Abstract

During the past fifteen years, David Collingridge has made important contributions to the understanding of technology and the prospects for its effective control. Though philosophically sophisticated, his views have been given more attention by social and political scientists than by philosophers. In an effort to explore the rationale and applicability of his views, this article takes up three tasks. The first is to explicate Collingridge's basic argument on the topic of controlling technology. This argument is contained in his earliest works, The Social Control of Technology (1980) and Critical Decision Making (1982). The second task is to offer some critical comments on the adequacy of Collingridge's case, and the third is to apply the results of this analysis to a particular development in instructional technology (the use of expert systems and decision support systems).