Tools for Conviviality
by Ivan Illich · first published 1973
41% recommend56% neutral3% critical
Why HN recommends it
A 1973 critique of technology arguing that tools should serve people rather than enslave them. It remains relevant to AI, cities and software, and anticipated free software. Suited to readers of tech criticism.
Summarised by Claude from recommending comments
Tools for Conviviality is a 1973 book by Ivan Illich about the proper use of technology. It was published only two years after his previous book Deschooling Society. In this new work Illich generalized the themes that he had previously applied to the field of education: the institutionalization of specialized knowledge, the dominant role of technocratic elites in industrial society, and the need to develop new instruments for the reconquest of practical knowledge by the average citizen. He wrote that "[e]lite professional groups … have come to exert a 'radical monopoly' on such basic hum
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…has some great passages but in it is also the germs of the anti-vaccination and natural healing movements. His critiques are powerful but the answer is not deinstitutionalism. The answer is taking his Tools for Conviviality to heart when engaging with/through institutions. Without conviviality, Learning Webs will become a "Platform" with blood-sucking silicon valley middle men taking a 20% cut on all education spending…
on “Deschooling Society (1970)” ↗…not just due to geography but to actual urban planning/architecture. Post-WWII US cities were explicitly designed for cars, and that's a disaster ecologically and practically. See also Ivan Illich's Tools for Conviviality which has a long analysis on why car-oriented cities has a terribly-low efficiency.
on “Oil firms slash U.S. Gulf of Mexico output by 91% ahead of Hurricane Ida” ↗* Tools for Conviviality, by Ivan Illich * The Peregrine, by J.A. Baker
on “Books That Changed How I Hear Music” ↗Some influential and interesting books on how humanity interacts with technology (and vice-versa): * The Technological Society, Jacques Ellul * Tools for Conviviality, Ivan Illich * Shop Class as Soulcraft, Matthew Crawford
on “Ask HN: Interesting (Non software) books?” ↗If you are intrigued in the argument but would like a less inflammatory author, check out “Tools For Conviviality” by Ivan Illich.
on “The Technium: The Unabomber Was Right (2009)” ↗You guys could read "Tools for Conviviality"[1] by Ivan Illich (1973). He talks about how tools could be more limited and useful to the person rather than make a person slave of the tool (he repeats this idea a lot). It expands on a previous idea…
on “Computers and Creativity” ↗Deschooling Society - Ivan Illich One-Dimensional Man - Herbert Marcuse Tools for Conviviality - Ivan Illich On Liberty - J. S. Mill The Annals - Tacitus The Histories - Tacitus
on “Ask HN: Books Worth Rereading Periodically?” ↗…organised "spaces" and groups to challenge digital imposition. [1] Not wishing to bore with lots of tech critique literature and references but Jacques Ellul (New Demons, Empire of Non-Sense), Ivan Illich (Tools for Conviviality) and Neil Postman (particularly Technopoly and Amusing Ourselves to death) - all good materials to understand the difficulty of neatly distinguishing individual choice/freedoms from context of culture…
on “Why Disconnecting from Your Phone Is So Good for You – and How to Do It” ↗…He wrote Eliza, the very first AI chat program, almost sixty years ago. I reread this book recently and it is still very pertinent, especially his discussion of AI. Other classics in this category: Tools for Conviviality Ivan Illich (1973) The Technological Society Jacques Ellul (1954, English translation 1964) The Human Use of Human Beings Norbert Wiener (1950) Technics and Civilization Lewis Mumford (1934) I admit…
on “The greatest tech books of all time” ↗Great share, Thanks. Have you read "Tools for Conviviality" by Illich ? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tools_for_Conviviality
on “Willingham Sends Fables into the Public Domain” ↗…first written accounts of the hacker culture. Weizenbaum's original paper on Eliza (1966) [0] is still very pertinent to the present generation of chatbots, especially the introduction and discussion. Tools for Conviviality, Ivan Illich (1973) [1]. Influenced recent work by the computer scientists Steven Kell [2],[3] and Kartik Agaram [4]. Computation and Human Experience, Phil Agre (1997) (excerpt at [5]). Agre got a…
on “Ask HN: Good books on philosophy of engineering?” ↗Why is Ivan Illich so underrated ? He predicted and theorized free software 10 years before it happened in Tools for Conviviality, made the most obvious and needed critic of education and hospitals alone against the Zeitgeist, studied step by step a lot of field of society to find patterns to simplify understanding. He created…
on “Silence Is a Commons by Ivan Illich (1983)” ↗This issue is evident to many smart people, and it would behove you to find a few whose conclusions were more prosocial, and sustainable. One such perspective is Tools for Conviviality, a 1973 book by Ivan Illich. Your ultimatum is imaginatively anemic.
on “Meta's Embrace of A.I. Is Making Its Employees Miserable” ↗Three books. These two feel especially relevant: Small Is Beautiful: Economics as if People Mattered - E.F. Schumacher Tools for Conviviality - Ivan Illich and The Dictionary of Obscure Sorrows - John Koenig
on “Ask HN: What are you reading?” ↗Is it ok if simply I point you to https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tools_for_Conviviality and urge you to read the book (it's quite short)?
on “Deschooling Society (1970)” ↗