Response to the Unbound Prometheus: Hans Jonas'Affirmation of Responsibility in. Technological Age of Unbridled and Uncontrolled Development

The comprehensive and life-long task Hans Jonas sets
himself is to find an ethics for the our age, the technological one; an
approach he develops mainly in his book The Imperative of  Respon-­
sibility. Jonas is certainly not against technology especially since
technological innovations play positive roles in the field of  health
and medicine, communication and transport. While the technologi­-
cal potential itself is not the problem, the lack o f  ethical restrictions,
the unbridled and uncontrolled development and increase o f  tech­
nological power is indeed a problem. The destructive potential o f 
technology cannot be contained and Jonas metaphorically describes
this ethical impasse as ‘the finally unbound Prometheus.’ The lim­-
itlessness and infiniteness o f  human dominion are expressions o f 
our Promethean arrogance and immodesty. It is one thing that we
have reached such degree o f  technical mastery' that we can cultivate,
manipulate, shape and change life up to the point that we irrevers­-
ibly damage or even destroy it. It is another that there are no ethical
restrictions that can protect us from effectuating our own demise as
well as the destruction o f  the environment. It is in this context that
Jonas underscores the importance o f  human responsibility.
The author holds that everyone can participate in the critique of
technological utopianism and construction o f  a new world, more
human, more clean. Whether through an artistic practice, through
participation in events, by creating a website, or through discussions and debates, everyone can add a stone to build our future world and
to bring about change in the attitude o f  humanity. The Imperative of 
Responsibility is one o f  those stones which humanity needs today.
It seems then that the ethics of  Jonas by criticizing the enslavement 
of  human person to our modern economy and comfort technology,
addresses one of  the biggest problems that humanity must address
in the twenty-first century.