In this blog post, we’ll explore various perspectives on whether technological progress is an inevitable outcome or a product of chance, and examine how these two factors interact to drive technological advancement.
Among the games we enjoy, there’s the “Sid Meier’s Civilization” series, which is famous for its high addictiveness—so much so that it’s often referred to as one of the “Three Great Devilish Games.” In this game, players must research new technologies to develop their civilization. While players can start by researching the technologies they want first, they must eventually acquire a certain level of prerequisite technologies to develop advanced technologies and continue progressing through the game. In addition to technological advancement through research, players can also acquire technologies for free by completing specific religious buildings or achieving major milestones before rival players; furthermore, the research speed for some technologies accelerates under specific circumstances, such as during war. Furthermore, in special situations involving “Great Scientists,” technological progress can advance rapidly.
Looking at technological development in “Civilization,” some technologies can only be developed once a society has advanced enough to do so, or once a certain threshold of prerequisite technologies required for researching higher-level technologies has been met. These technologies can be viewed as inevitable outcomes, as they require specific prerequisites to be fulfilled. Conversely, if these prerequisites are not met, the technology in question cannot be discovered or developed.
On the other hand, new technologies are sometimes discovered even under conditions not directly related to technology itself, such as the completion of a specific religious building or the emergence of a Great Scientist. These technologies appear without a direct connection to the development process of existing technologies and drive technological progress. In this sense, technology can also be viewed as a product of chance. Furthermore, these random elements do not necessarily appear in every game, and players cannot predict which random events will occur before starting the game.
So far, we have examined two possible aspects of technological development through examples of technology research in ‘Civilization’. While this explanation may seem straightforward, it actually only partially accounts for technological development. Let’s now explore these two perspectives in greater depth.
Is technological progress truly inevitable? Let’s consider a counterexample. Suppose that all the foundational technologies necessary for refrigeration—such as refrigerants and power source engines—have been developed, but no one is researching or even considering refrigeration technology itself. In this case, even though all the necessary conditions are met, the technology is not developed. In other words, this is because there is no human awareness of the problem or the will to research refrigeration technology. In other words, while the necessary condition—the existence of prior technologies—is met, the sufficient condition for developing them into actual technology is absent, so technological advancement does not occur.
Thus, if one insists that technology is merely an inevitable product, one commits the reductionist fallacy of explaining it solely by prior technology as the cause, while excluding the element of chance from the various causal relationships at play in technological development. Furthermore, viewing prior technology as the sole source of all causes necessary to explain technological development carries the risk of falling into the “idol of origin”—the belief that knowing the origin alone is sufficient to explain everything.
So, is technological development purely a matter of chance? Let’s consider the example of refrigeration technology again. Within the broader flow of overall technological development, refrigeration technology may be nothing more than a specific subfield. Even if it remains undeveloped for some time after the foundational technologies are in place, the overall flow of technological development does not come to a halt. Furthermore, once both the relevant technologies and social conditions are in place, there is a possibility that it will be developed at any given point in time. If we factor in “time” as a variable in technological development, it is highly likely that such a technology will eventually be developed—albeit at a different point in time. From this perspective, the earlier example can be seen as an explanation that overemphasizes contingent factors, such as the will of an individual seeking to research refrigeration technology. If the foundational technologies were not sufficiently in place, even the most brilliant researcher could not develop refrigeration technology. Ultimately, contingent factors—which are sufficient conditions—cannot completely replace necessary conditions.
Thus, technological development cannot be explained merely by a simple sequence of causal relationships. Neither can the entire process of technological development be explained by necessary conditions alone—such as prior technology—nor, conversely, by contingent factors alone. While contingent factors may play an important role in technological development, they are insufficient on their own to explain the entire process.
How, then, can the full picture of technological development be explained? First, we must acknowledge that both necessary conditions—such as prior technology—and sufficient conditions—such as the will of those seeking to develop the technology—are causal factors essential to technological development. Furthermore, these two factors do not act independently but form an interdependent relationship. In other words, technological development does not occur through just one factor; it is achieved only when the two factors interact and influence each other.
Another factor to consider when explaining the nature of technological development is the importance of each causal element. Here, “importance” refers to the influence each element exerts on the development of a specific technology. Thought experiments are useful for assessing this importance. For example, let’s assume that several elements—A, B, C, and D—acted as causal factors in the development of a technology called Z. By asking the question, “What if A had not existed?”, we can assess the importance of A and its interactions with other causal factors. Such thought experiments help us understand the entire causal chain driving technological advancement and can also be used to compare the importance of each factor and establish criteria for value judgments.
Finally, let’s summarize this article. First, we examined two perspectives on technological development: necessity and chance. Next, we confirmed through examples that technological development cannot be fully explained by either perspective alone. Technological development occurs through a process in which necessary and chance factors are interdependent and interact with one another. Furthermore, thought experiments that hypothesize scenarios in which a specific factor did not exist can be effective for examining the influence of each factor. Just as history cannot be explained by a single individual or event alone—but must be considered alongside the structure of society as a whole and various causal relationships—technological development can also be viewed not as a simple linear process, but as taking place within a larger developmental structure where diverse conditions, contingent factors, and multiple causal relationships interact over the course of time.
