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Why We Drive: Toward a Philosophy of the Open Road
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Volume
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About This Book
From the author of the landmark Shop Class as Soulcraft, a brilliant, first-of-its-kind celebration of driving that views the open road as a unique pathway of human freedom, one now critically threatened by automation. Once we were drivers, the open road alive with autonomy, adventure, danger, trust, and speed. Today we are as likely to be in the back seat of an Uber as behind the wheel ourselves. Tech giants are hurling us toward a shiny, happy "self-driving" future, selling utopia but equally keen to advertise to a captive audience strapped into another expensive device. Are we destined, then, to become passengers, not drivers? Why We Drive reveals that much more may be at stake than we might think. Ten years ago, in the New York Times-bestselling Shop Class as Soulcraft, philosopher-mechanic Matthew B. Crawford—a University of Chicago PhD who owned his own motorcycle shop—made a revolutionary case for manual labor, one that ran headlong against the pretentions of white-collar office work. Now, using driving as a window through which to view the broader changes wrought by technology on all aspects of contemporary life, Crawford investigates the driver's seat as one of the few remaining domains of skill, exploration, play—and freedom. Blending philosophy and hands-on storytelling, Crawford grounds the narrative in his own experience in the garage and behind the wheel, recounting his decade-long restoration of a vintage Volkswagen as well as his journeys to thriving automotive subcultures across the country. Crawford leads us on an irreverent but deeply considered inquiry into the power of faceless bureaucracies, the importance of questioning mindless rules, and the battle for democratic self-determination against the surveillance capitalists. A meditation on the competence of ordinary people, Why We Drive explores the genius of our everyday practices on the road, the rewards of "folk engineering," and the existential value of occasionally being scared shitless. Witty and ingenious throughout, Why We Drive is a rebellious and daring celebration of the irrepressible human spirit.
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Reviews
"In the past two decades, we have already given over much of our ability to navigate the world to black-box algorithms; as that journey accelerates into a smart machine future, we would be advised to look out where we are going."
"The text is yet more evidence for Crawford's argument, now extending over three books, that paying attention to and placing ourselves in the material world brings a certain satisfaction that we neglect at our peril."
"Let's question what progress means."
"It's purely a butt, to throw the rugged integrity of the latter into sharp relief ..."
"Crawford is at his best rattling the smug beliefs of 'bicycle moralists, electric scooter gliders-about, and carbon teetotalers,' not to mention safety nags, whose mission in life is to pour their enlightened sugar into renegade gas tanks."
"[Crawford] grabs us by the lapels and shakes for page after page, until we are bound to agree that driving expresses everything about how we evolved and learn and is essential to the exercise of fundamental freedom – indeed, to all that we are."
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