Oswald Spengler: Man and Technics

In this new and revised edition of Oswald Spengler’s classic, Man and Technics, Spengler makes a number of predictions that, today—more than eighty years after the book was first published—have turned out to be remarkably accurate.

Key Predictions by Spengler:

• Environmental Impact: Spengler predicted that industrialisation would lead to serious environmental problems and that countless species would become extinct.
• Labour Shifts: He foresaw that labour from Third World countries would increasingly outcompete Western workers by offering the same work for much lower wages. Consequently, industrial production would move to other parts of the world, such as East Asia, India, and South America.

Technology and Its Consequences:

According to Spengler, technology has not only enabled man to harness the forces of nature but has also alienated him from nature. Modern technology now dominates our culture, replacing what was once natural and organic.

Spengler starkly observes that after making himself the master of nature, man has become technology’s slave. He summarises this tragic paradox with the words: ‘The victor, crashed, is dragged to death by the team.’

The Fate of Western Civilization:

Finally, Spengler foresaw that Western man would eventually grow weary of his increasingly artificial lifestyle and begin to hate the civilisation he himself created.

• No Way Out: Spengler argues that the unrelenting progress of technological development cannot be halted.
• Doomed Culture: The current high-tech culture of the West is destined to be consumed from within and destroyed. A time will come, Spengler writes, when our giant cities and skyscrapers have fallen in ruins and lie forgotten—‘just like the palaces of old Memphis and Babylon.’

It remains to be seen if this last, and most dire, of Spengler’s prophecies will also come true.