Tolkien, Technology, and... War

[Lhunardawen]

Originally posted by Kuruharan
You are right that modern technology can gain physical distance, for some, from the things they do in war. However, they still know what they are doing, and at some point they are likely to see some evidence of their handiwork.

As some people might perceive the pictures of the bombing of a certain place to be more horrible than, for example, the Helm's Deep scene from TTT (pretending it happened in real life). Aside from the fact that you have seen something blown up to smithereens, it hurts to know that there are actual people affected. But some people tend to be insensitive, just as long as they get what they want. Tolkien might as well be angered with these people more than with technology itself.

[Esgallhugwen]

Aside from the fact that you have seen something blown up to smithereens, it hurts to know that there are actual people affected. But some people tend to be insensitive, just as long as they get what they want. Tolkien might as well be angered with these people more than with technology itself.

I totally agree with you there Lhunardawen. The technology we create to help and save has the potential to end our very existance all because of peoples greed. The people who use these machines to destroy are more at fault then the machines themselves, afterall they have no brains (the machines, well sometimes humans too) and therefore cannot have a say in how they are used for or against human kind.

If memory serves me correctly, and sometimes it doesn't, was it not Einstein or some other great scientist who discovered that we could harness the power of the atom? He intended it only to be used for the purpose of good, but when he found out what other intentions people would use it for, he stopped his research. To bad it didn't stop the atrocity from being made.

[Child of the 7th Age]

I don't think Tolkien was against all science and technology....only the abuses. But he did see "the Enemy" as the "Lord of Magic and Machines", who used magia for his own power. It was this potential for abuse that concerned JRRT. Having lived in the 20th century, he had seen this happen too many times. Yet it is possible to find postive references to technology in the Legendarium (as well as their negative counterparts), if you search closely. Let me mention just a few.

First, there is a brief but interesting comment in the Letters that suggests Tolkien drew a distinction between technological advancement per se, and the use of that technology for destructive purposes. This comment occurs in draft Letter 155, where Tolkien comments on the changes introduced into the Shire during the Wars of the Ring:

It would no doubt be possible to defend poor Lotho's introduction of more
efficient mills; but not to Sharkey and Sandyman's use of them.

To me, this draws a clear line between the technology itself and the way it is employed The critical difference is the element of coercion that Tolkien felt often followed on the heels of technology, especially technology that could be used for military purposes.

Tolkien displays a similar ambivalence in regard to the Noldor. He notes they were "always on the side of 'science and technology' as we should call it." Sometimes this had positive results. It is the Noldor, probably Feanor, who crafted the Palantiri. For many years, these were routinely used in helping the kings of Arnor and Gondor maintain the communications they needed to keep their realms together for as long as they did. No one, least of all Tolkien, condemned this. It was only when one of these crystal globes fell into Sauron's hands that their use became problematic, and they were abused. (On this, see UT).

Still, there is a less pleasant side of the Noldor's technology. These were the same Elves who cooperated with Sauron in forging the Rings of Power, certainly the most powerful 'technology' in Middle-earth. It was Sauron who duped and betrayed them into using their powerful skills to create something extremely destructive, which was ultimately against their own self-interest, and the self-interest of all the free peoples of Middle-earth.

Tolkien showed a similar ambivalence in dealing with the dwarves' love of mining. Mining is technology and a craft that can be used for both war and peace. There are many instances where the dwarves' greed for mithril and other fine metals led to misery. The one that immediately comes to mind is when they dug too deep in Moria and wakened evil things that would have been better left alone.

Yet there is another passage that leaves us with a totally different feeling: Gimli's rapturous description of the Caves at Helm's Deep.

No Dwarf could be unmoved by such loveliness. None of Durin's race would mine those caves for stones or ore, not if diamonds and gold could be got there....We would tend these glades of flowering stone, not quarry them.

It was presumably from these caves that the mithril came to rebuild the gates of Gondor, yet another positive use of technology. This last quote also suggests a tie-in to another theme in LotR that Tolkien stressed: that of guardianship of the Earth. Technology could be destructive for two reasons: the element of coercion, and the destruction of Arda's natural beauty. Technology without proper guardianship was an unalloyed evil.

It's no coincidence that parts of Mordor looked like industrial wasteland. In Frodo's words, "earth and air and water all seem accursed". Near Mount Doom, the Hobbits found "a huge mass of ash and slag and burned stone" where "the air was full of fumes; breathing was painful and difficult." Sound familiar anyone?

Would Tolkien have hated the computer? Given his ambivalent record, I'm not so sure. At one point he had a television so he could watch certain sports matches. He learned to drive a car, but gave it up, partially because he saw the way the influx of roads "destroyed" the British countryside. But he does depict a train with affection in one of his minor works. My guess is that he would not have hated the computer but might have been leery about such abuses as the spread of trash (the invasion of pornography and other stupidity into our homes) or the loss of privacy that sometimes results.

[The Saucepan Man]

I take your point, Child, but Tolkien also wrote:

Of course, I suppose that, subject to the permission of God, the whole human race (as each individual) is free not to rise again but to go on to perdition and carry out the Fall to its bitter bottom (as each individual can singulariter). And at certain periods, the present is notably one, that seems not only a likely event but imminent. Still I think that there will be a 'millenium', the prophesised thousand-year rule of Saints, i.e. those who have for all their imperfections never bowed heart and will to the world or the evil spirit (in modern but not universal terms: mechanism, 'scientific' materialism, Socialism in either of its factions now at war). (Letter 96)

and (to expand on a quote given earlier by Son of Númenor):

There is the tragedy and despair of all machinery laid bare. Unlike art which is content to create a new secondary world in the mind, it attempts to actualize desire, and so create power in this World; and that cannot really be done with any real satisfaction. Labour-saving machinery only creates endless and worse labour. And in addition to this fundamental disbility of a creature, is added the Fall, which makes our devices not only fail of their desire but turn to new and horrible evil. (Letter 75)

There does seem to a slight inconsistency between these quotes. The first suggests that he regarded mechanism as a manifestation of 'the evil spirit' in itself. The second suggests that, while not evil in itself, machinery would, as an inevitable consequence of the Fall of Man, be turned to evil (because it actualises the desire for power, which is itself an evil purpose). Either way, even though he might have acknowledged that mechanism did have its beneficial side, he appears to have thought that it would inevitably be turned to evil and that this, in itself, was a reason to regard it negatively.

The paradox I see here is that Ted Sandyman's mill (before 'corrupted' by Saruman) is a mechanism of sorts. As are the bow which Legolas uses and the cart in which Gandalf arrives in Hobbiton. They are all products of a certain level of technology, and yet Tolkien is happy to accept them as having the potential to be used both for good and for evil, without the latter being an inevitable consequence. It seems that it is only once technology develops beyond that stage that he sees the evil use as being inevitable. That, to me, is illogical. 'Fallen Man' is no less (and no more) capable of using the 'infernal combustion engine' for good than he is the horse and cart.

It seems to me that the 'embalming' nature of the Elves has its roots in Tolkien's dislike of technological advancement. Just as Tolkien himself was, the Elves are resisting change in Middle-earth, viewing the status quo as preferable by far. Yet I see this quality of Elvishness as extremely unnatural, as it seeks to work against the cycle of nature, which welcomes change and development by clearing away the old to make way for the new. Indeed, Tolkien himself states on a number of occasions that this desire to 'preserve' was one of the Elves' great failings. And, as you point out Child, the Elves' use of 'technology', in the form of the Rings of Power, to further this preservation of Middle-earth in their preferred state has dire consequences. Does this perhaps represent a recognition by Tolkien that his own resistance to change and development (in technological terms), however instinctively right it seemed to him, was in fact a flawed aspect of his own beliefs?

[Bombadil]

Great points and discussion by all, and in particular the latter: Sauce and Child. My interpretation of "Good technology," though, is one of the technology itself naught but a mere response to original, and ultimately evil technology.

It was presumably from these caves that the mithril came to rebuild the gates of Gondor, yet another positive use of technology.

You are correct Child, but if you were to go back to the roots of that situation - The door of Mithril was made to replace the one previously breached by the battering ram of Sauron's Army (for the first and only time, mind you). Grond was the evil technology that brought about the need for a mithril door. Such is the theory of militarization, and a more modern example being the cold war. With this type of rise in technology, all that can result form it is mass death and eventual self-destruction.

And to expand on this point:

But he seems to take no account of the benefits that advancements in technology can bring, particularly in terms of medical advancements, standards of living and information availability.

This was stated by the saucepan man. And to connect my point with that - There would be no need for medical advances if it weren't for the advance of the diseases.

BUt then there's the case for technology being able to do things like heal a bullet wound in a leg rather than have to amputate it, or cure legal blindess. These situations contradict my point somewhat (unless you want to bring up the fact that amputation from bullet wounds is caused by the technology of bullets, and modern factors can lead to loss of vision - an example being mass consumption of meat products leading to macular degeneration) Ahhh! im straying off point a little.

Anyways, To go back to some of the very first wars of Arda, you see that an enormous war- a war to mark an age- involves and was instigated by mere jewels. (And let me say i state "mere" lightly - they were the silmarils after all) But without the silmarils, there would be no war with Melkor. It was inevitable that a confrontation would elapse, but it was started due to the crafts of Feanor.

But perhaps in the end, mother nature towers over technology. This being the case in the Ent rebellion on Saruman, but perhaps to relate this to modern living one could see nature fighting back. As we pollute the air, she (Mother nature of course ) slowly fuses her polar ice caps. As we over-populate, and spread through this earth, so does her disease. Not disease brought upon by humans, but spread. I.E. the HIV virus, believed to have started in monkeys, is spread due to our ability to travel quickly and efficiently. And as we grow to depend on this technology, she turns her back on us - to the point where human survival is critically dependent to technology.

As we persist to go against laws of nature, and lead to ideas like cloning, and continue to add to the world's population, perhaps technology will ultimately balance things out. The more this planet is inhabited by human beings, the more deadly weaponry will become, the more deadly diseases will become, and in time ttechnology may possibly balance itself out. I apologize for straying off topic form Tolkien's views to my own, but I'm done.

[Estelyn Telcontar]

Saucepan Man says:

'Fallen Man' is no less (and no more) capable of using the 'infernal combustion engine' for good than he is the horse and cart.

While that is true, I would like to add a negative aspect that Tolkien also mentions in connection with Middle-earth technological advance - environmental pollution. The end products left over from a horse and cart are biodegradable, to use a modern word. Though it is of course possible to use modern technology for good purposes, the pollution remains. The exhaust of an ambulance (fired by an internal combustion engine) is no less harmful than that of a robber's getaway car...

[mark12_30]

Philip Gibbs was a WW1 correspondent who wrote several books after the war containing material that had been censored during the war. He wrote extensively about the Somme which is of course where Tolkien fought.

During the Somme (indeed during much of the war) the tactics were appallingly simple: (1) Extensive artillery shelling first (during which time the men sat huddled in their trenches dreading the next explosion; some went insane-- "shell shock" ) and then (2) bravely charging "over the top"-- squadron after squadron of men crossing no-mans-land (armed with a rifle each) running boldly into machine-gun fire.

The artillery shelling turned everything to mud. Body parts were everywhere. It wasn't safe to leave your trench to bury them.

Charging "over the top" and into machine gun fire was essentially suicide. Wave after wave of good, honest men were sent "over the top". For years. For little or no gain. Just death.

One of Gibb's main points was that the commanders simply kept sending men "over the top" in the name of "courage" without grappling with the fact that the casualty rate averaged 80% to 90% and sometimes 100%. These are completely unacceptable casualty rates yet the commanders kept sending the men "over the top", month after bloody month, year after bloody year.

So what Tolkien saw during his wartime was apallingly simple: Men sitting in muddy, body-parts-filled trenches waiting to be shelled to bits and slowly (or quickly) going insane; and men climbing out of their muddy, body-parts-filled trenches to run across the body-parts-filled mud of no-mans-land straight into machine gun fire and get mowed down.

What was the name of the certain death that the men faced when they went "over the top"? The "Machine"-gun.

If he hadn't hated "Machines" before the war already, I see why he hated them afterward.