Heidegger and Foucault: technology and disciplinary technology

Heidegger and Foucault, two influential thinkers of the 20th century, addressed the fundamental issues from different perspectives. In recent years, researches has been done on the relationship between Heidegger and Foucault on various topics in contemporary Western philosophy. One of the most important topics that can be the subject of the encounter is the question of "technology". Heidegger's essay The Question Concerning Technology (1954) and Foucault's book Discipline and Punish: The Birth of Prison (1975) will be the main subject for the encounter and perhaps the interaction of these two thinkers in this article. To understand technology from the perspective of these two thinkers, one must begin with being and power as the basis and background of this encounter.By examining the history of Being, Heidegger reveals different manifestations of the revelation of being. He claims that technology is a way of the revelation of being in modernity, in which beings are revealed as objects. The basis of Foucault's thinking is also the question of power. He examines the relationship between power and technology and leads us from the analysis of the relationship between technology and power to one of the forms of technology, which he calls disciplinary technology. According to Foucault, technology is a disciplinary network of power and knowledge relations that turns humans into subjects by shaping general practices and mechanisms. Therefore, Starting from two different bases (being and power), we thus arrive at the common discussion of technology and then at the parallel concepts of Gestell and discipline. By explaining the function of the Gestell, Heidegger shows how modern technology transforms nature and things into objects and standing reserve (Bestand) through a kind of challenging and discipline, revealing the methods of objectifying of things and nature. At the center of Heidegger's philosophy of technology is the idea that modern technology, "enframing" (Gestell), has changed our relationship to the world and to ourselves. He argues that modern technology is not just a tool or an instrument, but a pervasive force that shapes our entire way of being .For Heidegger, technology reveals itself as a mode that reveals or brings forth truth. It frames the world in a certain way and reduces everything to a calculable and manipulable standing reserve. This instrumental understanding of technology obscures its essence and prevents us from experiencing the world in a more authentic and meaningful way. Heidegger is of the opinion that such an understanding of technology leads to an oblivion of being, in which man is separated from his true essence and the deeper meaning of being. He calls for a reflexive attitude towards technology that enables us to establish a more authentic relationship to the world and to our own being.     Foucault's analysis of power and technology focuses on the ways in which power is exercised through disciplinary technologies in modern societies. He explores how power is exercised not only through direct coercion, but also through systems of control and normalization. Foucault introduces the concept of disciplinary power, which operates through various techniques and technologies to regulate individuals and populations. Disciplinary technologies include institutions such as prisons, schools, hospitals and factories, as well as techniques of surveillance, classification and examination. These disciplinary technologies create a network of power relations that shape and control people’s bodies, behaviors, and identities. They produce specific forms of knowledge, norms, and subjectivities, exerting power over individuals' lives and shaping their understanding of themselves and society.Foucault argues that disciplinary technologies are deeply intertwined with modern forms of knowledge and social control. They serve to enforce conformity, maintain social order and uphold dominant power structures. In his analysis, power is not only imposed from above, but is distributed throughout society and operates at different levels and through different mechanisms. On the other hand, Foucault tries to pay more attention to how subjects are made by technology than to how objects are made by technology. 

After this encounter, the final section sets out the similarities and differences between Heidegger's and Foucault's readings of technology issue, drawing on the opinions of commentators such as Sawicki, Dreyfus, Rayner, Sinnerbrink, and Lagdameo. These similar and different aspects sometimes bring the two thinkers closer and sometimes further apart, resulting from Heidegger's ontological encounter with technology as opposed to Foucault's genealogical encounter with technology. The presence of similarities, however, encourages the reader to merely trace the possible influence of Heidegger on Foucault's thinking about technology. The presence of differences can be also reduced to considering technology on two levels: ontological (Heidegger) and ontic (Foucault), but as a conclusion, this opinion is strengthened: Foucault's narrative of technology (especially disciplinary technology) is not a copy.  The repetition is rather a determined, concrete version and completion of Heidegger's analysis of technology. This shows that although two thinkers have taken different paths (being and power) in the discussion of technology, by taking up the discussion of power and technology, Foucault brings technology into complex, multi-layered relationships. By discussing the disciplinary institutions and techniques of biopolitics, he expands technology ontological dimension (in Heidegger). In this sense, technology as a way of revealing of being in modernity, which begins with Heidegger, is developed, completed, and strengthened in Foucault along the same path but in a different way (with a concrete and historical approach).