George Grant is a Christian, which prevents him from critiquing Liberalism as thoroughly as he could. He doesn't recognize what Nietzsche did, namely, that the Christian ethic of sanctifying the lives of the weak leads to the proliferation of weakness, and that it is this itself that leads to Liberalism and its various spiritual diseases. "Liberalism" is Christendom's corpse. Grant doesn't explain why he thinks all human life has value in-and-of-itself, but he is so deeply Christian that he doesn't think he needs to.

Still, his essays are nonetheless very solidly written and very accessible. With the exception of the essay on Nietzsche in the middle of the book, I think you could get just about anyone who is interested in the topics discussed in this collection - Technology, Abortion, Euthanasia, the Humanities - to read this book and get an intellectual thrill.

Though there are many problems I have with Christianity, I would still rather live in a Christian society than the one we have now. Reading this book confirmed what I have suspected for a long time: It is impossible for Christendom to be able to overcome the Liberalism that is destroying it because its own moral framework makes it impossible to defend itself.

All in all, a good read. Recommended for those looking to read some solidly written essays.

[Matthew Loftus · Rating 4 out of 5]

Many technologies are introduced into our lives with the expectation they are value-neutral and do not have any expectations for how they should be used. George Grant ably dismantles this claim and challenges us to face our own brave new world with wisdom.

[Murtaza · Rating 3 out of 5]

As a Canadian chauvinist, I naturally assumed that I was familiar with all the major Canadian philosophers. As it turns out, I had never encountered George Grant. I suspect the reason is that he is a Christian reactionary and his ideas are out of fashion with the prevailing progressive ethos. Nonetheless if he is a reactionary he also seems to be a gentle one who is sincerely concerned with the spiritual well-being of others. This book is his critique of the impact of "technique" on our ability to understand the world, particularly our tendency to reduce things to objects for our (supposed) knowledge. There are also a few additional essays on Nietzsche and the related subjects of abortion and eugenics.

"When human beings are oblivious of eternity, they always make false things sacred," Grant writes at one point. This short book's message as a whole could probably distilled down to this simple point. He also draws a moving observation from Socrates that justice (in the original sense of "giving something its due") is something we dislike and find tiresomely distracting at first, but come to find "overwhelmingly beautiful" upon recurring familiarity with it. This is something quietly profound worth meditating on. In general, sadly, Grant is not a great writer. Given that I was already familiar with some of his critiques from Allastair Macintyre I was able to make the best of him in this short book. I don't really recommend it unless one has a particularly developed interest in Christian or specifically Anglo-Canadian philosophy.

[Kyle · Rating 4 out of 5]

A collection of essays chiefly focusing on the underlying paradigm of our "technological" epoch, and how much this differs (and is even a direct inversion) of the traditional Western worldview as inherited from Christianity and Platonism. The book is strongest in its final two essays on euthanasia and abortion, detailing these two phenomena as the clearest signs of the gradual erosion of the foundational principles of human rights, human dignity and justice in the technological age, principles which for so long had been the 'crown' of Canada's heritage from the English world. Written in the mid-1980s, it reads as prescient in light of the expanding euthanasia laws and abortion rhetoric that dominates in 21st century Canada.

[Wyatt Graham · Rating 5 out of 5]

If the author is George Grant, you read.

[Kristin · Rating 3 out of 5]

My chief complaint is that the essays are too short to deal with the depth of the subject matter. Grant raises a lot of important ideas: technology as an ontology, and the modern disjunction between truth and beauty, but he often has to summarize for the sake of space- "I don't have room to explain the history of this idea here" etc.
A lot of the same ideas are more fully developed in Allan Bloom's The Closing of the American Mind, which I would highly recommend for a follow up on the critique of the modern university, and for a more in-depth examination of Nietzche.

[W. Littlejohn]

Read one essay for class. This man is as brilliant and eloquent a critic of modernity as can be found, and his thoughts on technology are deeply insightful and provocative. I'm hoping to go back and read the rest, now that classes have ended. (Yes, I know this is the exact same text I put for my review of his other book, but it applies to both, and I'm in a hurry.)

[Jordan McPeek]

A book I've hung onto from university days. Maybe I'll re-read it someday.

[Conor · Rating 3 out of 5]

The title essay is worth the book, but I was a bit underwhelmed by the other essays.