Technological Determinism in Fahrenheit 451: A Study

Abstract

Ray Bradbury’s novel Fahrenheit 451 stands as one of the most enduring dystopian critiques of modern media ecology and technological expansion. The novel is set in a future where literature is banned and firemen burn books, and it presents a society fundamentally reshaped by its material artifacts. The main character of the novel, Montag is a fireman, whose job is to burn all the books found in the houses of people, as these books are considered to be a source of tears and sadness, and those who question such kind of destruction are too burned with the books. This research paper is a study which shows how a technology can become a source of human destruction if it is not handled and controlled by the human themselves. Christian Lous Lange in his 1921 Nobel Peace Prize acceptance speech righteously warned us that “Technology is a useful servant, but a dangerous master”. And the core of this research study is to prove true the words of Lange, that an uncontrolled technology can destroy the society and even change its structure. And to achieve this aim, three theories are used for analyzing this novel, they are: hard technological determinism, soft technological determinism, and Neil Postman’s technopoly. Analysing novel through these theories will help us to understand how a technology can change societal structure, be a source of destruction of culture and can be used to control human thinking. This research paper is significantly important in this modern world where AI is growing and expanding so quickly that it in turn will be a factor that will harm our society and economics. Through this research paper, we will learn how a technology, which people never asked for, still became a part of people’s lives which couldn’t later be resisted and replaced caused harm to a society, changed and eradicated their culture and people themselves are mere spectators of it.