Pain and self-exploitation in the digital era

Abstract

This article intends to show the close relationship between the problem of technique and the historical experience of pain, typical of the digital era, in which suffering is commonly denied or concealed. From our stance, pain is a fundamental experience that should be embraced because it connects us directly with the world and ourselves. In order to carry out this task, we will discuss the proposals of Nietzsche and Jünger, who argue that pain has an epochal interpretative character. Thus, while in the age of technique pain is usually hidden behind an appearance of security and comfort, precisely provided by technique, in the digital era this is exacerbated with the self-exploitation and the optimization of existence, as denounced by Byung Chul Han.