TECHNOLOGY AT THE CROSSROADS: A CALL FOR TRANSFORMATIVE TECHNOLOGY IN THE POST-PANDEMIC ERA

Globalization is viewed in this work as a critical concept by which we understand the transition of human society into the post-pandemic era. In this vein, this paper attempts to look into the process of globalization and its central feature, technology. Technology has become a global force that affects political, social, ethical, and environmental. The ancient Greeks, such as Plato and Aristotle, who lived in aristocratic societies, rejected discourse on technology as unworthy. Social, political, and theoretical activities, rather than technical, were deemed as the highest forms. Plato, for instance, alluded to the artisans merely as the cheapest form of metal compared to gold associated with the philosopher-rulers, while silver is equivalent to the warrior class. Technological change, defined as "progress," is seen as an inevitable process in modern history. This paper explored issues of globalization and the implications of technology, employing crucial viewpoints of Martin Heidegger, acknowledged as one of the powerful and influential philosophers of the 20th century. Specifically, this paper explored “machination (Machenschaft)” and Heidegger’s Technik (Technology) or Gestell (Enframing). Machination is not just human conduct but the act of manipulation. It is a revelation of beings as a whole as exploitable and manipulable objects. The world seems to be a collection of present-at-hand thing with no intrinsic meaning or purpose, a cold place where we cannot put down any roots. All we can do is calculate and control. We observe and measure everything. We make things go faster and faster. Thus, there is a need to discuss and recognize issues related to technology. Heidegger's thoughts offer analytic tools that contribute to a critical understanding of the multidimensional effects, risks, and possibilities brought about by modernity and its globalization..

1. Becoming those who served

This chapter defines what is meant by “warrior” in early Japanese history, describes the different possible origins of the warrior class, and the interaction between elite warrior-nobles and non-warrior nobility. In this early period, from prehistory to the ninth century, there was no well-defined warrior class or status group. Warriors across Japan did not think of themselves as belonging to a single group, nor did they have much political power except for the warrior-noble elite, like the Taira and Minamoto clans.

Samurai: A Very Short Introduction

A book about the samurai from their origins in the eighth and ninth centuries until their demise in the mid-nineteenth century. It describes samurai life, work, philosophy, and warfare as it changed over time and covers what samurai were doing when they weren’t fighting. The first half of the book tends to focus on warriors who were essentially aristocrats; warrior families who looked to non-warrior nobles for models of behaviour, lifestyle, and politics. It traces the early formation of a warrior regime, how it interacted with an emperor-centered noble court located permanently in Kyoto, and the political and cultural struggles within the warrior class. The second half of the book zeroes in on the details of warlord families, the struggles of “rank-and-file” samurai typically depicted in popular culture—warriors from the seventeenth through nineteenth centuries. It also shows how samurai history, culture, and values were consumed by non-samurai and, in so doing, contributed to an idealized warrior image that even samurai themselves tried to emulate.

POST-GADDAFI REPERCUSSIONS IN NORTHERN MALI

While utopias of (political) autonomy or an independent (Tuareg) state have for long been part and parcel of internal debates among Tuareg, it was only recently that the claim for independence was formulated to the outside world. A Tuareg state, Azawad, was even put into practice, albeit for some months only. A second characteristic is that there has never been a serious attempt at integrating all Tuareg, regardless of the country they are living in, into a unique nation-state. Is the 'national identity' of the respective post-colonial states so strong that it supplants the 'claim for independence'? Or is the pre-colonial form of political organisation among Tuareg, the regional drum-group (ettebel), still so vivid that it impedes the establishment of a state that would encompass all Tuareg? Apart from the independence movement MNLA (Mouvement National pour la Libération de l'Azawad) operating in Northern Mali, there are Islamist groups which fight for the spread of an Islamic mode of life. Some of these succeeded in recruiting Tuareg, particularly among the Tuareg of the Kidal region. The appeal of the 'Islamic claim' to the Kidal Tuareg goes back to their genesis as a political entity during the period of colonial conquest when the French installed a regional 'drum-group' within the framework of administrative chieftainship. As nearly all regional Tuareg claim descent from members of the Islamic army that conquered North Africa in the 7th century, regional power differs from power structures in all other regions inhabited by Tuareg. It is based on a double legitimacy: that of Islamic nobility, and that of the Tuareg warrior class. For several months, however, there has been ideological dissent among the Tuareg followers of the Islamic movements. This debate revolves around several issues, particularly the question as to whether or not the Islamic mode of life is to be limited to the sole region of Kidal.

Burial complex of equestrian class representatives from the northwestern Khazaria

The authors analyze the plentiful material complex that was discovered at the cremation burial ground in the vicinity of the Staraia Pokrovka village of Chuhuiv District in Kharkiv oblast. On account of the absence of any bone remains this complex doesn’t belong to burial sites. However, it is connected with the Saltovo people’s burial ritualism in the forest-steppe zone of the Khazar Khaganate. On the basis of multiple analogies of considered artifacts from Saltovo-Mayaki sites, this material complex can be dated to the second half of 8th – early 9th centuries.The presence of military items, equestrian equipment and nomad living items allows to refer it to the burial complexes of the equestrian warrior class representatives. There are the second fibula, two cosmetic kits (“ostensories”), tweezers with chain and mirror with graffiti, which point to the fact that part of things refer to women's dressing. A bronze ring found in the complex probably belonged to a woman, as well. Two sets of things appertained to two heterosexual individuals. These findings show that complex under study apparently accompanied the pair burial.

Diverse genetic origins of medieval steppe nomad conquerors

Over millennia, steppe nomadic tribes raided and sometimes overran settled Eurasian civilizations. Most polities formed by steppe nomads were ephemeral, making it difficult to ascertain their genetic roots or what present-day populations, if any, have descended from them. Exceptionally, the Khazar Khaganate controlled the trade artery between the Black and Caspian Seas in VIII-IX centuries, acting as one of the major conduits between East and West. However, the genetic identity of the ruling elite within the polyglot and polyethnic Khaganate has been a much-debated mystery; a controversial hypothesis posits that post-conversion to Judaism the Khazars gave rise to modern Ashkenazim. We analyzed whole-genome sequences of eight men and one woman buried within the distinctive kurgans of the Khazar upper (warrior) class. After comparing them with reference panels of present-day Eurasian and Iron Age populations, we found that the Khazar political organization relied on a polyethnic elite. It was predominantly descended from Central Asian tribes but incorporated genetic admixture from populations conquered by Khazars. Thus, the Khazar ruling class was likely relatively small and able to maintain a genetic identity distinct from their subjugated populations over the course of centuries. Yet, men of mixed ancestry could also rise into the warrior class, possibly providing troop numbers necessary to maintain control of their large territory. However, when the Khaganate collapsed it left few persistent genetic traces in Europe. Our data confirm the Turkic roots of the Khazars, but also highlight their ethnic diversity and some integration of conquered populations.

Bushi philosophy

Bushi is one of several terms for the warrior of premodern Japan; samurai is another. The ‘way of the warrior’ – that is, the beliefs, attitudes and patterns of behaviour of the premodern Japanese warrior – is commonly called bushidō (literally, the ‘way of the bushi’). However, bushidō is actually a phrase of rather late derivation, and in premodern times was never exclusively used to describe the warrior way. Two of the earliest and most enduring phrases for the way of the warriors who rose in the provinces of Japan in the late ninth and tenth centuries were the ‘way of the bow and arrow’ and the ‘way of the bow and horse’. These phrases, however, referred to little more than prowess in the military arts, the most important of which, as the second phrase clearly specifies, were horse riding and archery. For many centuries no one in Japan undertook to define systematically what the way of the warrior in a larger sense was or should be. Warrior beliefs, ideals and aspirations – including loyalty, courage, the yearning for battlefield fame, fear of shame and an acute sense of honour and ‘face’ – were widely recognized, but neither warriors nor others apparently felt the need to codify them in writing. Not until the establishment of the Tokugawa military government (shogunate) in 1600, which brought two and a half centuries of nearly uninterrupted peace to Japan, did philosophers begin to study and write about the warrior way (bushidō). Concerned about the meaning and proper role of a ruling warrior class during an age of peace, philosophers posited that warriors should not only maintain military preparedness to deal with fighting that might occur, but should also develop themselves, through education based primarily on Confucianism, to serve as models and moral exemplars for all classes of Japanese society.

The Evolution of the Ancient Way of the Warrior: From the Ancient Chronicles to the Tokugawa Period

The term bushidō is widespread today and involves history, philosophy, literature, ­sociology and religion. It is commonly believed to be rooted in the ancient “way” of the bushi or samurai, the Japanese warriors who led the country until modern times. However, even in the past the bushi were seldom represented accurately. Mostly, they were depicted as the authors thought they should be, to fulfil a certain role in society and on the political scene.By taking into account some ancient and pre-modern writings, from the 8th to the 19th centuries, from the ancient chronicles of Japan, war tales, official laws, letters, to martial arts manuals and philosophical essays, and by highlighting some of the bushidō values, this article attempts to answer the questions how and why the representation of the bushi changed from the rise of the warrior class to the end of the military government in the 19th century.