Filippo Reale - Hopes and Hypes in Technology Dynamics for Societal Transformation [ETAC6 presentation]

HOPES AND HYPES IN […] SOCIETAL TRANSFORMATION Filippo Reale Goethe-University Frankfurt 4 June 2025 Panel “Hype Assessment II” ETAC6, Vienna, 2-4 June 2025 4 June 2025 Reale: Hopes and Hypes | ETAC6 Vienna 2025 CIRCUMSCRIBING HYPES •Literary perspective: •If the economy runs on fictions (Beckert 2016), Hype specifically runs on “sensations” (i.e. furors)—Hypes build on, and are eased by (institutionalized) mechanisms of, spectacle (Debord 1967) •Ideological perspective: Hypes are the result of “entrepreneurial storytelling” •The more intense the Hype, the higher the profit •Through Hypes, entrepreneurs valorize (i.e., they extract profit form) not the technology, but the enthusiasm •They valorize normative-cognitive matrices of their social environment (cf. commodity fetish) •Radical perspective on the (extractive!) relations between markets and social structures ➢Critical Theory of Entrepreneurship (Ogbor 2000), etc., Critical “Economic Sociology of Innovation” (Reale 2024) 4 June 2025 Reale: Hopes and Hypes | ETAC6 Vienna 2025 2 LOCATING HOPES •Hopes: Cure for cancer; nuclear fusion… •Hope (Def.): A collective or shared hope (of indeterminate concreteness) that a technology may solve a collectively accepted problem (of certain severity) •Very wide-spread e.g., in contemporary “grand societal challenges” •Hopes develop w/o (i.e., before) interaction with the entrepreneur/innovator •A relatively small effort of entrepreneurial storytelling suffices to draw a full-grown matrix of ready enthusiasm—“focusing” the Hope (“breakthrough” narrative) •Hopes have the potential to self-amplify if addressed accordingly •Hypes: promise-requirement cycle—Hopes: requirement-promise cycle (path. dep.) •The main component of understanding Hypes typically is communicative •The main component of understanding any given Hope is historical 4 June 2025 Reale: Hopes and Hypes | ETAC6 Vienna 2025 3 ANALYZING HOPES •Contemporarily, Hopes are collective or shared hopes that a technology solve a certain problem (challenge) •They are probably translatable into, they are a psychological transmutation of, the fear from which they stem •Often: existential fears (illness, death, extinction, …) •This suggests a metaphysical thread at the core of Hopes •…and (the rudiments of) a messianic subtext to entrepreneurialism in Hopes •(Hype as prophecy?) •Through Hopes, entrepreneurs valorize faith and belief •Suggests a critical study of Hopes informed by a Theology of economic progress and novelty (cf. Godin 2021) 4 June 2025 Reale: Hopes and Hypes | ETAC6 Vienna 2025 4 ANALYZING HOPES (SEQ.) •Choosing technology to project hope on (and not someone/-thing else) is a culturally bound phenomenon •Particular historical variation of this in current capitalist context •Question: are Hopes currently projected onto technology or onto novelty? (Innovation fetish?) •Innovation fetish at least leads to an overconfidence in/overenthusiasm for novelty •Libidinous core of present collective relations to innovation (Barber 2004) •This is generally the case for Hypes across the board (susceptibility for Hypes) •For Hopes specifically? 4 June 2025 Reale: Hopes and Hypes | ETAC6 Vienna 2025 5 CONCLUDING PROPOSITIONS I. It is profitable for the entrepreneur (like for a doctor) to deliver on promises (meet requirements) while maintaining the basic fear behind the Hope they are exploiting •Result: double-binding for “hoping” constituency towards entrepreneurs as a corollary of the profit motive •A general pattern for Hypes? Equivalent to e.g., planned obsolescence?—In any case, particularly problematic in conjunction with existential threats (+ public procurement) II. Role of TA: demystify/deconstruct candidate technologies •Profane the anticipated technical capabilities, question the inherent value of novelty •Not to dim lights or poop parties but to “rationalize” technological progress III. Critically reconsider the role of hope and of Hopes, incl. consequences and implications, in dedicated or “mission-oriented” innovation governance IV. (Re-)Arrange hope as a source of (or motivation for) cultural-technical evolution rather than of profit 4 June 2025 Reale: Hopes and Hypes | ETAC6 Vienna 2025 6 THE END PD Dr. Filippo REALE Adjunct Professor of Sociology Faculty of Social Sciences Goethe University Frankfurt [email protected] www.filipporeale.owlstown.net 4 June 2025 Reale: Hopes and Hypes | ETAC6 Vienna 2025 7