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Gerd-Günter Voß's three conducts of life.md

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Gerd-Günter Voß's three conducts of life

In From Tech Critique to Ways of Living Alan Jacobs introduces German sociologist Gerd-Günter Voß's three conducts of life: traditional, strategic, and situational.[@jacobs-2021-tech p.29] These conducts describe an increasingly instrumental relationship to nature from taking stewardly and sustainable care of resources to the "immediacy of appropriation":[@jacobs-2021-tech p.30]

Gerd-Günter Voß is a German sociologist who has thought about our changing relationship to nature, and has proposed three different models of the conduct of life: traditional, strategic, situational.

The movement through these three forms of conduct, whatever benefits it might have, makes our relations with nature increasingly instrumental. We can see this shift more clearly when looking at our changing experience of time, and our understanding of the values inscribed in the passage of time. Within the traditional conduct of life, it is necessary to take stewardly care of the resources required for the exercise of a craft or a profession, as these get passed on from generation to generation.[@jacobs-2021-tech p.29]

... in the progression from the traditional to the strategic to the situational conduct of life, continuity of preservation becomes less valuable than immediacy of appropriation: We need more lithium today, and merely hope to find greater reserves—or a suitable replacement—tomorrow. This revaluation has the effect of shifting the place of the natural order from something intrinsic to our practices to something extrinsic. The whole of nature becomes what economists tellingly call an externality. ^ca4c17

thoughts & links:

  • Reminded by situational conduct of life of [[knowledge that is localised and fleeting]] and the value of that localised understanding.

  • it'no longer necessary to take stewardly care. This seems to relate (slightly) to ideas above re zooming out/long now. See [[Jacobs - from tech critique to ways of living]] and in particular his discussion of Gerd-Günter Voß.

  • interesting re [[Lithium dancing]] the idea of the two young women's place in nature. Paradox of their location (most likely just to escape being inside, or at least their only option was to be outside -- other not allowed during lockdown), how oblivious they were to it, and the technology's instrumental relationship to nature. See [[human industrial economy]]

  • reminded of screendance's fascination with filming dancing in nature. The trees, the green grass. A trope.

  • #unfinished

reference: Jacobs, A. (2021) ‘From Tech Critique to Ways of Living’, The New Atlantis, 63(Winter), pp. 25–42.

original source/found: working through Jacobs' website