The John Potts and Andrew Murphy reading consider the terms ‘technology, culture and technique’ and how they intertwine in our society.

In thinking about what technology is:

• Long history and changing meanings of the word
• It developed with terms like the ‘Industrial Revolution’ to describe the radical restructuring of Western societies as a result of industrial processes.
• During the 1860s, technology meant the system of mechanical and industrial arts
• Technology has now come to describe the overall system of machines and processes
• Contemporary meaning of technology is ABSTRACT. Can be said “we now live in technology surrounded by technological systems and dependent on them”
• Technology in the contemporary world involves cultural values, ideologies, ethical concerns and is shaped by political and economic determinants

The reading then went on to discuss what a technique is:

• Put simply it is “the use of skill to accomplish something”.
• We need techniques to use technologies
• If we lost technique we would lose operational skills and the thinking to produce technologies

Finally, what is culture?

• Very difficult to define
• Can be about self-contained cultures
• Can also embrace all human activity around the world
• Can pertain to the arts or entertainment
• Potts and Murphy think of culture as DYNAMIC and MULTIPLE
• It is dynamic because ideas and values change
• It is multiple because it contains the activities of different classes, races and ages.
• In the words of Brian Eno: “Culture is everything we do not have to do”.