Gilbert Simondon

Readings of two Simondon papers: “Technical Mentality” and “The Position of the Problem of Ontogenesis.”

Simondon, who’s thought was very influential on Deleuze in obvious ways, writes about the notion of individuation as something that is an ongoing process and tension. He says that it is not something that can be studied backwards from the individual but needs to be looked at from a phase of preindividuality and how this then individuates.

This is useful for me in terms of looking at how much theory regarding technology focuses on the human subject and the subjectiviation possible through technology. Simondon shows that to be an individual is to be constantly in a state of ‘metastability’ such that this leads to a new phase of being, and that to be an individual is always to be within an environment and a community. This is pretty much the picture I’m wanting to paint of technology but with the human not at the centre. This notion of individuation would apply to all of the elements in the technological process. If technology itself is this being that is constantly changing then its environment is society, people and everything else surrounding it. I still, however, want to propose technology as something that resembles the preindividual phase Simondon refers to before being is individuated. That it is a potential. This is something I still need to be able to define more clearly, but this is helpful in doing so.

These ideas can be seen also in “Technical Mentality” in his insistence that, in order to study a being, you must study it in its entelechy – ie, in its potential for what it can become – rather than in the static state of what it is. This is interesting for my project because this is a mentality that considers being, considers things, as constantly changing and this, again, reflects my notion of technology, that it is a state of continual change that will never reach a static state. To be able to draw on concepts used by Simondon in explaining this will be useful. This technical mentality is an application of thought, or an attitude, in studying a thing and the idea of studying something in its entelechy is helpful. I need to be able to be clear that it is not simply the ‘potential’ that is technology, that it is the physical parts (hardware, humans, etc.) and the instructions/information that make it technology.

As an aside, though, Simondon’s idea of nature is clearly as that which has not been altered in any way by human intervention. He considers that energy from humans is human energy while energy from oil or wind is ‘natural’ energy.

It was Simondon who first used the term “technicity” which I need to read more about.