The uses of idolatry
"Max Weber's Polytheism If you bought this book-as opposed to begging, borrowing, or stealing it-there is a good chance that you bought it from Amazon, which has made the purchase of nearly anything fantastically easy. You simply make a few clicks in a virtual environment, and the product...
| Main Author: | |
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| Format: | Print Book |
| Language: | English |
| Subito Delivery Service: | Order now. |
| Check availability: | HBZ Gateway |
| Fernleihe: | Fernleihe für die Fachinformationsdienste |
| Published: |
New York, NY
Oxford University Press
[2024]
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| In: | Year: 2024 |
| Standardized Subjects / Keyword chains: | B
Religion
/ Theology
/ Idolatry
/ Consumer society
/ Social anthropology
/ History
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| Further subjects: | B
Idolatry
Biblical teaching
B Idolatry |
| Online Access: |
Inhaltsverzeichnis (Aggregator) |
| Summary: | "Max Weber's Polytheism If you bought this book-as opposed to begging, borrowing, or stealing it-there is a good chance that you bought it from Amazon, which has made the purchase of nearly anything fantastically easy. You simply make a few clicks in a virtual environment, and the product appears on your doorstep, like magic, within a day or two. If you have the money, almost anything from anywhere in the world can be summoned out of thin air to materialize at your home. The material world can be experienced thus as magical, but this experience is hard to square with even a cursory examination of the ruthlessly efficient international network necessary to make such deliveries work. When Max Weber wrote about the rationalization of modern Western society over a hundred years ago, he could not have foreseen the lengths to which such rationalization has been taken in an Amazon warehouse, or "fulfillment center." There poorly paid "associates," who are often temporary workers with few benefits, scurry among the bins retrieving and packing just about anything that can be imagined. A handheld device keeps track of their movements. It directs them to the next item to pick, and a timer starts: 14 seconds to scan in the next item four aisles over, for example. The device warns them if they are falling behind, and keeps track of their pick rate. Falling behind, calling in sick, and other offenses can cost a worker their job, so some "associates" have resorted to urinating in bottles to avoid taking bathroom breaks. In January 2018 Amazon received patents on a wristband that can track a warehouse worker's arm movements. Responding to the negative reaction, an Amazon spokesperson presented the wristband as a liberating boon for workers: "The speculation about this patent is misguided... This idea, if implemented in the future, would improve the process for our fulfillment associates. By moving equipment to associates' wrists, we could free up their hands from scanners and their eyes from computer screens." In the Amazon warehouse, Weber's melancholy description of the "iron cage"-a heartlessly efficient mechanized modernity-seems fully vindicated"-- |
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| Item Description: | Includes bibliographical references and index |
| ISBN: | 0197679056 |