In my last post I stirred up a good debate on the issue of technology.  Although my primary intent was to recommend the use of wild places as a place of retreat from the pressures and distractions of modern life so heavily influenced by rapid technological change, I believe some felt that by my reference to Jacques Ellul’s writing I was condemning modern technology and was recommending a return to some idyllic, but fictitious, “good ole days.”

So let me reiterate what I mentioned in comments I posted last fall:

No doubt the value of wilderness is almost more in what is not found there than in what is.  Consider what we typically do not find in a true uninhabited wilderness (uninhabited by humans, that is!):

. . . personal multipliers of power (vehicles, electricity, et. al.)
. . . markets and marketers
. . . external temptations
. . . false values
. . . lying words
. . . too many voices to attend to
. . . too many people to relate to
. . . racial, ethnic, and gender tensions
. . . personal deception and pretense (masks)
. . . meaningless entertainment
. . . continuous distraction
. . . an overload of news (information)
. . . an overload of human technology
. . . an overload of noise
. . . the need to talk incessantly
. . . daily routines and responsibilities clamoring for attention
. . . constant time pressure
. . . the sense that I am in control

Is there any person who cannot benefit from being relieved of these stresses from time to time?

Many of those stresses relate to modern technology; so let me say a few more words about the thoughts of Elull, a French Christian and professor of sociology at the University of Bordeaux who died in 1994.  His magnum opus was the sociology tome The Technological Society (1964), which was not a Christian publication (though containing many Christian and theological implications).  His book The Technological Bluff was published in 1990 by Christian publisher Eerdmans.  His major point in that book was a sort of twist on Emerson who said that “Things are in the saddle and ride mankind,” and held that, “Technology is in the saddle and rides mankind.”

His belief was that those of us living in the technology society, for all its many benefits, are so enamored of technology and technology is so pervasive in its influence that we have simply lost control over it—and lost even the will to control it.  Without critical, moral, wise, and godly oversight and direction, technology has a life of its own that has in many ways become a powerful extension of human evil.

So we have atomic energy and the atomic bomb; we have microwave ovens to cook and expensive electronic toys and TV to divert our thoughts and steal our time from the things of first importance; we have chain saws to harvest timber and do landscaping; and we have massive machines that literally mow down old growth forests and threaten entire ecosystems; we have TVs and computers for instant access to important information and access to more information than one can possibly grasp, pornography one click away from our online Bibles, and endless diversion.

TVA coal ash spill 2008

And all the while, God’s good earth suffers and we suffer for our lack of valuing it, understanding it, being good stewards of it, and neglecting being outdoors in it enough to be reminded of the power and glory of our Creator and be refreshed and renewed by the experience.

So here I am in my high-tech office employed as a blog author and writing this post, which shortly you will be reading via the Internet on your high-tech device in your high-tech home.  With a hunger within me for the simple, agrarian ways (thinking Wendell Berry and the Amish), I do this with a nagging sense of both guilt and angst—wishing often that I was not here but out there.  A technology captive with self-applied shackles.  Sigh.

See you outdoors!

Dean

One of the values of the wild is that helps put technology in its place.  One way to understand this is to imagine yourself on a remote wooded ridge—say somewhere in the Ozarks.  You’re suddenly engulfed by a violent thunderstorm, and while rushing to find shelter and safety, you find yourself in the company of two others in the same pursuit.  Together you find a large overhanging rock ledge and crawl under it for cover.  Finally at rest, you seek to begin a conversation but quickly find that verbal communication is hopeless—for the other two, because of some warp in time, are a French explorer from the late 1600’s and an Osage Indian from the 1200’s.

Because your cell phone doesn’t work where you are, it’s a mere fascination to the other two, and your iPod, while it creates a sense of awe, soon goes the way of all battery-powered devices and your companions’ wonder ceases.  Your clothing, too, is a curiosity—as well as your eye-glasses.  But when the storm soon shows that it is but the precursor of a cold front bringing with it several inches of snow, other modern devices, like your classic Swiss Army “knifelet” becomes of little value, and the frustration of leaving that lighter in your car several miles away only adds to your distress.  What you discover is that the wild pretty much obliterates all the differences between the generations.  But you are also soon delighted that you are not caught in these circumstances with, say, “important people” like Oprah, Michael Jackson, or Donald Trump, who appear to have never have ventured more than a hundred yards away from a light switch and whose wilderness survival understanding could well be limited to the old joke that you start a fire by rubbing two boy scouts together.

I like to think that in the wilderness we meet our ancestors, because apart from our technology and heads full of technical knowledge, most of which is of little lasting significance, our common spiritual, emotional, physical, and relational needs have been the same since Adam left the Garden.  Further, the importance of the health and fruitfulness of the creation is as important now as it ever was.  They could not—and we cannot—remain healthy without good air, good water, good soil, adequate shelter, and health-giving foods—access to which modern technology may as much threaten as provide.

Dean and St. Francis

Having, as most of us do, a pride of the present, we find ourselves irrationally disconnected from the past—somehow thinking that no forebear would have much to offer us moderns.  Yet if we did find ourselves in a raging thunderstorm on a wilderness mountaintop, we’d quickly learn that we are fundamentally no different from any other person living today—or yesterday. The fears, desires, and temptations of the first human beings were at heart no different from ours.  The wild is one of the most important venues for compelling us to recognize what is most significant in life and what is common to all people of all ages.

In the same clothes, speaking the same language, I believe we’d find Saint Francis, William Penn, and John Muir certainly far wiser and astute companions on life’s journey than Bill Gates or Steve Jobs.  Jacques Ellul reminds us of this in his book The Technological Bluff:

[Modern technology] causes us to live in a world of diversion and illusion. . . .  It finally sucks us into this world by banishing all our ancient reservations and fears.

So among its many other values, a walk in the wild links us in an unbroken chain with all who have gone before. Valuing and preserving our natural parks and wilderness areas will permit our descendants to do the same.

See you outdoors!

Dean