The Odyssey of Instrumental Rationality: Confronting the Englightenment's Interior Other

In this paper we advocate and demonstrate the value of science fiction as a potent way of
‘practicalising philosophy.’ Science fiction narratives provide an ideal-typical setting through
which theory can be represented, clarified and developed. They also help us link the
abstraction of theory and the messiness of practice, while partly side-stepping the enigma
whereby any study of the empirical world may merely reflect back the particular ontologies
and epistemologies that constitute that world. In particular, we claim that the television series
Star Trek provides a powerful metaphor for understanding and teaching certain themes
regarding modernity, including the possibility of universal progress through economic
expansion (capitalism, colonialism), technological development (industrialism, positivism),
and the possibilities for universal emancipation (democracy). We especially focus on the
Borg Collective, a form of life that has become one of the most enduring and critical mirrors
that Star Trek has held up to contemporary society, and which can be usefully understood as a
metaphor for the dark side of instrumental rationality. The paper draws on the various
encounters between the Enterprise and the Borg to illustrate and engage with the diverse
writings of Weber, the Frankfurt School, Habermas, Foucault, and Haraway on modernity’s
continuing and ambivalent struggle with instrumental rationality.