Low technology

Not to be confused with Do it yourself or Low cost.

Low technology, often abbreviated low tech (adjective forms low-technology, low-tech, lo-tech), is simple technology, opposed to high technology or high-tech . They often refer to a traditional or non-mechanical kind, such as crafts and tools that pre-date the Industrial Revolution .

Low technology can simply be practiced or fabricated with a minimum of capital investment by an individual or small group of individuals. Also, the knowledge of the practice can be completely comprehended by a single individual, free from increasing specialization and compartmentalization. In some definition, low-tech techniques and designs may fall into disuse due to changing socio-economic conditions or priorities. Overall, these technologies are easily fabricable, adaptable and reparable, and use little energy and resources (that all come from local sources) to stay on the whole eco-friendly.

Low-techs are present in everyday life. For example, biking to work or repairing your own devices instead of throwing them away corresponds to the low-tech philosophy.

History

Historical origin

Primitive technologies such as bushcraft, tools that use wood, stone, whool, etc. can be seen as low-tech, as the pre-industrial revolution machines such as windmills or sailboats.

In the 70s

The economic boom after the war resulted in a doubt on progress, technology and infinite growth at the beginning of the 70s, notably with through the report The Limits to Growth (1972). Many have sought to define what soft technologies are, leading to the low-tech movement. Such technologies have been described as "intermediaries" (E.F. Schumacher) , "liberating" (M. Bookchin) , or even democratic. Thus, a philosophy of advocating a widespread use of soft technologies was developed in the United States, and many studies were carried out in those years, in particular by researchers like Langdon Winner .

2000s and later

"Low-tech" has been more and more employed in the scientific writings, in particular in the analyzes of the work from some authors of the 1970s: see for example Hirsch ‐ Kreinsen , the book "High tech, low tech, no tech" or Gordon .

More recently, the perspective of resource scarcity - especially minerals - lead to an increasingly severe criticism on high-techs and technology.

Since 2007, the Dutch Kris de Decker has published (with his collaborators) some reflections on low-tech solutions, the problem of high-techs, and the updating of technologies supposedly "obsolete" via the "Low <-tech Magazine". The header is: "Doubts on progress and technology", and specifies that the lowtechs "refuse to assume that each problem has a high-tech solution" , with a progressive translation of the articles in other languages since recently.

In 2014, the french engineer Philippe Bihouix published "L'âge des low tech" (The age of low-techs) where he presents how a european nation like France, with little mineral and energy resources, could become a "low-tech" nation (instead of a "start-up" nation) to better correspond to the sustainable development goals of such nation . He cites various examples of low-techs initiative and describe the low-tech philosophy and principles. In 2015, the Low-tech Lab project opened, consisting in a low-tech web platform for documentation and free sharing ('wiki' type) of inventions, and to put forward reflections on the low-tech philosophy.

Many definitions

Binary definition

According to the Cambridge International Dictionary of English, the concept of low-tech is simply defined as a technique that is not recent, or using old materials . Companies that are considered low-tech have a simple operation. The less sophisticated an object, the more low-tech. They are sometimes even assimilated to archaic methods. This definition does not take into account the ecological or social aspect, as it is only based on a simplistic definition of low-tech philosophy. The low-techs would then be seen as a "step backwards", and not as possible innovation.

Also, with this definition, the "high-tech" (ex: the telegraph) of a certain era becomes the "low-tech" of the one after (ex: compared to the telephone).

Technocriticists

Main article: Technocriticism

Low-tech is sometimes described as an "anti high-tech" movement, as a deliberate renunciation of a complicated and expensive technology. This kind of protest movement criticizes any disproportionate technology: a comparison with the neo-luddic or technocritical movements, which appeared since the Industrial Revolution, is then possible. This critical part of the low-tech movement can be called "no-tech", see for instance "No-tech magazine".

Recently: a wider and more balanced approach

A second, more nuanced definition of low-tech may appear. This definition takes into account the philosophical, environmental and social aspects. Low-tech are no longer restricted to old techniques, but also extended to new, future-oriented techniques, more ecological and intended to recreate social bounds. A low-tech innovation is then possible .

Contrary to the first definition, this one is much more optimistic and has a positive connotation. It would then oppose the planned obsolescence of objects (often “high-tech”) and question the consumer society, as well as the materialist principles underneath. With this definition, the concept of low-tech thus implies that anyone could make objects using their intelligence, and share their know-how to popularize their creations. A low-tech must therefore be accessible to all, and could therefore help in reduction of inequalities .

Furthermore, some reduce the definition of low-tech to meet basic needs (eating, drinking, housing, heating ...), which disqualifies many technologies from the definition of low-techs, but this definition does not is not always accepted . Finally, considering that the definition of low-tech is relative, some prefer to use lower tech , to emphasize a higher sobriety compared to high-tech, without claiming to be perfectly "low".

Examples of low technology

Note: almost all of the entries in this section should be prefixed by the word traditional.

• weaving produced on non-automated looms, and basketry.
• hand wood-working, joinery, coopering, and carpentry.
• the trade of the ship-wright.
• the trade of the wheel-wright.
• the trade of the wainwright: making wagons. (the Latin word for a two-wheeled wagon is carpentum, the maker of which was a carpenter.)

(Wright is the agent form of the word wrought, which itself is the original past passive participle of the word work, now superseded by the weak verb forms worker and worked respectively.)

• blacksmithing and the various related smithing and metal-crafts.
• folk music played on acoustic instruments.
• mathematics (particularly, pure mathematics)
• organic farming and animal husbandry (i.e.; agriculture as practiced by all American farmers prior to World War II).
• milling in the sense of operating hand-constructed equipment with the intent to either grind grain, or the reduction of timber to lumber as practiced in a saw-mill.
• fulling, felting, drop spindle spinning, hand knitting, crochet, & similar textile preparation.
• the production of charcoal by the collier, for use in home heating, foundry operations, smelting, the various smithing trades, and for brushing ones teeth as in Colonial America.
• glass-blowing.
• various subskills of food preservation:
  • smoking
  • salting
  • pickling
  • drying

Note: home canning is a counter example of a low technology since some of the supplies needed to pursue this skill rely on a global trade network and an existing manufacturing infrastructure.

• the production of various alcoholic beverages:
  • wine: poorly preserved fruit juice.
  • beer: a way to preserve the calories of grain products from decay.
  • whiskey: an improved (distilled) form of beer.
• flint-knapping
• masonry as used in castles, cathedrals, and root cellars.

Legal status of low-technology

See also: Handicraft, Organic food, and Natural foods

By federal law in the United States, only those articles produced with little or no use of machinery or tools with complex mechanisms may be stamped with the designation "hand-wrought" or "hand-made". Lengthy court-battles are currently underway over the precise definition of the terms "organic" and "natural" as applied to foodstuffs.

Groups associated with low-technology

• Arts and Crafts Movement, popularized by Gustav Stickley in America around 1900.
• Bauhaus movement of Germany around the same time.
• Do-It-Yourself phenomenon arising in America following World War II.
• Back-to-the-land movement beginning in America during the 1960s.
• Luddites, whose activities date to the very beginning of the Industrial Revolution.
• Living history and open-air museums around the world, which strives to recreate bygone societies.
• Simple living adherents, such as the Amish and to a lesser extent some sects of the Mennonites, who specifically refuse some newer technologies to avoid undesirable effects on themselves or their societies.
• Survivalists are often proponents, since low-technology is inherently more robust than its high-technology counterpart.

See also

• Obsolescence
• Do it yourself
• Anti-consumerism
• Degrowth
• Simple living
• Embodied energy

Sources

• Falk, William W.; Lyson, Thomas A. (1988). High tech, low tech, no tech: recent industrial and occupational change in the South. SUNY Press. ISBN 9780887067297.

• De Decker, Kris (2012). Low-tech magazine (tome 1 and 2). ISBN 9781794711525.

• Watson, Julia (2020). Lo—TEK. Design by Radical Indigenism. Taschen. ISBN 978-3836578189.

References

General

• Merriam webster dictionary

External links

• Low-Tech Magazine – Doubts on progress and technology
• Low-tech lab (english version)