Everyday life is intimately interwoven with complex technological ecologies. We can no longer consider technology as the alienating other . The idea is that we inhabit technological ecologies emphasises our connectedness to our environment (material, natural, technological) and our dependence on available resources (material, energetic, biological, cultural). Mastering these conditions is vital to our survival on this planet.
Techno-Ecologies builds upon the urgent call by philosopher Felix Guattari for an integrated perspective on the dramatic techno-scientific transformations the Earth is undergoing. Three crucially important ecological registers need to be taken into account: the environment, social relations, and human subjectivity. This techno-ecological perspective was the topic of the TECHNO-ECOLOGIES conference in Riga, November 4-5, 2011.
This publication is structured around three thematic sections related to Guattari's ecological registers, and a fourth that introduces emerging techno-ecological art practices. It brings together contributions by conference participants as well as other authors, engaging issues of social and ecological sustainability and a deeper understanding of technology as an extension of our techno-phantasmatic desires. Techno-Ecologies thus offers a perspective that can help us chart less hazardous routes into the future than the ones travelled currently. Authors: Siegfried Zielinski, Ronald van Tienhoven, Koert van Mensvoort, Tatiana Goryucheva, Andrew Gryf Paterson, Normunds Kozlovs, Martin Howse, Daniel Irrgang, Arne Hendriks, Gisele Trudel, Ilva Skulte, Annie Goh, Rasa Smite, Eric Kluitenberg, Raitis Smits and others
