Subject, Object, and History under Digital Technology

In the French technological philosopher Bernard Stiegler’s work *Technics and Time, 1: The Fault of Epimetheus*, he discusses the ancient Greek myth in which the Titan Epimetheus, when distributing various skills, forgot to assign excellent skills to humans. This forced his brother Prometheus to steal fire from Mount Olympus and give it to humanity. Stiegler states: “Prometheus came to inspect the results of the distribution. He saw that all the other animals had been appropriately endowed with their respective strengths, but that humans alone were naked, without clothing or sharp teeth and claws. The fate of humans, who were to emerge from the earth to meet the daylight, was approaching. To save humanity, Prometheus, laboring on their behalf, stole from Hephaestus and Athena the creative faculty of technics and fire (for without fire it was impossible to acquire or use technics). In this way, he gave humanity a great gift. Humans thereby acquired the intelligence needed for their vital needs.” This act not only symbolizes the origin of technics but also foreshadows the complex entanglement of technics with human destiny. The fire is both a source of light and progress and a medium of disaster and punishment. The story of Prometheus reminds us that technics has never been a neutral tool but is deeply embedded in the power structures and historical processes of human society. Today, under the wave of digital capitalism, the role played by technics has become increasingly complex. It not only reshapes modes of production and social relations but also gives rise to new forms of domination and ideology. It is precisely against this background that contemporary Western critical theorists, such as the advocates of techno-feudalism and accelerationism, have re-examined and developed Marx’s thought on technics, seeking to reveal the technological objects, technological subjects, and their deep connections with history and society in the digital age.

在法国技术哲学家贝尔纳·斯蒂格勒(Bernard Stiegler)的著作《技术与时间1:爱比米修斯的过失》(La Technique et le temps1:La faute d'Epiméthée)中，谈到了古希腊神话中作为泰坦神的爱比米修斯在分配各种技能的时候，忘记了给人类分配优秀的技能。这导致了他的兄弟普罗米修斯不得不从奥林匹斯山盗取火种，赠予人类。斯蒂格勒说道：“普罗米修斯来检验分配结果了。他看到其他所有的动物都适当地各获其长，唯有人赤身裸体，既无衣履也无尖齿利爪。人类走出地底迎见天日的命运就要来临。为挽救人类而操劳的普罗米修斯从赫菲斯托斯和雅典娜那里盗取了技术的创造机能和火(因为没有火就无法获得和利用技术)。就这样，他送给人类一份厚礼。人类从此获得了可用于它生命需要的理智。”这一行为不仅象征着技术的起源，也预示了技术与人类命运的复杂纠葛。火种既是光明与进步的源泉，也是灾难与惩罚的媒介。普罗米修斯的故事提醒我们，技术从来不是中立的工具，而是深深嵌入人类社会的权力结构与历史进程之中。今天，在数字资本主义浪潮下，技术所扮演的角色愈发复杂，它不仅重塑了生产方式与社会关系，还催生了新的统治形式与意识形态。当代西方批判理论家，如技术封建主义与加速主义的倡导者，正是在这一背景下，重新审视并发展了马克思关于技术的思想，试图揭示数字时代的技术物、技术主体及其与历史、社会的深层关联。

In his works, Marx had already keenly captured the importance of technics as the core of productive forces. He regarded technics as a driving force for historical development, while also criticizing the capitalist alienation of technics—that is, how technics is transformed into a tool for exploiting labor. However, in the era of digital capitalism, the form and function of technics have undergone fundamental changes. New technological objects such as data, algorithms, and artificial intelligence have not only changed the modes of production and consumption but also redefined human subjectivity and social structure. Theorists of techno-feudalism point out that the rise of the digital platform economy has enabled a few tech giants to monopolize data and algorithmic resources, forming a new feudal-like structure of domination.

马克思在其著作中，早已敏锐地捕捉到技术作为生产力核心的重要性。他将技术视为推动历史发展的动力，同时也批判了资本主义对技术的异化使用，即技术如何被转化为剥削劳动的工具。然而，在数字资本主义时代，技术的形态与功能发生了根本性变化。数据、算法、人工智能等新型技术物不仅改变了生产与消费的方式，还重新定义了人类主体性与社会结构。技术封建主义理论家指出，数字平台经济的崛起使得少数科技巨头垄断了数据与算法资源，形成了一种新的封建式统治结构。

At the same time, accelerationist theorists attempt to draw inspiration from Marx’s thought on technics, proposing a more radical critical path. They argue that the accelerated development of technics does not necessarily lead to alienation and oppression but may instead become the key to breaking through the shackles of capitalism.

与此同时，加速主义理论家则试图从马克思的技术思想中汲取灵感，提出了一种更为激进的批判路径。他们认为，技术的加速发展并非必然导致异化与压迫，反而可能成为突破资本主义桎梏的关键。

Against this background, contemporary critical theorists have supplemented and revised Marx’s thought on technics in multiple ways. They not only focus on the materiality of technics as productive forces but also delve into the cultural dimension of technics as ideology; they not only analyze the transformation of the labor process by technics but also reveal the reshaping of human subjectivity by technics; they not only criticize the alienated use of technics but also explore the emancipatory potential of technics. Through these efforts, they have provided new theoretical tools for understanding the complex realities of the digital capitalist era and have infused new vitality into Marx’s thought on technics. Below, we examine the development of Marx’s philosophy of technics by contemporary Western Marxism from three aspects: technics and the subject, technics and the object, and technics and history.

在这一背景下，当代批判理论家对马克思的技术思想进行了多方面的补充与修正。他们不仅关注技术作为生产力的物质性，还深入探讨了技术作为意识形态的文化性；不仅分析了技术对劳动过程的改造，还揭示了技术对人类主体性的重塑；不仅批判了技术的异化使用，还探索了技术的解放潜能。通过这些努力，他们为理解数字资本主义时代的复杂现实提供了新的理论工具，也为马克思的技术思想注入了新的生命力。下面我们分别从技术与主体、技术与物、技术与历史三个方面分别来看当代西方马克思主义对马克思技术哲学的发展。

I. Technics and the Subject: From the Industrial Subject to the Intelligent Subject

一、技术与主体：从工业主体到智能主体

Marx is that fire-stealer. On the eve of the birth of capitalist industrial society, he became our Prometheus, helping us emerge from the shadowy kingdom of Amenthes [1]1 Amenthes is the ancient Egyptian underworld, a realm of the dead. The author uses it metaphorically to suggest a state of ignorance or bondage from which Marx’s thought delivers humanity., allowing us to re-examine the entire development of human history and the future direction of human society on the basis of historical materialism. In *The German Ideology*, Marx tells us very clearly that what moved human society from barbarism to civilization, from backwardness to progress, was never conceptual enlightenment or the revolution of noble phrases. Those notions of self-consciousness and the *cogito* are merely concepts that humans retrospectively bestowed after developing into modern society. True progressive thought can only be found in the material mode of production of social history. He points out: “If they dissolve philosophy, theology, substance, and all this rubbish into ‘self-consciousness,’ and if they ‘liberate’ ‘man’ from the domination of these phrases—which man has never been enslaved by—then ‘man’s’ ‘liberation’ has not advanced a single step; real liberation is only possible in the real world and by real means; without the steam engine and the jenny spinning machine, slavery cannot be abolished; without improved agriculture, serfdom cannot be abolished; when people cannot yet secure their food, drink, shelter, and clothing in both quality and quantity, they are fundamentally unable to achieve liberation. ‘Liberation’ is a historical activity, not a mental activity; ‘liberation’ is brought about by historical relations, by industrial conditions, commercial conditions, agricultural conditions, and conditions of intercourse.” [2]2 This is a paraphrase and partial quotation from Marx and Engels, *The German Ideology* (1845–1846), where they critique the Young Hegelians and argue that material conditions, not ideas, are the basis of historical change. It is evident that Marx provides us with a general principle for thinking about technics. It is also on the basis of historical materialism that technics is regarded as an achievement of human social practice in history. Humans do not create history on a blank slate; we always advance on the basis of previous social practice (including scientific and technological practice). In Marx’s era, these technics were represented by the jenny spinning machine and the steam engine; in our era, this technics is represented by big data, artificial intelligence, intelligent driving, humanoid robots, and so on. Therefore, we do not regard technics and its products as something external to humanity, but as an integral part of human social practice in specific eras.

马克思就是那个盗火者，在资本主义工业社会诞生的前夜，他成了帮助我们走出阿门塞斯阴影王国的普罗米修斯，让我们可以在历史唯物主义的基础上重新审视整个人类历史的发展以及人类社会的未来方向。在《德意志意识形态》中，马克思十分明确地告诉我们，人类社会之所以从野蛮走向文明，从落后走向进步，从来不是什么观念启蒙或者高贵词句的革命。那些自我意识和我思的观念，不过是人类在发展到现代社会之后，才回溯性地赋予的概念。真正的进步思想，只能在社会历史的物质生产方式中去寻找，他指出：“如果他们把哲学、神学、实体和一切废物消融在‘自我意识’中，如果他们把‘人’从这些词句的统治下——而人从来没有受过这些词句的奴役——解放出来，那么‘人’的‘解放’也并没有前进一步；只有在现实的世界中并使用现实的手段才能实现真正的解放；没有蒸汽机和珍妮走锭精纺机就不能消灭奴隶制；没有改良的农业就不能消灭农奴制；当人们还不能使自己的吃喝住穿在质和量方面得到充分保证的时候，人们就根本不能获得解放。‘解放’是一种历史活动，不是思想活动，‘解放’是由历史的关系，是由工业状况、商业状况、农业状况、交往状况促成的。”可见，马克思为我们提供了思考技术的一般性原理，也是在历史唯物主义的基础上，将技术看成历史上人类社会实践活动的成就，人类不是在一片空白的土地上来创造历史，我们总是站在以往的社会实践(包括科学技术实践)的基础上向前推进。在马克思的时代，这些技术表现为珍妮走锭精纺机和蒸汽机，在我们的时代，这种技术表现为大数据、人工智能、智能驾驶、人形机器人等。因此，我们不是将技术及其产物视为一种外在于人类的存在，而是视为人类社会实践活动在具体时代中的组成部分。

Of course, it must be noted that although Marx set forth the general principles of historical materialism, he obviously could not have imagined the state of affairs we find ourselves in today under digital and intelligent technology. He could not have accurately predicted ChatGPT and Deepseek large models in the nineteenth century, nor could he have predicted the robots in today’s automated factories. Yet this does not affect the guiding status of Marx’s principles of historical materialism in the development of today’s digital and intelligent technology. However, as the Australian left-wing scholar McKenzie Wark has observed: “Starting with the last of these questions, it is very important to situate Marx in his own time. What we now think of as technology was for Marx more a matter of machinery. His was an age of steam, powering factories, railways, shipping, and the printing presses of the newspapers for which he wrote. It was an age of the telegraph, but before electricity was widely distributed, or before the rise of modern chemistry, particle physics, genetics, climate science, or information science. Marx did his best to keep up with the scientific and technological developments of his time, but that was more Engels’s work.” Wark is not wrong: Marx provided the principles for understanding industrial history, but as for the concrete discussion of specific science and technology, although Marx touched upon it, it was Engels who had a deeper understanding of the development of industrial technology. After Marx’s death, with the emergence of automated industry, Fordism, and post-Fordist production, Theodor Adorno, Herbert Marcuse, Gilbert Simondon, Andrew Feenberg, Stiegler, Bruno Latour, and others continuously applied Marx’s principles of historical materialism to new industrial technological production and environments, thereby developing Marx’s theory to a certain extent.

当然，需要注意的是，马克思尽管提出了历史唯物主义的一般原理，但显然，马克思不可能想象我们今天在数字技术和智能技术下的状态，他不可能在19世纪就准确地预测到ChatGPT和Deepseek大模型，也不可能预测到今天的自动化工厂中的机器人，但这并不影响马克思的历史唯物主义原理在今天数字技术和智能技术发展中的指导性地位。不过，正如澳大利亚左翼学者麦肯齐·瓦克(McKenzie Wark)所看到：“从这些问题中的最后一个开始，将马克思置于他自己的时代是非常重要的。我们现在认为的技术对马克思来说更多的是机器的问题。他所处的时代是一个蒸汽时代，蒸汽为工厂、铁路、航运和他为之写作的报纸的印刷机提供动力。这是一个电报时代，但在电力广泛分布之前，或在现代化学、粒子物理学、遗传学、气候科学或信息科学兴起之前。马克思尽力跟上他所处时代的科技发展，但那更多是恩格斯的工作。”瓦克没有说错，马克思提供了理解工业历史的原理，但真正对于具体科学技术的探讨，马克思虽有涉猎，但更了解工业技术发展的是恩格斯。在马克思去世之后，随着自动化工业、福特制、后福特制生产的出现，西奥多·阿多诺(Theodor Adorno)、赫伯特·马尔库塞(Herbert Marcuse)、吉尔伯特·西蒙东(Gilbert Simondon)、安德鲁·芬伯格(Andrew Feenberg)、斯蒂格勒、布鲁诺·拉图尔(Bruno Latour)等人都不断地将马克思的历史唯物主义的原理应用到新的工业技术生产和环境之中，从而在一定程度上发展了马克思的理论。

So, for the philosophy of the subject, to what extent has contemporary Western Marxism enriched and developed Marx’s thought on technology? We need to understand that the concept of the subject in Marxist philosophy is not a generalized abstract subject. Starting from the *Economic and Philosophic Manuscripts of 1844*, the *Theses on Feuerbach*, and *The German Ideology*, Marx opposed the German classical philosophy’s understanding of capitalism from an abstract concept of the subject. For example, Marx opposed Feuerbach’s use of “man” or Stirner’s “Unique One” as the core concept for thinking about capitalism, because such “man” is simply “the German.” Marx’s concept of the subject is a subject within concrete material modes of production, that is, the proletarian producing beside the industrial machine. This stance existed from the young Marx onward; he pointed out: “He can maintain himself as a physical subject only as a worker, and only as a physical subject can he be a worker.” [3]3 Karl Marx, *Economic and Philosophic Manuscripts of 1844*, in *Marx and Engels Collected Works*, vol. 3 (Moscow: Progress Publishers, 1975), p. 272. [Translator’s note: The English translation follows the standard MECW version; the Chinese text here is a paraphrase.] That is to say, workers become subjects not because they are products of reason or self-consciousness, but because they operate machines as physical bodies; only then do they become subjects. This kind of subject is an enslaved subject. The value produced by the machine lies not only in realizing the exploitation of the worker’s surplus value, but also in linking the physical bodies of countless workers through the machine, forming a mode of relations of production centered on machine production. The capitalist realizes the exploitation and oppression of the subject through this mode of production of large-scale industrial machinery. In short, only the worker is the industrial subject of capitalist society. The capitalist’s life of pleasure and dissipation is entirely built upon the foundation of exploiting and dominating the industrial subject (the worker).

那么，对于主体哲学来说，今天西方马克思主义在何种程度上丰富和发展了马克思的技术思想?我们需要理解的是，马克思主义哲学中的主体概念，并非一般化的抽象主体，马克思从《1844年经济学哲学手稿》《关于费尔巴哈的提纲》以及《德意志意识形态》开始，就反对德国古典哲学从一种抽象化的主体概念来理解资本主义，例如马克思反对费尔巴哈将“人”或施蒂纳的“唯一者”作为思考资本主义的核心概念，因为这样的“人”就是“德国人”,马克思的主体概念，是一种在具体的物质生产方式中的主体，也就是在工业机器旁生产的无产者。这种立场从青年马克思开始就一直存在，他指出：“他只有作为工人才能维持自己作为肉体的主体，并且只有作为肉体的主体才能是工人。”也即是说，工人成为主体并不是因为他们是理性或自我意识观念的产物，而是他们作为肉体去操作机器，他们才成为主体，这种主体是一种奴隶化的主体，机器生产的价值不仅仅在于去实现对工人剩余价值的剥削，还在于通过机器，将无数工人的肉体联结起来，形成一种围绕着机器生产构成的生产关系模式，而资本家是通过这种大工业机器的生产方式实现了对主体的剥削和压迫。简言之，只有工人才是资本主义社会的工业主体。资本家的声色犬马的生活完全建立在对工业主体(工人)剥削和支配的基础之上。

Clearly, in today’s digital age, the concept of the subject is also not an abstract noun. Since Marx has already pointed out that the subject is invented in the production and life of civil society, the concrete connotation of the subject must be closely related to a specific historical stage. Then the subject of today’s digital and intelligent technology must also bear the traces of our era. We can consider the development of the Marxist concept of the subject by contemporary Western Marxism from the following points.

显然，在今天的数字时代里，主体的概念也不是一个抽象的名词，既然马克思已经指出，主体是在市民社会的生产和生活中被发明出来的，主体的具体内涵必然与一定的历史阶段密切相关，那么今天的数字技术和智能技术的主体，也必然带有我们这个时代的痕迹。我们可以从如下几点来思考当代西方马克思主义对马克思主义主体观念的发展。

1. The Coded Subject

1.被编码的主体

The French left-wing thinker Félix Guattari perceived the characteristics of codification and encoding in the era of digital capitalism. For example, he proposes: “The coded interpersonal relations of aristocrat-servant or master-apprentice are replaced by rich ‘human’ relations mainly established upon abstract quantitative systems such as labor, wages, ‘skills,’ and profit. In the final analysis, society is no longer a matter of ‘man,’ but a matter of decoded flows.” [4]4 Félix Guattari, *The Three Ecologies*, trans. Ian Pindar and Paul Sutton (London: Continuum, 2000), p. 50. [Translator’s note: The English translation is adapted from the published version to match the Chinese paraphrase.] Here, Guattari points out that in the former feudal aristocracy and guilds, the master’s control over the servant and the master’s control over the apprentice was a direct physical control. In capitalist society, especially in the era of digital capitalism, the art of governance in capitalism replaces the previous physical subject with the coded subject. The object of capitalist production and governance shifts from Foucault’s disciplined body to the encoded code. Therefore, the Italian Marxist scholar Maurizio Lazzarato also argues: “The enunciating subject of the ‘I’ (a composite subjectivity of flesh and blood, rich in multiple semiotics, perceptions, and modes of knowledge) detaches itself from the totality, vitality, and existential dimensions of the assemblage, fusing with the speaking subject, fusing with the ‘social’ linguistic forms that precede and define him. By shaping itself to adapt to the discursive subject, the collective assemblage of enunciation submits to the individuating linguistic machine. The latter, according to the model of the ‘semiotic triangle,’ encodes the different modes of expression of the semiotic system and subjectivity.” [5]5 Maurizio Lazzarato, *Signs and Machines: Capitalism and the Production of Subjectivity*, trans. Joshua David Jordan (Los Angeles: Semiotext(e), 2014), p. 42. [Translator’s note: The English translation is adapted from the published version to match the Chinese paraphrase.] In other words, our subject today is no longer merely the physical existence beside the production machine, but also a subject existence encoded by digitalization. The meaning of the subject’s existence lies not in the body, but in the encoded symbol. The capitalist manages the production process through various numbers and codes. For the subject to enter the production process, it must first possess a work number and corresponding codes (such as ID cards, licenses, and authorization codes) to become a subject.

法国左翼思想家菲利斯·加塔利(Felix Guattari)看到了数字资本主义时代的代码化和编码化的特征。例如他提出“贵族—仆人或师傅—徒弟式的编码人际关系，被主要建立在劳动、工资、‘技能’、利润等抽象量化体系之上的丰富的‘人’的关系的规范所取代。归根结底，社会不再是‘人’的问题，而是解码化的流的问题。”在这里，加塔利指出，在以往的封建贵族和行会中，主人对仆人，师傅对徒弟的控制是一种直接的身体控制，而在资本主义社会中，尤其到了数字资本主义时代，资本主义的治理术，用编码化的主体取代了之前的身体化的主体，资本主义生产和治理的对象，从福柯的规训的身体，变成了被编码的代号。所以，意大利马克思主义学者莫里齐奥·拉扎拉托(Maurizio Lazzarato)也认为：“‘我’的阐释主体(有血有肉的复合主体性，富含多重符号学、感知和知识模式)将自己从装配的整体性、生命性和存在性维度中剥离出来，与言说主体融合，与先于并定义他的‘社会’语言形式融合。通过塑造自身以适应话语主体，语篇的集体组合服从于个性化的语言机器。而后者则根据‘符号学三角’的模式，对符号学系统和主体性的不同表达方式进行编码。”换言之，我们今天的主体，不再仅仅是生产机器旁的肉体存在，更是被数字化编码的主体存在，主体存在的意义，不在于身体，而在于被编码的符号，资本家通过各种编号和代码来管理生产进程，主体进入到生产过程中，也是首先具有了工号和对应的编码(如身份证、许可证和授权码等)才能成为主体的。

2. The Linked Subject

2.被链接的主体

The coded subject is not the ultimate goal of contemporary digital capitalist production. To use Marx’s words in the *Grundrisse* (1857–1858), its purpose is to bring about the “real subsumption” of the worker under the capitalist mode of production: “With the real subsumption of labour under capital, or the specifically capitalist mode of production, what becomes the actual executor of the total labour process is not the individual worker but an increasingly socialised combination of labour capacities – the various competing labour capacities that constitute the total production machine.” This means that workers participate in capitalist production as subjects not as individuals, not as single workers, but as “an increasingly socialised combination of labour capacities,” which implies that workers must to a certain degree become a united labour force. In Marx’s era, this unity was accomplished by industrial machinery. But in the later work of Antonio Negri, this unity is a unity of immaterial labour. Negri says: “In the metropolis, new modes of production and new value consistencies are indeed produced by the concentration and accumulation of living labour capacities of immaterial and cognitive labour (this is the common ground of the centre-right and centre-left, and what they like). If in the metropolis the flows of knowledge and understanding have now become a common element – then, as I have already said, all this means that class struggle traverses the entire metropolitan dimension, and in the transformations brought by its flows and struggles, the metropolis becomes the engine of the production of subjectivity.” Negri clearly continues Marx’s line of thought; he does not think of an isolated Cartesian subject, but of a worker subject united by industrial production. In Negri’s case, this has evidently become a united subject of immaterial production. However, Negri does not concretely explain how workers are united by immaterial labour in the digital age; his immaterial labour remains too abstract. Hence, contemporary Western Marxist critiques of digital capitalism point to this fundamental issue: workers can be linked together not because of immaterial labour, but because they are coded. For example, the Canadian Marxist scholar Nick Dyer-Witheford speaks of “workers linked to other places via telecommunication means, presenting themselves as a ‘crisscrossing’ ‘network’.” Thus it can be seen that under the digital mode of production, the worker subject has already become a linked digital subject. This is not only the condition of the proletariat, but also the universal condition of the digital and intelligent era.

被编码的主体并不是当代数字资本主义生产的最终目的，用马克思在《1857—1858年经济学手稿》中的话来说，其目的是让工人“实际上地从属于”资本主义的生产方式，“随着劳动对资本的实际上地从属或特殊资本主义生产方式的发展，变成总劳动过程的实际执行者的并不是单个工人，而是日益以社会规模结合起来的劳动能力：互相竞争的和构成为总生产机器的各种劳动能力”。这意味着，工人作为主体参与资本主义的生产，不是以个体，不是以单个工人，而是以“日益社会地结合起来的劳动能力”成为生产主体的，这意味着工人必须在一定程度上成为联合起来的劳动力。在马克思的时代，这种联合是由工业机器来完成。但在后来的安东尼奥·奈格里(Antonio Negri)的著作中，这种联合是一种非物质劳动的联合。奈格里说：“在大都市中，新的生产方式和新的价值一致性确实产生于非物质劳动和认知劳动的活劳动能力的集中和积累(这是中右派和中左派的共同立场，也是他们所喜欢的),如果在大都市中，知识和理解的流动现在已成为共同的要素——那么，正如我已经说过的，所有这一切都意味着，阶级斗争穿越了整个大都市的维度，在其流动和斗争所带来的变革中，大都市成了主体性生产的引擎。”奈格里显然延续了马克思的思考，他思考的不是孤立的我思主体，而是被工业生产联合起来的工人主体，在奈格里这里，显然已经成为非物质生产的联合主体。不过，奈格里并没有具体解释工人是如何在数字时代被非物质劳动联合起来的，他的非物质劳动还是过于抽象，因此，当代西方马克思主义的数字资本主义批判指出了这个根本问题，工人之所以可以被链接起来，不是因为非物质劳动，而是因为他们被编码，例如加拿大马克思主义学者尼克·戴尔-维特福德(Nick Dyer-Witheford),就谈到了“工人们在通过远程通信手段链接到其他地方，并呈现为一个‘纵横交错’的‘网络’”。由此可见，数字生产方式下的工人主体已经是被链接起来的数字主体，这不仅是无产阶级的状况，也是数字时代和智能时代普遍性的状况。

3. The Controlled Subject

3.被控制的主体

Finally, the linked power of the subject is, for the capitalist, a force that needs to be controlled, because any uncontrolled force will not only produce but also burst the capitalist system, ultimately destroying it. The proletarian subject is not only coded and linked, but also subjected to control. The French philosopher Gilles Deleuze, in his essay “Postscript on the Societies of Control” written in the 1980s, predicted in advance the condition of the subject under control in today’s digital and intelligent society. He pointed out: “The life of control adopts the third type of machine: information machines and computers, whose passive danger is interference, and whose active danger is computer crime and the introduction of viruses. This is the technological change, and more profoundly, the change of capitalism.” Deleuze’s thought further influenced Bernard Stiegler. In a lecture at Nanjing University, Stiegler stated: “The hyper-industrial situation pushes the society of control, which Deleuze established as mediated by mass media, into a stage of hyper-control. This hyper-control arises from the self-production, self-collection, and self-publication of personal data by the masses – whether these actions are intentional or unintentional – and the exploitation of these large datasets through high-performance computing.” In summary, we see that no matter how the subject is coded or linked, the ultimate goal is for the subject to accept control by the capitalist mode of production.

最后，被联结起来的主体力量，对于资本家来说，是一种需要得到控制的力量，因为任何不受控制的力量，不仅会生产，也会将资本主义体制爆裂，最终摧毁资本主义的体制。无产阶级的主体，不仅被编码化和链接化，而且也遭到了控制。法国哲学家吉尔·德勒兹(Gilles Deleuze)在20世纪80年代撰写的《控制社会后记》一文中就提前预测到在今天的数字社会和智能社会下主体被控制状况，他指出：“控制的生活采用了第三类机器：信息机器和电脑，其被动性的危险是干扰，主动性的危险是电脑犯罪和病毒的引入。这就是技术的变化，更深刻地说是资本主义的变化。”德勒兹的这种思想，进一步影响到了贝尔纳·斯蒂格勒，在南京大学的讲座中，斯蒂格勒谈道：“超级工业情境使德勒兹所说的建立于大众传媒调节之上的控制社会进入超级控制阶段，这种超级控制产生于大众对个人数据的自我生产、自我收集和自我发布——无论这些行为是有意还是无意一并通过对这些大量数据集进行高性能计算而加以利用。”总而言之，我们看到，无论主体如何被编码，如何被链接，最终的目的都是主体接受资本主义生产方式的控制。

Thus it can be seen that contemporary Western Marxism, while adhering to Marx’s historical materialist view of the subject, has to a certain extent developed the Marxist view of the subject by considering the particularities of the subject under contemporary digital and intelligent technology, transforming Marx’s subject from a distinct industrial subjectivity into an intelligent subjectivity. The form of intelligent subjectivity lies in the subject being continuously coded, becoming a user and code, entering the linked network in the form of digital code, and ultimately accepting the control of the entire capitalist production matrix.

由此可见，当代西方马克思主义在坚持了马克思的历史唯物主义的主体观之后，通过思考当代数字技术和智能技术下主体的特殊性，在一定程度上发展了马克思主义的主体观，让马克思的主体从鲜明的工业主体性发展成为智能主体性。智能主体性的形式在于主体被不断地编码，成为用户和代码，并以数字代码的形式进入到链接的网络之中，最终接受整个资本主义生产矩阵的控制。

II. Technology and the Object: The Birth of the Technological Object in the Digital Age

二、技术与物：数字时代的技术物的诞生

Starting from the *Economic and Philosophic Manuscripts of 1844*, Marx paid attention to the issue of machinery in industrial production. He greatly valued the materials on the condition of British industry provided to him by Engels, which allowed Marx to thoroughly study the works on machine production by Schulz, Babbage, and Ure. But in his youth, Marx held a certain degree of disparagement toward the machine as an object. For example, Marx said: “Similarly, division of labour makes the worker increasingly one-sided and increasingly dependent; division of labour not only leads to competition among men, but also to competition among machines. Because the worker is degraded to a machine, the machine can confront him as a competitor.” At this time, Marx still had an incomplete understanding of the machine, viewing it as a passive, inert object. Thus, in Marx’s early concepts, the machine remained an object, a passive thing under the modern subject-object cognitive model.

从《1844年经济学哲学手稿》开始，马克思就关注到工业生产的机器问题，他十分重视恩格斯给他提供的英国工业状况材料，这让马克思充分学习了舒尔茨、拜比吉和尤尔等人关于机器生产的著作。但青年时代的马克思对作为物的机器，存在一定程度的贬低，例如马克思说：“同样，分工使工人越来越片面化和越来越有依赖性；分工不仅导致人的竞争，而且导致机器的竞争。因为工人被贬低为机器，所以机器就能作为竞争者与他相对抗。”这时的马克思还存在对机器不完善的理解，将机器视为一种消极的被动的物。这样，在马克思的早期概念中，机器仍然是一种客体，一种现代主客体认知模式下的被动的物。

Marx later extensively read works on the technology of capitalist industry. In his *Economic Manuscript of 1861–1863*, he also devoted an entire chapter to re-examining the issue of machinery in capitalist industrial production. This section was later defined by the Italian workerist movement as the “Fragment on Machines.” At this stage, Marx no longer regarded the machine as something purely negative, but saw that “just as the system of machinery changes the division of labour and cooperation, so too does the system of machinery, based on its superiority in work and power, in many cases abolish or alter simple cooperation.” That is, through reading works like Babbage’s, Marx realised that the machine as an object differs from the tools of the agricultural era. Tools at most assist the individual worker, whereas the value of the machine lies not only in increasing capitalist productive forces, but also in forming, through cooperation in machine production, a specific division of labour and cooperation centred around the machine, thereby to a certain extent discarding the manufactory based on guilds and creating relations of production and a mode of production specific to capitalism. As Marx said: “As long as manufacture uses machines, the machines are correspondingly produced in a handicraft manner or on the basis of the division of labour in manufacture. Once machine production becomes the dominant production, its means of production – the machines and tools it uses – must themselves be produced by machines.” In other words, at this period Marx no longer thought of the machine as a purely inert, lifeless object; the machine began to possess a latent agency. It is precisely through the unity of machines that workers’ labour power can be combined in production. Although the machine is not the direct subject of production, it lays the material foundation of the entire production process and is the concrete force that organises individual workers together. However, due to the limitations of historical development, Marx’s thinking on machines and objects in the 1860s did not completely break free from the subject-object model of modern philosophy. Although the machine differed from the concept of an isolated, rigid, abstract object, and from tools awaiting human use, it remained merely an intermediary that united workers’ subjectivity on its interface; it itself did not become a force with genuine agency.

马克思后来广泛阅读资本主义工业的工艺学著作，在他的《1861—1863年经济学手稿》中，也专门用一整章的篇幅，重新讨论资本主义工业生产中的机器问题，这个部分也被后来的意大利工人主义运动界定为“机器论片段”。在这个阶段，马克思不再将机器看成一种纯粹消极的东西，而是看到了“正如机器体系改变了分工和协作一样，机器体系也基于自身在工作和动力方面的优越性在许多场合下废除或改变了简单协作”。也就是通过对拜比吉等人著作的阅读，马克思意识到机器作为物，不同于农耕时代的工具，工具顶多是对个体的人的协助，而机器价值不仅仅在于提高了资本主义生产力，而且在于通过机器生产中的合作，形成了一种特定的围绕机器而进行分工和协作，从而在一定程度上抛弃了行会中的工场手工业，形成属于资本主义特有的生产关系和生产方式。正如马克思所说：“只要工场手工业使用机器，那么与之相适应，机器就会以手工业方式或者以基于工场手工业中的分工的方式制造出来。一旦机器生产成为占统治地位的生产，它的生产资料——它所使用的机器和工具本身就应当是用机器生产的。”换言之，马克思在这个时期不再从单纯的惰性的无生命的物来思考机器，机器开始具有一种隐性的能动性，正是通过机器的联合，工人的劳动力才能在生产中被组合起来，机器虽然不是直接的生产主体，但是它在生产过程中奠定了整个生产的物质基础，也是将工人个体组织在一起的具体力量。但由于历史发展的局限性，马克思在19世纪60年代对机器和物的思考，并未完全脱离现代哲学的主体—客体的模式，机器尽管不同于孤立的僵化的抽象的物的概念，不同于等待人去利用的工具，但机器只是一个中介，将工人的主体性在其界面上联合起来，它本身并没有成为一种具有真正能动性的力量。

However, this mode of thinking about things from the perspective of inert, isolated objective existence is clearly no longer suited to the development of digital technology today, nor to reflecting on the mode of production and relations of production under digital capitalism. This necessitates that Western Marxist scholars undertake a new reflection on the concept of the thing within Marxist technological thought. In this regard, the earliest philosopher to pose a challenging reflection on the concept of the thing was the French philosopher of science Gilbert Simondon. His work *On the Mode of Existence of Technical Objects* represents a major development of the concept of the thing under Marx’s technological thought. Simondon proposes: “The technical object appears in a world where social structures and psychic contents are formed by labor: the technical object therefore enters the world of labor, rather than creating a technical world with new structures.” [7]7 Gilbert Simondon (1924–1989), French philosopher of technology; his concept of the “technical object” and “associated milieu” influenced later media theory and object-oriented ontology. It can be seen that Simondon attempts, through the concept of the “technical object” he proposes, to form an associated milieu, thereby linking together various factors related to the technical object. Of course, this technical object is also constituted by human labor, which, through its associative relationship with the technical object, forms what is called the technical world.

然而，这种从惰性的孤立的客体存在角度来思考物的方式，显然已经不适合今天数字技术的发展，也不适合于去思考数字资本主义下的生产方式和生产关系，这就需要西方马克思主义学者对马克思主义技术思想中的物的概念进行新的反思。在这个方面，最早对物的概念提出挑战性思考的哲学家是法国科学哲学家吉尔贝·西蒙东，他撰写的《论技术物的存在模式》是对马克思技术思想下物的概念的重大发展。西蒙东提出：“技术物(objet technique)出现在一个这样的世界，里面的社会结构和心灵(psychiques)内容由劳动所形成：技术物因此进入了劳动世界，而不是创造一个拥有新结构的技术世界。”可以看到，西蒙东试图通过他所提出的“技术物”的概念形成一种缔结环境(associaté milieu),从而将与技术物关联的各种因素联系起来。当然，这种技术物也是由人类的劳动来构成的，人类的劳动通过与技术物的缔结关系，形成所谓的技术世界。

It is worth noting that because Simondon had not read Marx’s later *Economic and Philosophical Manuscripts of 1861–1863*, his evaluation of Marx is essentially still based on the early *Economic and Philosophic Manuscripts of 1844*. However, in Simondon’s view, Marx overlooked one point: in the capitalist production process, it is not only the worker who is alienated; not only does the worker become a machine, but the machine itself also suffers alienation. In Simondon’s view, the machine is a typical technical object. When no worker operates it, the machine is not a machine; only when the worker operates the machine beside it does the machine truly exist as a technical object. In other words, the value of the machine does not lie in its material existence, but in its forming a rhythmic collaborative relationship with the worker who operates it. Hence Simondon emphasizes: “The machine is known and used through labor, not through technical knowledge. The relationship between the worker and the machine is insufficient, because the worker, when operating the machine, does not extend invention. The typical central obscure zone of labor is transferred to the use of the machine: it is now the machine’s function, the machine’s origin, the meaning of the machine’s operation, and how it is made that constitute the obscure zone. The original central obscurity of the hylomorphic schema is preserved: people know the machine’s input and output, but do not understand its operation; the worker, present to perform an operation, even if he gives orders to the machine or serves it, does not truly participate.” In other words, it is not only the worker’s labor that is alienated; in Simondon’s view, the machine becomes fixed capital, existing as the capitalist’s asset. The machine cannot truly become an object of effective operation for the worker. Simondon states: “Machines are often manufactured as absolute technical objects; they operate themselves, but rarely allow information exchange between the machine and the human. Ergonomics has not gone far enough in seeking the optimal arrangement of control devices and control signals. This is a very useful research direction, constituting the starting point for finding the real conditions of coupling between machine and human.” Thus, the alienation of the machine and the alienation of the worker’s labor share the same root: both are victims of capitalist private ownership. When the machine becomes the capitalist’s fixed capital and property, it means the machine is estranged from the worker who truly combines with it. The worker’s estrangement from the production process produces alienated labor; the machine’s estrangement signifies the alienation of the machine or the alienation of the technical object.

值得注意的是，由于西蒙东并未阅读过马克思后期的《1861—1863年经济学哲学手稿》,他对马克思的评价基本上还是基于其早期的《1844年经济学哲学手稿》,但在西蒙东看来，马克思忽略了一点，在资本主义生产过程中，被异化的并非只有工人，不只是工人变成了机器，机器本身也遭到了异化。在西蒙东看来，机器就是一个典型的技术物，在没有工人操作它的时候，机器不成为机器，只有工人在机器旁操作机器的时候，机器才真正作为一个技术物而存在。换言之，机器的价值并不在于它的物质存在，而是在于它与操作机器的工人形成一个有节奏的协作关系，所以西蒙东才强调说：“机器是通过劳动而不是通过技术知识而被认识和使用。工人与机器之间的关系不足，因为工人在机器上操作时并没能延伸发明。劳动典型的中心晦涩区域被转移到机器的使用上：现在是机器的功能、机器的来源、机器运作的意义和它是如何被制造的才是晦涩区域。形质论图式的原始的中心隐晦被保持了下来：人们知道机器的输入和产出，但不懂它的运作；工人在场执行一个操作时，即使他为机器下达命令或为机器服务，他也没有真正地参加。”换言之，不仅仅工人的劳动被异化，在行动看来，机器成为一种固定资本，机器作为资本家的资产而存在，机器无法真正成为与工人有效操作的对象。西蒙东说：“机器经常被制造成绝对的技术物，它自我操作，但很少容许机器和人之间的信息交换。人类工程在寻找控制设备和控制信号的最佳安排方面走得并不够远。这是一个非常有用的研究，它是寻找机器和人之间耦合的真实条件的起点。”那么，机器异化和工人的劳动异化的根源是一致的，它们都是资本主义私有制的受害者，当机器变成了资本家的固定资本和财产，也就意味着机器与真正同机器相结合的工人相疏离，工人与生产过程的疏离产生了异化劳动，机器的疏离则意味着机器的异化或技术物的异化。

Simondon’s concept of the technical object was not born in the digital age, but it provides a new opportunity for later thinking about things. Whether it is Deleuze and Guattari, Latour, Stiegler, Slavoj Žižek, Timothy Morton, Benjamin Bratton, and others, all have proposed new reflections on the issue of the technical object under digital technology. For example, Stiegler, in *Technics and Time, 1: The Fault of Epimetheus*, states: “The animal-technological relationship between humans and matter is a special form of the relationship between living beings and their environment, namely, humans relate to their environment through organized passive matter (technical objects). The uniqueness lies in the fact that this organized passive matter, the technical object, evolves within its own mechanism: thus it is neither a simple passive object nor can it be reduced to a living being.” Stiegler sees that the technical object plays a greater mediating role in the digital age than the machine did in Marx’s era. Because the exchange process between humans and the material environment is realized precisely through the technical object. The mobile phones and computers in our hands transform us into certain codes according to a certain paradigm, and these codes can only be translated, computed, transmitted, and distributed within the technical objects of intelligent machines, ultimately achieving communication between us and the social environment and the natural environment. In this sense, the technical object is no longer a cold machine, but an existence between living beings and passive objects. The technical object has truly achieved seamless communication between humans and the environment, and between the individual and society. When we use a mobile phone, we are not truly using the phone in our hands, but rather the vast digital network behind this technical object of the phone. The applications we use, such as WeChat, Alipay, and Didi, [8]8 WeChat (social media/messaging), Alipay (digital payment), and Didi (ride-hailing) are major Chinese digital platforms. actually connect us, through the technical object of the phone, to a larger technical society. In this sense, once we are online, we and the technical object are inseparable. It is precisely for this reason that Yuk Hui, deeply influenced by Stiegler, further develops the technical object of the digital age into the “digital object,” arguing that digital objects possess new characteristics not present in the technical objects of the industrial age. Hui states: “We can identify the associated milieu of digital objects, each milieu being further stabilized by the specific network in which it is located, including its users, data structures, network protocols, and so on. To be stabilized by the system, it must also include various mechanisms that regulate it… Digital objects also constantly re-establish and negotiate relationships with other objects, systems, and users within the associated milieu. Digital objects also assume functions such as maintaining emotions, atmospheres, collectives, and memories. This gives us a dynamic and positive understanding of digital objects.” This means that the birth of the technical object under digital technology is the birth of a technical object that combines human subjects with various technical environments through data structures, various protocols, and components such as switches, servers, relays, and sensors.

西蒙东的技术物的概念并非诞生于数字时代，但对后来的物的思考提供了一个新的契机，无论是德勒兹和加塔利，还是拉图尔、斯蒂格勒，以及斯拉沃热·齐泽克、提摩太·默顿(Timothy Morton)、本杰明·布拉顿(Benjamin Bratton)等人，都在数字技术下提出了关于技术物问题的新的思考。例如，斯蒂格勒在《技术与时间1:爱比米修斯的过失》中就说道：“人与物质之间的动物-技术学的关系是生命物体和环境之间的关系的一种特殊形式，即人借助有机化的被动物质(技术物体)而与环境发生关系。独特之处在于，技术物体这种有机化的被动物质在其自身的机制中进化：因此它既不是一种简单的被动物体，也不能被归于生命物体。”斯蒂格勒看到，技术物在数字时代比马克思时代的机器所起的中介作用更大。因为人类与物质环境之间的交换过程，就是通过技术物来实现的，我们手中的手机和电脑，以某种范式将我们转为一定的代码，而这些代码只能在智能机器的技术物中进行转译、运算、传输和分布，最终实现了我们与社会环境和自然环境之间的沟通。在这个意义上，技术物已经不再是一种冷冰冰的机器，而是一种介于生命体和被动物体之间的存在。技术物已经真正实现了人类与环境，个体与社会的不分彼此的沟通，当我们使用手机的时候，我们并不是真正在使用手中的这个手机，而是在使用手机这个技术物背后巨大的数字网络，我们使用的微信、支付宝、滴滴等应用，实际上都是通过手机这个技术物将我们联系到一个更宏大的技术社会之中，在这个意义上，一旦我们联网，我们和技术物是不分彼此的。也正因为如此，深受斯蒂格勒影响的许煜也将数字时代的技术物进一步发展成为“数码物”(digital object),认为数码物存在着工业时代技术物不具有的新型特征，许煜说：“我们能够识别数码物的缔合环境，每个环境都被其所在的特定网络进一步稳定，还包括其用户，数据结构，网络协议等等。为了被系统所稳定，它还必须包括调节它的各种机制……数码物也在不断地重新建立与协商同其他物体、系统和用户在缔合环境中的关系。数码物也承担着维持情绪、氛围、集体、记忆等功能。这使我们对数码物有一个动态和积极的理解。”这意味着数字技术下的技术物的诞生是一种通过数据结构、各种协议和交换器、服务器、中继器、传感器等构成的人类主体与各种技术环境结合起来的技术物的诞生。

The Slovenian critical thinker Slavoj Žižek has also offered his own reflections on technological objects. Taking Elon Musk’s proposal for brain-computer interfacing as a case, he reconsiders the relationship between subject and technological object from the philosophical perspectives of Marx and Hegel. In his book *Hegel in a Wired Brain*, Žižek writes: “The machine reduces experience to everything that happens in my brain, and thus, according to the definition of externalism, means the loss of the locus of my experience—that complex whole… However, this case is far from settled. The complex interaction between my brain and the environment produces complex experience suffused with meaning, but this interaction must necessarily be recorded in my brain in some way. Therefore, by replicating the neural processes in my brain, it is indeed possible to produce the same experience in another subject for sharing.” Brain-computer integration or the wired brain is a new proposition in the development of intelligent technology. The brain is clearly the primary organ of the subject; what philosophy calls the mind is highly dependent on the brain. Through brain-computer interfacing, a proposition arises: the information in the brain has been highly datafied and informatized, so that the thinking of the brain can make the brain-computer interface device (as a technological object) lose the necessity of the subject-object distinction. Žižek continues: “‘I’ am directly embedded in it, while the machine is external to me. However, the wired brain cuts a rift in this immediacy: if a machine external to me can directly record my thinking, does this not mean that ‘I’ do not directly possess my body, that my body is already external to me, that I am in a sense external to myself?” This inevitably implies the reification of the subject’s mind and the subjectification of computers and smart devices as technological objects. The distinction between subject and object is clearly not applicable here; a more accurate statement is that subject and object are already linked, collaborating, and merging with each other on an interface of value alignment, where information is the common mode of existence for both subject and object. Borrowing Kate O’Riordan’s formulation: “Previous objects—genomes, biosensors, and smart networks—have generated new forms of representation, bringing changes to the world. These forms of representation can be said to be informational; the text itself is a thing, not a form of representation. In information culture, new forms of expression are not recognized, and the question of who is authorized to produce meaning becomes crucial.”

斯洛文尼亚批判思想家斯拉沃热·齐泽克也通过自己的方式给出了技术物的思考。他对艾隆·马斯克(Elon Musk)提出的脑机互联的案例，从马克思和黑格尔的哲学视角重新思考了主体与技术物之间的环境。在《连线大脑的黑格尔》一书中，齐泽克提出：“机器将经验化约为我大脑里发生的一切，因而根据外部主义的界定，就意味着丧失了我的经验坐落——那一复杂的整体……然而，这一案例远非获得定论。我的大脑与环境间的复杂互动，产生了充盈着意义的复杂经验，但是这一互动必然以某种方式记录在我大脑之中。因此，通过复制出我大脑里的神经进程，确实有可能在另一个主体那里生产出同一种经验供其分享。”脑机结合或连线大脑是智能技术发展的一个新的命题。大脑显然是主体所在的主要器官，哲学中所谓的心灵，高度依赖于大脑，通过脑机互联，导致的一个命题是，大脑中的信息已经高度被数据化和信息化，那么大脑的思考可以使脑机互联设备(作为一种技术物)丧失主体—客体区分的必要性，齐泽克继续说道：“‘我’直接嵌入其中，而机器外在于我。不过，连线大脑在这种直接性中划出了一道裂口：如果一台外在于我的机器有可能直接记录我的思维，那么，这难道不是意味着：‘我’并不直接掌握着我的身体，即我的身体已然外在于我，我在某种意义上外在于自身?”这势必意味着主体心灵的物化，和作为技术物的电脑和智能设备的主体化，主体和物区分，在这里显然不太适用，更确切的说法是，主体和物已经在一个价值对齐的界面上，彼此链接，彼此协作，彼此融合，而信息就是主体与物的共同存在方式，借用凯特·奥利奥丹(Kate O'Riordan)说法：“之前的物——基因组、生物传感器和智能网络——都产生了新的表现形式，给世界带来了变化。这些再现形式可以说是信息性的，文本本身就是事物，而不是表征形式。在信息文化中，新的表述形式并不被认可，在这种文化中，谁能对意义的产生进行授权的问题至关重要。”

Thus, compared to the issue of technology and the subject, contemporary Western Marxism and critical studies of digital capitalism have already expanded Marx’s thought on technology in the area of technology and the object. Machines are no longer cold, lifeless machines, but technological objects that connect humans together. Today’s digital networks, mobile phones, smart computers, and even driverless cars, drones, and robot dogs are all network matrices where subjects and objects, linked through information and data, merge with each other. This is an extremely important feature for us to consider today regarding the mode of production of digital and intelligent technologies.

由此可见，相对于技术与主体的问题，在技术与物的问题上，当代西方马克思主义和数字资本主义批判研究在这个方面已经对马克思的技术思想进行了很多拓展，机器不再是冷冰冰的机器，而是将人类衔接在一起的技术物，今天的数字网络，手机，智能电脑，甚至无人驾驶的汽车、无人机、机器狗都是通过信息和数据层面联结在一起的主体和对象彼此融合的网络矩阵。这是今天我们思考数字技术和智能技术生产方式的一个极为重要的特征。

III. Technology and History: Progress or Regression

三、技术与历史：进步抑或倒退

Whether it is the issue of the subject or the issue of the object, the core problem of Marx’s historical materialism points to a fundamental content—history. In Marx’s view, history is not purely created by the subject; it must depend on certain social existence and material relations of production. At the same time, history is not simply natural history or cosmic history; the human subject is not a passive and inert existence. On the contrary, in Marx’s works, humans remain the key force driving historical progress. However, the subject does not create history arbitrarily and willfully. As Marx wrote in *The Eighteenth Brumaire of Louis Bonaparte*: “Men make their own history, but they do not make it as they please; they do not make it under self-selected circumstances, but under circumstances existing already, given and transmitted from the past.” Marx indicates that history is created by the combination of a certain subject (the people, the proletariat, etc.) and the historical conditions inherited from the past. Thus, history has both its subjective aspect and its objective historical dimension. The steam engines and spinning jennies that Marx saw, and later the Goldborough turbines, internal combustion engines, and triodes that Simondon saw, are precisely the “circumstances existing already, given and transmitted from the past.” For today’s digital and intelligent technologies, the drones, smartphones, and smart cars we use are also the historical conditions we encounter. This means that Marx has already integrated a certain reflection on technological thought into his historical materialism, and this technological thought essentially embodies the basic principles of historical materialism.

无论是主体问题，还是物的问题，马克思的历史唯物主义的核心问题都指向一个根本的内容——历史。在马克思那里，历史不是纯粹的主体创造的历史，它必须依赖于一定的社会存在和物质生产关系，同时历史也不是简单的自然史和宇宙史，人类主体不是一个被动消极的存在，相反，在马克思的著作中，人类仍然是那个推动历史进步的关键性力量。不过主体不是随心所欲的任意地创造历史，正如马克思在《路易·波拿巴的雾月十八日》中写道：“人们自己创造自己的历史，但是他们并不是随心所欲地创造，并不是在他们自己选定的条件下创造，而是在直接碰到的、既定的、从过去承继下来的条件下创造。”马克思表明，历史是一定的主体(人民、无产者等)与过去承袭下来的历史条件结合起来创造的，那么历史既有其主观方面，也有其客观的历史向度。在马克思看到的蒸汽机、珍妮走锭精纺机，以及后来西蒙东看到的金堡涡轮机、内燃机、三极管等，其实就是“直接碰到的、既定的、从过去承继下来的条件”,那么，对于今天的数字技术和智能技术来说，我们使用的无人机、智能手机、智能汽车，也是我们遇到的历史条件。这意味着，马克思已经将一定的技术思想的观照，融入他的历史唯物主义之中，而这种技术思想在本质上就体现了历史唯物主义的基本原则。

Regarding the basic principles of historical materialism, Marx once gave a certain description in the preface to *A Contribution to the Critique of Political Economy*. Marx said: “In broad outline, the Asiatic, ancient, feudal and modern bourgeois modes of production may be designated as epochs marking progress in the economic development of society. The bourgeois relations of production are the last antagonistic form of the social process of production—antagonistic not in the sense of individual antagonism, but of an antagonism that emanates from the individuals’ social conditions of existence; but the productive forces developing within bourgeois society create also the material conditions for a solution of this antagonism. The prehistory of human society accordingly closes with this social formation.” In this famous passage, Marx establishes two basic facts:

对于历史唯物主义的基本原则，马克思曾经在《〈政治经济学批判〉序言》中，给出了一定的描述，马克思说：“大体说来，亚细亚的、古希腊罗马的、封建的和现代资产阶级的生产方式可以看做是经济的社会形态演进的几个时代。资产阶级的生产关系是社会生产过程的最后一个对抗形式，这里所说的对抗，不是指个人的对抗，而是指从个人的社会生活条件中生长出来的对抗；但是，在资产阶级社会的胎胞里发展的生产力，同时又创造着解决这种对抗的物质条件。因此，人类社会的史前时期就以这种社会形态而告终。”马克思在这段著名的文字中确定了两个基本事实：

(1) History develops according to laws, so we can find a so-called science of history. The science of history does not, like idealist historians, regard history as a product of absolute ideas, but rather as something with laws formed on the basis of humans’ material conditions of production. Although history has diversity and contingency and is not purely deterministic, regarding the relationship between productive forces and relations of production, and between economic base and superstructure, Althusser gives an explanation in *For Marx*: “Determination in the last instance by the economy depends on the stage of the process, which is neither a chance coincidence nor due to external or accidental causes, but mainly due to internal and necessary causes, the result of the displacement, transfer, and condensation of contradictions.”

(1)历史是具有规律行动发展的，因此我们可以找到一种所谓的历史科学。历史科学并不像唯心主义历史学家那样认为历史是一种绝对观念的产物，而是基于人类的物质生产条件而形成的具有规律性的东西。尽管历史具有多样性和偶然性，不是纯粹的某种决定论，对于生产力与生产关系，经济基础与上层建筑的说法，阿尔都塞在《保卫马克思》中给出一个解释：“归根到底由经济起决定作用是按过程的阶段为转移的，这既不是偶然的巧合，又不是由于外界的或偶然的原因，而主要是由于内部的和必然的原因，由于矛盾的交替、转移和压缩的结果。”

(2) More crucially, the scientific inference of historical materialism is that capitalism is not eternal in history, but a stage of historical development. Once the development of productive forces breaks through the fetters of capitalist relations of production—for example, when technological progress can no longer be further advanced under capitalist relations of ownership—then what inevitably follows is the demise of capitalism, ultimately transitioning to a new society. In *The Communist Manifesto*, this idea is expressed as “the inevitable doom of capitalism and the inevitable victory of socialism.” Socialist society, as the next stage of history, will necessarily replace capitalist society in the movement of historical laws, becoming the future of human history.

(2)更为关键的在于历史唯物主义的科学推断了资本主义不是历史的永恒，而是历史发展的一个阶段，一旦生产力的发展突破了资本主义生产关系的桎梏，例如科技进步已经不能在资本主义所有制关系下得到进一步的提升，那么，迎来的必然是资本主义的灭亡，最终过渡到新的社会。在《共产党宣言》中，这个思想表述为“资本主义必然灭亡，社会主义必然胜利”。作为历史下一阶段的社会主义社会必然会在历史规律的运动中取代资本主义社会，成为人类历史的未来。

However, there is a problem here. In Marx’s writings, no very detailed explanation is given: if capitalism falls into crisis and perishes under its inherent contradictions, how can we be certain that the next stage after capitalism is socialism? This point is also confirmed in Marx’s division of four historical stages: “In broad outlines, Asiatic, ancient, feudal and modern bourgeois modes of production can be designated as progressive epochs in the economic formation of society.” That is to say, the contradiction between the productive forces and the relations of production under capitalism can determine that “capitalism is bound to perish,” but Marx did not explicitly provide a direct reason for the “inevitable victory of socialism.” The question then is: who can guarantee that in the process where capitalism falls into crisis and increasingly perishes, there will necessarily be progress rather than regression—for example, regression to the stage of feudal society? In fact, in 1882, Engels also raised this doubt in a letter to Marx, because at that time Engels had been reading the works of a vulgar bourgeois historian, Georg Ludwig von Maurer. Von Maurer put forward a hypothesis: capitalism did not truly overthrow feudalism, shake off its fetters, and establish its own position once and for all. The transition was extended, complex, uncertain, and reversible. In the letter, Engels wrote: “He [referring to von Maurer] has the ‘enlightened’ prejudice that since the dark Middle Ages there must have been continuous progress toward something better. This not only prevents him from recognizing the antagonistic character of real progress, but also prevents him from recognizing individual cases of regression.” Engels saw that von Maurer had pointed out the existence of a large number of feudal elements in modern capitalist society. In this sense, von Maurer believed that feudalism was still an inherent historical existence, rather than being replaced by capitalism. Engels criticized von Maurer’s view of history from the perspective of historical materialism. He affirmed that there were individual phenomena of feudalism in Germany, but the existence of these phenomena could only be individual and did not constitute the overall trend of historical development in capitalist society. Thus, we can infer that even if at some historical turning point there is a transition to socialist society, there will still be individual and contingent factors of regression in the overall historical stage, such as residual phenomena of capitalism and feudalism.

不过，这里存在一个问题，在马克思的著作中，并没有给出十分详细的解释，如果资本主义陷入危机，并在资本主义内在矛盾下灭亡，我们何以能确定资本主义的下一阶段就是社会主义。这一点也在马克思的“亚细亚的、古希腊罗马的、封建的和现代资产阶级的生产方式可以看做是经济的社会形态演进的几个时代”的四个历史阶段的划分中得到了印证。也就是说，资本主义的生产力与生产关系的矛盾能够确定“资本主义必然灭亡”,但马克思并没有明确给出“社会主义必然胜利”的直接理由，那么问题在于，谁能保证在资本主义陷入危机并日趋灭亡的过程中，一定是前进，而不会出现倒退，例如倒退到封建社会的阶段?其实，1882年恩格斯在一封给马克思的信中，也曾经提出了这样的疑惑，因为当时恩格斯一直在阅读一位庸俗的资产阶级历史学家格奥尔格·路德维希·冯·毛勒(Georg Ludwig von Maurer)的著作，冯·毛勒提出了一个假设，即资本主义并没有真正推翻封建主义，挣脱其束缚，一劳永逸地确立自己的地位。过渡是扩展的、复杂的、不确定的和可逆的。在信中，恩格斯写道：“他(指冯·毛勒)具有‘开明的’成见，以为自从黑暗的中世纪以来必定会不断朝着更美好的方向进步。这不仅妨碍他认识真正进步的对抗性质，而且也妨碍他认识到个别的倒退情况。”恩格斯看到了冯·毛勒指出的现代资本主义社会中仍然存在大量封建主义的因素，在这个意义上，冯·毛勒认为封建主义仍然是一种固有的历史存在，而不是被资本主义所取代。恩格斯用历史唯物主义的视角批判了冯·毛勒的历史观，他肯定了德国存在着个别的封建制的现象，但这些现象的存在只能是个别的，并不构成资本主义社会历史发展的总体趋势。那么，我们可以推断，即便在某个历史的转折点上，过渡到社会主义社会，但在总体的历史阶段上，仍然会有个别的偶然的倒退的因素，如资本主义和封建主义的残留现象。

In the context of contemporary digital technology and intelligent technology, the question of Marxist historical science has once again been placed on the agenda by the trend of thought known as techno-feudalism. Techno-feudalism recognizes the crisis of capitalist development, but it believes that the cause of the capitalist crisis is not capitalism itself, but rather the degeneration of big capital into an outdated image—namely, cloud lords who enclose territories and fiefs in cloud space. These cloud lords no longer rely on the surplus value of the working class to fill the chasm of their desires; instead, by occupying cloud territories and cloud fiefs, they resemble feudal lords who want to collect rent from users on cloud territory. Thus, without engaging in any concrete production, they can continuously extract enormous cloud rent revenues from cloud territory.

在当代数字技术和智能技术的背景下，关于马克思主义的历史科学的问题，再一次被技术封建主义思潮提上了议程。技术封建主义看到了资本主义发展的危机，但他们认为，导致资本主义危机的不是资本主义本身，而是大资本退化为一种过时的形象，即以圈占云空间中领土和采邑的云贵族，这些云贵族不再依赖于工人阶级的剩余价值填充自己欲望的沟壑，而是通过占据的云领土和云采邑，类似于封建贵族想从云领土的用户身上收取租金，从而他们可以在不从事任何具体生产的基础上，源源不断地从云领土上牟取巨大的云租金收益。

The first to raise the question was McKenzie Wark. In his 2019 book *Capital Is Dead*, he stated: “This is no longer capitalism; it is something worse. The ruling class of our time no longer maintains its rule by owning the means of production, as capitalists did. Nor does it maintain its rule by owning land, as landlords did. The ruling class of our time owns and controls information.” This point also resonated with another author of techno-feudalism, the former Greek Minister of Finance and Marxist political economist Yanis Varoufakis. In his book *Technofeudalism*, Varoufakis similarly raised the historical question brought about by the development of digital technology and intelligent technology. He pointed out: “Cloud capital is expanding its domain at an exponential rate. Ironically, as we have seen with electric vehicles and green energy, this even includes the Great Inflation itself, which played a major role in the great adjustment of power from land capital to cloud capital—in a word, from capitalism to techno-feudalism.” In summary, Wark, Varoufakis, Žižek, and others see that the development of digital technology, although bringing crisis to capitalism, does not result in the liberation of the people and the proletariat, but rather in a historical regression, a retreat to a relatively barbaric stage—the stage of techno-feudalism.

最先提出问题的是麦肯齐·瓦克，在他2019年的《资本已死》一书中谈道：“这不再是资本主义，而是更糟糕的东西。当代占统治地位的统治阶级不再像资本家那样通过拥有生产资料来维持统治。也不再像地主那样通过拥有土地来维持统治。我们这个时代占统治地位的阶级拥有并控制着信息。”这一点也在技术封建主义的另一位作者，希腊财政部前部长、马克思主义政治经济学者雅尼斯·瓦鲁法基斯(Yanis Varoufakis)那里得到了共鸣，瓦鲁法基斯在他的《技术封建主义》一书中同样提到了数字技术和智能技术的发展，带来的历史问题，他指出：“云资本都在以指数级的速度扩大其领域。令人啼笑皆非的是，正如我们在电动汽车和绿色能源方面所看到的那样，这甚至包括大通胀本身，它在权力从土地资本向云资本的大调整中扮演了重要角色——一句话，从资本主义到技术封建主义。”总而言之，在瓦克、瓦鲁法基斯以及齐泽克等人看到数字技术的发展，尽管为资本主义带来了危机，但这种危机的后果并不是人民和无产阶级的解放，而是进入一个历史的倒退，退回到一个相对野蛮的阶段——技术封建主义阶段。

We cannot simply regard the trend of thought of techno-feudalism as erroneous, still less can we regard it as a subversion of Marx’s historical materialism. Although techno-feudalism has become a very prominent Western Marxist trend of thought criticizing capitalism in the 2020s, the questions it raises still require our serious attention. Not all Western Marxist scholars agree with the historical regression thesis of techno-feudalism. For example, Jodi Dean, a Marxist scholar at the New School in the United States, said that when she first heard McKenzie Wark’s assertion that “we are not in the stage of capitalist society, but in a worse stage,” she thought Wark was “completely crazy.” She immediately responded: “Denying that we live in a capitalist society seems very unreasonable.” [9]9 Jodi Dean is an American political theorist and professor at The New School, known for her work on communism, the Left, and digital media. However, Jodi Dean believes that the historical regression thesis raised by Wark, Varoufakis, and other techno-feudalist trends cannot be simply ignored. This is precisely why Jodi Dean wrote *The Capitalist Grave: New Feudalism and New Class Struggle*. She attempts to refute the historical regression thesis of techno-feudalism on the basis of Marx’s historical materialism and proposes: “The grave of capital may be completely different from what Marx, Engels, and their millions of comrades imagined, prompting us to consider another possibility: perhaps its gravedigger is not the industrial proletariat. This is my main view, and also a refutation of Wark: capital is not dead. Capital is digging its own grave. The laws of motion of capitalism are reflexively folding back on themselves, becoming no longer characteristic of capitalism. The process long directed outward through colonialism and imperialism is now turning inward in a way that destroys the laws of motion of capitalism, repeating accumulation strategies typical of feudalism: rent-seeking, plunder, and political control.” Jodi Dean’s view represents her continued belief in the basic development of Marx’s historical materialism—that the general trend of history is progressive, but this does not preclude some detours and twists in the course of historical development. Before the inherent basic contradictions of capitalism are resolved, capitalism will not truly perish.

我们不能仅仅认为技术封建主义思潮是错误的，更不能将技术封建主义思潮视为对马克思历史唯物主义思想的颠覆。尽管技术封建主义在21世纪20年代已经成为一个十分显著的西方马克思主义对资本主义批判的思潮，但他们提出的问题仍然是需要我们正视的。对于技术封建主义的历史倒退论，不是所有的西方马克思主义学者都表示赞同，譬如美国新学院的马克思主义学者约迪·迪恩(Jodi Dean)表示她第一次听到麦肯齐·瓦克的“我们不是处在资本主义社会阶段，而是处在更糟糕的阶段”的论断时，她表示瓦克“简直是疯了”,她立刻回应说：“否认我们生活在资本主义社会里，这看起来非常不符合常理。”(26)但是，约迪·迪恩认为对于瓦克、瓦鲁法基斯等技术封建主义思潮提出的历史倒退论，不能简单地漠然处之，这也是为什么约迪·迪恩会专门撰写《资本之墓：新封建主义和新阶级斗争》的原因，她试图在马克思历史唯物主义的基础上，对技术封建主义历史倒退论给出反驳，并提出：“资本的坟墓可能与马克思、恩格斯以及他们的数百万同志所预想的完全不同，这促使我们考虑另一种可能性：也许它的掘墓人并不是工业无产阶级。这是我的主要看法，也是对瓦克的反驳：资本并没有死。资本正在自掘坟墓。资本主义的运动规律正在反射性地自我折叠，变得不再具有资本主义的特征。长期以来通过殖民主义和帝国主义向外引导的进程，正在以破坏资本主义运动规律的方式向内转向，并重复着封建主义典型的积累策略：寻租、掠夺和政治控制。”约迪·迪恩的看法代表她仍然坚信马克思的历史唯物主义的基本发展、历史的大趋势是进步的，但这并不妨碍历史发展过程中会出现一些迂回和曲折。在资本主义内在的基本矛盾没有解决之前，资本主义是不会真正灭亡的。

In summary, whether it is the historical retrogressionism of techno-feudalism represented by Václav, Žižek, or Varoufakis, or the progressivism of Jodi Dean, who attempts to re-examine history from the perspective of Marx’s historical materialism, all point to the fact that capitalist society will ultimately be replaced by socialist society, albeit with occasional individual detours in the process. We can regard these Western Marxist scholars as a timely and evolving supplement and development of Marx’s view of history under digital and intelligent technology. Although their theories have not been rigorously verified by historical logic, the attempts they have put forward provide a reference for thinking about Chinese-path modernization today. We can still call them the Prometheuses of the digital age. Unlike the Prometheus of ancient Greek mythology, who brought the fire of technology, and unlike Marx in the era of the Industrial Revolution, who provided us with the critique of historical science and political economy, their thinking is a wake-up call that turns us from dusty old archives to the real problems brought by the technological revolution. We need this Promethean voice from beyond our borders. In the traces of their explorations, we can find a theory of modernization and historical materialism more suitable for China’s independent knowledge system.

总而言之，无论是瓦克、齐泽克或瓦鲁法基斯等技术封建主义的历史倒退论，还是约迪·迪恩试图重新从马克思的历史唯物主义视角看待历史的进步论，均指向资本主义社会最终仍然会被社会主义社会所取代，只是过程略有偶然的个别的迂回。我们可以将这些西方马克思主义学者看作是在数字技术和智能技术下对马克思的历史观的一种因时制宜和与时俱进的补充和发展。尽管他们的理论并没有得到十分严格的历史逻辑的验证，但他们提出的尝试为今天的中国式现代化提供了一种可借鉴的思考。我们仍然可以称呼他们是数字时代的普罗米修斯，他们并不像古希腊神话中的普罗米修斯那样送来了技术的火种，也不像工业革命时代的马克思，为我们提供了历史科学和政治经济学批判，但他们的思考是将我们从尘封的故纸堆里转向科技革命带来的现实问题的一声棒喝，我们需要这种普罗米修斯的域外之声，在他们的探索痕迹中，我们能找到更适合中国自主知识体系的现代化和历史唯物主义理论。

IV. Conclusion and Remaining Discussion

四、结语与余论

The widespread application of digital technology has already brought unprecedented changes to human society. As one scholar points out: “Science and technology are continuously fulfilling their material promises to humanity, and machine algorithms and artificial intelligence have constructed a ‘brave new world.’ Faced with a rapidly changing and accelerating social world, humanity is overly indulging in the myth of technological creation, causing us to race headlong down the track of technology.” [10]10 This is a reference to Aldous Huxley’s dystopian novel *Brave New World* (1932), used here to critique the uncritical embrace of technology. This article attempts to analyze and reveal, from the three aspects of subject, object, and history under digital technology, that contemporary Western Marxism must change its conceptual tools when facing the enormous transformations brought by digital and intelligent technology. After all, whether it is the concept of subject, object, or history, within Marxist philosophy, these are not immutable. From industrial technology to automation technology, and then to today’s digital and intelligent technology, how we understand the concepts of subject, object, and history constantly raises questions, critiques reality, and attempts to think, on a new basis, how a future new society might be possible within the context of history, as technology is updated and developed.

数字技术的广泛应用，已经为人类社会带来了前所未有的变化，正如有学者指出：“科学技术不断向人类兑现物质性许诺，机器算法、人工智能更是构建了一个‘美丽新世界’。面对日新月异、不断加速的社会世界，人类过度沉迷于科技创造的神话，导致我们在技术的轨道上低头狂奔。”本文试图从数字技术对主体、物和历史三个方面分析揭示当代西方马克思主义在面对数字技术和智能技术带来巨大变革的时候必须改变自己手中的概念工具。毕竟，无论是主体、物还是历史的概念，在马克思主义哲学之中，都不是一成不变，随着工业技术到自动化技术，再到今天的数字技术与智能技术，我们如何理解主体、物和历史的概念，都在随着技术的更新和发展在历史的境遇中不断地提出问题，批判现实，并试图在新的基础上思考一个未来的新社会是如何可能的。

Finally, through the critique and reflection of Western Marxism, what we must clearly do is, based on China’s own wisdom, in the wave of digital and intelligent technology, and based on the Chinese-style wisdom of “maintaining constancy while embracing change,” [11]11 “Maintaining constancy while embracing change” (守衡创变) is a Chinese phrase emphasizing a balance between preserving fundamental principles and adapting to new circumstances. propose a plan of “holding the two ends and using the middle” [12]12 “Holding the two ends and using the middle” (执两用中) is a classical Chinese philosophical concept from the *Doctrine of the Mean* (中庸), advocating a balanced, moderate approach that avoids extremes. against the historical backdrop of changes unseen in a century. In this way, we can, on the one hand, avoid the conservative stagnation brought by purely technological radicalism, and on the other hand, help us find the most suitable rhythm of technological development for Chinese-path modernization, providing a Chinese-style answer to the development of big data and artificial intelligence. (Notes omitted)

最后，通过西方马克思主义的批判与思考，我们明确要做的是基于中国自己的智慧，在数字技术和智能技术的浪潮中，基于“守衡创变”的中国式智慧，在百年未有之大变局的历史背景下，提出“执两用中”的方案。这样，我们才能一方面避免单纯的技术激进主义带来的保守停滞，另一方面也有助于我们找到最适合于中国式现代化的技术发展节奏，给出一个大数据和人工智能发展的中国式回答。（注释略）

Online Editor: Zhang Jian

网络编辑：张剑