2.Prometheus Bound

Although the theme of technology is addressed in several Greek tragedies, nowhere does this happen as extensively and poignantly as in Prometheus Bound, which is traditionally ascribed to Aeschylus. In Prometheus Bound the ambivalent character of Prometheus'gift to mankind, technè，is placed in the foreground.This tragedy ties in with the well-known creation story of Greek mythology.According to this myth the Titan Prometheus（“he who knows or sees ahead”）fashioned man out of clay in the gods'image.His not very smart brother Epimetheus（“he who looks backwards”），who appropriated for himself the task of endowing all mortal beings with fitting powers for survival, went about so enthusiastically that when he finally reached man, there were no powers left.Since Prometheus had helped Zeus to dethrone his father Chronos and thus become head of the gods, he hoped that Zeus would assist him in liberating man from his state of helplessness.When Zeus refused, Prometheus decided to rob the god Hephaestus of his fire and the goddess Athena of her technical knowledge and give these to man.Zeus, not only incensed by Prometheus'disobedience but also fearing that these powers might make man too mighty, takes fire away from man, but Prometheus cunningly succeeds in stealing it back from Zeus and gives it to man for good.Zeus out of revenge lets Hephaestus tie Prometheus for all eternity to a rock at the end of the earth, where an eagle will again and again tear the immortal Titan's body to pieces and feast on his liver, which, however, the dream of every alcoholic, grew back during the night.

Aeschylus'tragedy begins when Hephaestus is chaining Prometheus to the rock with the help of Cratus（force）and Bia（violence），Prometheus Bound has little dramatic action but consists mainly of the conversations between the suffering Prometheus and the personages who visit him：the god Oceanus, his daughters the Oceanides, and the mortal Io, who has been turned into a cow by Zeus'jealous wife Hera. The visitors lament Prometheus'fate and advise him to express his regrets to Zeus and acknowledge his rule in order to escape his punishment.But not Prometheus.He snaps at the Oceanides：“Worship, adore, and fawn upon whoever is your lord.But for Zeus I care less than nothing.Let him do his will, let him hold his power for his little day—since he will not bear sway over the gods for long”.[117]

Aeschylus'fellow citizens, who only shortly before had released themselves from tyranny and were now defending a budding democracy, will have read Prometheus'scathing criticism of the despotic Zeus as a political message that could not be misunderstood. But at least as important in Prometheus Bound are Aeschylus'reflections on the“uses and disadvantages of technology for life”.At the center of the tragedy is Prometheus'defense of his theft of the“technical arts”（technai）from his fellow gods.Prometheus pointsout to the Oceanides that he has thereby enabled man to flee the miserable life he led before.[118]Then follows a long list of the many technical means Prometheus has given to man, not just the tools that enable man to build houses and ships and make ploughs and weapons, but also the knowledge of numbers, which allows man to explain and predict the motions of the heavenly bodies, and the skill of writing—“creative mother of the Muses'arts”—which makes it possible for man to remember everything.Or as Prometheus himself summarizes it：“Hear the sum of the whole matter in the compass of one brief word—every art possessed by man comes from Prometheus”.[119]Prometheus'apology bespeaks the great admiration Aeschylus has for man's technological achievements, which enable him to control both inanimate and living nature and take his destiny into his own hands, raise man above his animal state and lend him a divine splendour.

Seen in the context of Prometheus'unfortunate fate, however, his eulogy of technology is not without tragic irony. Prometheus may be powerful owing to his technical arts and ability to look ahead, but this does not prevent his being chained to the rock by means of these very same arts.The leader of the Oceanides'choir, despite her pity for the tormented Prometheus, cannot refrain from interrupting his eulogy with a comment that is not wholly free of irony or even cynicism：“You have suffered sorrow and humiliation.You have lost your wits and have gone astray；and, like an unskilled doctor, fallen ill, you lose heart and cannot discover by which remedies to cure your own disease”.[120]

If we perceive the anthropomorphic Greek pantheon as a projection of the tragedians'philosophy of man, then the god Prometheus seems to symbolize the fortunes of ingenious man himself. Seen in that light Prometheus'tragic-ironic fate seems intended to show that man with the help of technology not only freeshimself of his natural deficiences, but that he does so at the cost of a new, eternal servitude.Man is not just the master of technology but its slave as well.And he cannot free himself from this slavery by means of his technical ingenuity.As Prometheus'fate shows this slavery can turn out catastrophically.The tragedy in other words seems to warn us that if we play with fire we are in danger of getting burned, or worse.The tragedy thus warns us—to use an expression that is often heard is discussions about risk-laden technologies such as genetic manipulation—not to“play God”.

Still more tragic irony is hidden in Prometheus Bound. As Prometheus'name already suggests, technical mastery requires looking ahead.Technical intervention requires the ability to predict in advance the effects of one's actions.In giving technical insight to humankind, Prometheus offers this power as well.But since man is and will remain a finite[121]，and therefore mortal being, this is a rather ambivalent“gift”.The technical arts that mortal man disposes teach him to foresee the time and circumstances of his own death.That this is not altogether such a delightful prospect is brought out by the discussions about whether it is so appealing to have a“gene passport”that would enable us to predict when and of what we will die.Luckily Prometheus has a solution for this too：“I caused mortals to cease foreseeing their doom[……]I caused blind hopes to dwell within their breasts”.[122]

After this intervention by Prometheus mortal man still realizes that he is going to die but not when or by which cause. Such a blind hope can justly be called a mixed blessing, or, as Jean Pierre Vernant has it in his analysis of Prometheus, a“blessed illusion”.[123]On the one hand this illusion liberates man from the knowledge of the circumstances of his inevitable death.But still it remains fate, since the imposed limitation to our anticipatory powers meansthat man must also lack the power to fully grasp the consequences of his actions.

Aeschylus'mythological explanation for this human limitation remains a painfully effective way to characterize the human condition. If man were an animal or a god, he would know no hope.In the first case his situation would be literally hope-less, as he would be ignorant and totally in the hands of nature's blind necessities.If man were an immortal, all-knowing god, he would be hope-free, since he would have no need of it.Mortal man is positioned between the animals and the gods and therefore dependent on blind hope.But those who intervene technically in nature without being able to foresee the consequences are in permanent danger.

The picture painted of technology in Prometheus Bound is altogether highly ambivalent. Technology raises man above his animal life and lends him a divine aspect, but at the same time as a mortal he lacks the insight that would be needed to fully control technology and runs the risk of becoming subservient to it.Prometheus Bound is also, as are nearly all classical tragedies, ambivalent in the sense that the writer does not make an unambiguous choice either for or against technology.Such a choice, given technology's tragic ambivalence, is impossible.We are after all technical creatures, or—as Helmuth Plessner calls it—“artificial by nature”.[124]As technical beings we have no option but to be technical, whether we like it or not.And we must not forget that in doing so we can not only take to the skies but also fall into bottomless depths, as Icarus experienced.This ambiguity causes the tragic attitude to life to lie beyond the conflict between optimism and pessimism.

There is no denying that the tragic view of political and technical action has an uncanny character. It is an ominous attitude toward fate.Maybe that iswhy in the subsequent course of European history it has summoned so many opposing forces.On the one hand the call of Prometheus'interlocutors to abandon hubris and reacknowledge the rule of the gods was answered.This is the road that will lead Europe via Jerusalem to Christianity.On the other hand many have nourished the blind hope that man would eventually gain control over technology.This road leads from Plato's Athens through Bacon's New Atlantis, to modern technology.With Jerusalem's and Athens's rule the tragic tradition appears to have been marginalized.And that brings us back again to Steiner.

However, it is precisely modern technology that contains all the elements needed to revitalize the sense of the tragic. In the 20th century we had a harsh confrontation with the tragic dimension of modern technology.That has certainly not taken away our“blind hope”for technical controllability and manipulability of our lives.That hope dies hard.But since a number of decades the sense of the tragedy inherent in modern technology has also germinated.What we are witnessing is the rebirth of tragedy out of the spirit of modern technology.