E-Journal of Philosophy of Education:
International Yearbook of the Philosophy of Education Society of Japan, Vol. 8, 2023

Technological Transformation of Corporeal Existence:
Philosophical Reflection on the Theory of Corporeality of the
Kyoto School
Ayaki MONZEN
Kanazawa Seiryo University
Abstract
This study explores how the progress of “Gijutsu (art/technology)” impacts human transformation.
Currently, technological literacy largely defines social relationships and life-long experiences.
Therefore, school educational intents emphasize flexible updates of new technologies. This study
reconsiders human ontological transformation through the systematic use of new tools andmachineries in society based on the theory of corporeality of the Kyoto School.
Key words: Gijutsu (art/technology), tool, machinery, institution, Motomori KIMURAIntroduction
Recently, the digital transformation (DX) of education has gained considerable
attention. Under the Global and Innovation Gateway for All (GIGA) School concept,
children learn by using digital learning devices such as tablets and forming friendships
through various communicational applications. As literacy in information andcommunication technologies has become crucial to social relationships and life-longexperiences, school educational intents encourage flexible updates of technologicalinnovation.
However, is it reasonable for pedagogical discussions to incline toward effective
teaching methods for technical changes? Thus, this study reconsiders human ontologicaltransformation through the systematic use of “Gijutsu (art/technology)” in society. A
technical “rut” has been established through educational curriculums to provide specificCorrespondence:
Ayaki MONZEN, Kanazawa Seiryo University. Email: monzen@seiryo-u.ac.jp

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physicality suitable for socially required progress. Then, this study aims to use theperspectives of the Kyoto School to gain new viewpoints on today’s education. The
purpose is to convert the uniformity of technical “ruts” to the diversity of technological“channels” to build creative connections in society. By focusing on descriptions by
Motomori Kimura (1895-1946) and referring to Kiyoshi Miki (1897-1945), this study
considers human corporeal potentiality.

1. Theory of corporeality according to the Kyoto School
Keiichi Noe evaluates the thoughts of Kitaro Nishida (1870-1945) as thefoundation of philosophical discussions on human corporeality in Japan. According toNoe, Nishida shared the “global contemporariness” of thoughts with thephenomenologists of the time, while simultaneously identifying their tendencies andlimitations to the “rut of Cartesian subjectivism,” which was discussed based on theindividual experience and consciousness of the subjective inner self (Noe, 1994, p. 84).
This rut, which Nishida pointed out in his contemporaries, provides a
psychologistic and subjectivistic framework of human development and becomes theground for techno-rationalistic models of education. From this perspective, educational
arguments tend to be an effective methodology for the desired transformation fortechnical individuals.
In addition, under the intellectual influence of its members, the Kyoto School
developed several arguments on human corporeality as a dynamic complexity between
physical nature and human will (Yokoyama, 2005). Their discussions developed new
viewpoints to critically examine human-centered, technical rationalism.
There are two main streams of this challenging discussion as follows: one was
Nishida’s philosophy and the other was Hajime Tanabe’s (1885-1962) philosophy.
Nishida’s theory on corporeality was formed and deepened partly through his focus onart making, which vividly described the moment of “Koui-teki chokkan [actingintuition: 行為的直観].” Tanabe’s theory initiated the discussions on corporeality in
the Kyoto School, which investigates the corresponding dual structure of humancorporeality, namely the “inner,” “ego-belonging” aspect and “outer,” “transcendental”
aspect.
Kimura formed his thoughts on corporeality under a hybrid influence of both thesephilosophies. Along with Nishida and Tanabe, Kimura developed his concept of “Gijutsu”
and expanded it into a unique mode of presence as “Gijutsu-teki shintai [technologicalcorporeality: 技術的身体]” and its root of “Rekishi-teki shizen [historical nature: 歴史
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的自然].”

2. Theory of technological corporality to cultivate the relationshipbetween science and technology: Discussions by Motomori Kimura
In the famous article “Hyogen Ai [Expressive Love: 表現愛]” Part I, Kimura
discusses human beings as corporeal existence closely related to the context of culturalformations as follows.
Culture is not human’s conquest against nature but must be, in its deepest
essence, human’s formation of their actuality within the historical nature. In otherwords, culture is awareness as human beings through the cultivation of thehistorical nature. “Cultura,” in its profound and true sense, is nothing other thanthe cultivation of the historical nature ――that is to say, “Agricultura.” (Kimura,
1997, p. 31)
In this discourse, he states that the human body is an active pioneering point of
the creative will of the historical nature, partly cutting into physical materials. The
concrete formation of human embodiment through physical work depends on the mind.
Just as a sharp point of a chisel bites into a rock and gouges it out, people put theirwhole corporeal existences into difficult works. The unique characteristic of humancorporeality emerges through the correspondence of physical and mental actions (Ibid.,
p. 34).
Kimura focuses on this narrative structure of human creative will for new
cultures driven by embodiment works through cultivating the historical nature. The
human body is considered to be a cord of continuing changes occurring between
physical environments and the human will of socialites. In this sense, his idea that“awareness as human beings is embodied through cultivations of the historical nature”
does not simply indicate the function of the “Seishin [spirit: 精神]” that is always
human value-oriented.
In this context, the word “awareness” means the actual minds that come up withintuitive reflections accompanied by doing or acting in pre-linguistic ways. This
reflection hits through physical tricks or pathological affections while applying
technologies to some intention. This concrete insight is paraphrased by Kimura as“corporeal inspiration by hand works (including other bodily acts)” or “physical tact
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works in corporeality.”
Such considerations suggest that humans as corporeal existence do not input
readymade techniques but are gradually becoming unique and renewing their freshness
by inquiring into environments.
Furthermore, Kimura’s theory of corporeality is characterized by original
discussions on “Rishin-teki shintai [remote extension of the corporeality: 離身的身体].” He considered the cultural progress of science and technology from theperspective of global connection and communication. He regarded the theory of global
corporeality as a key to reconstructing national education. In addition, he suggested his
theory of world citizenship as a member of the Kyoto School through the concept of“Sekaishi-teki bunka-teki fuhen [world university in historical and cultural contexts: 世界史的文化的普遍].” This concept of university as the bottom of daily life wasrelevant to the renewal of “Gijutsu,” which enables the edge of rational inquiry. Thesearguments provide us with new viewpoints about human corporeality. As an “active tipof formative awareness” of the historical nature, human corporeality extends into
physical surroundings to capture cultural innovations, making exchanges and contacts
with different cultures (Kimura, 1946, p. 264, 282-283).
Kimura’s descriptions of remote extension of the corporeality include threeroutes of cultural interaction: the main concept “Michi [channels: 道]” can be
explained in detail as “Koutsuu-unyu [transportation: 交通運輸],” “Tsuushin[communication: 通信],” and “Denpa-houdou [propagated report: 伝播報道].” Theseroutes refer to the extended corporeality conveyed as mediums of technology. In using
and enjoying the fruits of modern natural science, these routes unexpectedly anduncertainly transform human corporeality.
The following passage on “transportation” is remarkable as a indicates oftechnical use of science and technology. Scientific achievements and their applications
in daily life always give birth to new technologies.
It should be noted that the transportation system is not merely a conveyor for
convenient movements. Transportation has more meaning than a merely
technical way of passing and moving. Theoretically, the transportation systemitself is nothing more than a chisel-like machinery as a pioneer of newtechnological channels. (Ibid., p. 281)
In this study, the focus is on Kimura’s consideration of the viewpoint about theantagonistic dialogue between two aspects of human corporeality, one is an immanent
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self and the other is the transcendental matter. In other words, the former is the bodily
self under control while the latter is the living actuality beyond arbitrariness.
Kimura inherited the dual structure of corporeality from Tanabe’s thoughts. The
technological corporeality, while making a dialogue between its inner and outer aspects,
is recreated thoroughly in daily practices. Thus, the technological corporeality is always
open and embarking on new cultural possibilities.
However, Nishida’s thoughts of “acting intuition” also definitively influenced
Kimura’s theory of corporeal remote extension. Nishida offered Kimura a uniqueparadoxical perspective. The point is that the corporeal self is dynamically activated,through using science and technology, realizing its characteristics or roles by
permeations and immersions into the world. Nevertheless, this argument of humancorporeality in symphony with its environment should not be identified with the spirit ofself-loss or self-sacrifice.
The historical world forms and creates itself through human corporeality, andthen human bodies are the rationalizing agency of several irrational events.
Humans have their bodies as tools, and at the same time, they are always
corporeal existences. To be immersed in the living world does not mean thathuman bodies disappear or become merely homogenized generically. Rather, thepermeation or immersion into the world means that human bodies become
deeply realized, self-satisfied, and openly aware of themselves by listening
thoroughly to the bottom or edges of the body. (Nishida 2003, p. 47)
Kimura succeeded Nishida’s understanding of the dual structure of humancorporeality. According to Kimura, the aspect of “having a body as a tool” is interpreted
as instrumental corporeality, and the aspect of “being a corporeal existence” isexplained as technological corporeality (Kimura, 1997, p. 35). As a corporeal existence,
humans work on the world through their bodily instrumentality to encounter different
environments and, by grasping materials in response, gradually receive the outlines andlimitations as individuals. Thus, human beings continue to be recreated with social
relationships embedded in the situation of the time and place.
Following Tanabe and Nishida’s philosophies, Kimura captures the tact ofcorporeal inspirations through hand works, expanding into tangible or intangible
cultures established by science and technology.
Furthermore, Kimura discusses the historical and social corporeality related tothe use of “tools” and “machinery.” According to him, the tools around us are
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A. MONZEN“dialectical entities that are both self-negated bodies and self-negated substances.” Hementioned that tools are “the most reliable and experienced alter self of humanexpressive subjectivities,” which “always invokes a purpose or a plan for the humanformative will concretely.” Tools are featured by “removability,” “substitutability,” and“publicness (subjective validity)” (ibid., pp. 37-39).
This argument alters the understanding of the use of tools. Human beings use atool as a means to an end; however, in line with Kimura’s way of thinking, using a tool
is revealed to be an interactive situation in which the tool calls upon the formability ofbodies as “objectively projected will of outside.” The tool stimulates and forms the“expressive will,” conveying limitations or pressures from the environment. Kimura
compared such a tool to a “corresponding partner of outside.”
In contrast to such a collaborative nature of tools, machineries are viewed as“negative bodies” or “objective bodies.” Machinery is a “bodily zero-point” that hasneither power nor workability; however, it “actively regains its powerful motions
through the double negation (the negation of the direct negation of point of effort) andpositively recovers its subjectivity.” Kimura indicates that machineries accompany
specific corporeality called “trans-corporeality” (ibid., pp. 40, 46). It is an “overall planembodied as a complex unity of partial plans,” also an “architecture of plans,” under
objective rationality. Machinery does not respond to human bodies, absorbing humancorporeality, and working without reliable correspondences or relationships.
Kimura took the function of tools as his point of argument and focused on the“Kotsu [a knack, a hang: 骨、骨法]” and “Kokyu [a tact: 呼吸]” originally acquired
before noticing practical corporeality. In addition, he focused on the human will tosearch for natural materials using corporeal inspirations (ibid., pp. 41-42). Under sucharguments, he had a sense of crisis of the time in surrendering to the “great voice” ofmachinery, which brought profound qualitative changes in the human sense of art andmorality.
Today people are living in the era of artificial intelligence (AI) networks that are
involved with each other like complexes of invisible vast machinery. Faced with suchtechnological transformations as corporeal existence, Kimura’s arguments on machinery
can explore the issue of human transcendence. This aspect should be examined morepositively and radically linked with social structure. Then, the next section refers to thetheory of social corporeality by Kiyoshi Miki, who considered the technologicalformations of institutions.

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3. Theory of social corporality to explain institutional connections
between science and technology: Discussions by Kiyoshi MikiIn the article “Kousouryoku no Ronri [The Logic of Imagination: 構想力の論理]” Chapter I “Myth,” Miki explains “Logic of imagination” as the “imagination tied tonature, a nature in a subjective sense, in other words, to human pathos.” Moreover, hedefines this subjective nature working as pathos or passions, “Shakai-teki shintai [social
corporeality: 社会的身体] (Miki 1967b, p. 95).”
The social corporeality is supported mainly by collective liaisons of laborious
interests, which enable us to form a variety of intuitions cooperatively. Although a social
institution for technological development is taken as “Katachi [form: 形]” of labororiented negotiations, Miki attentively captures human occupations behind it. Social
corporeal negotiations encourage to utilization of nature including pathos. His theory ofcorporeality explores this deepest aspect of human productivity from the perspective of
the corporeal passion of nature.
According to him, a social institution that defines human productive acts is a“form,” which is defined by three points, as follows: (1) a mimetic character as“convention and fiction”; (2) a habitual and traditional character as “custom”; and (3) alegal, compulsory, and authoritative character as “mores” or “nomos.”Based on the above, not only (3), which directly governs social life, but also (1)and (2) include sociality. (1) means “convenio (to come together, assemble),” whichaccompanies a social property of logos as “unity,” “agreement,” and “promise” among
unspecified multiple people. In addition, (2) has a collective, natural, and inevitableproperty of pathos, distinguished from individual customs (ibid., pp. 102-103).
In Chapter 3 “Technology,” he describes the linkage between science andtechnology related to the institutional aspect of technology as follows.
Technology is created when humans remote and detach themselves from nature,
and at the same time, through technology, they are bound to and return to nature.
(ibid., p. 255)
This is quite ambivalent as a form of negotiation between nature and humans.
Technology becomes more self-evident through those dual actions and their repetitions.
By extension, it accompanies “the tendency to imitate oneself endlessly,” and then takes
on a normative meaning as an institutional form.
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former is an experimental and critical activity to accumulate objective knowledge for
freedom and to control over nature, whereas the latter is an activity to question the resultsof science among nature in practice and institutionalize them as customs. However, like
Kimura, he also relies on Nishida’s argument of “acting-intuition” and “seeing by doing,”
stating that science and technology emerge in an improvised way, and pointed out themulti-layered overlapping between science and technology.
Miki developed his theory of social corporeality at the point of “Gijutsu” toconstrain and to be constrained by the forms of institutions. There are some suppressedor unknown gaps in the boundaries between new forms of institutions. In his article“Tetsugaku Nyumon [An Introduction to Philosophy: 哲 学 入 門 ]” (1940), this
discussion is redrawn under the phrase that “human technology succeeds the technology
of nature.” The phrase indicates social motivation for technology “Gijutsu” driven by anindefinite, demonic impulse. This demonic character of “Gijutsu” is reflected in thesentence that “at the root of the world lies infinite darkness, infinite impulse.” Miki states
and tries to indicate that social corporeality is linked deeply to technology as an
institutional formation (Miki 1967b, pp. 163-166). He illustrates that, in the first place,institutional formation is not a solid contractual form of mutual benefits, but an open
activation by a latent and potential force of unknown and unlimited formations.
Regarding the passionate form of unknowns, the concept of demonic formative
force discussed by Nishida offers a clue to Miki, that is, an affected impulse of
selflessness before the conscious distinguishment of objects. The force is over subjective
controls. In this sense, social corporeality in Miki’s institutional theory does not focus on
objective and collaborative corporeality that shares general standards and common sense.
Rather, his theory grasps the powerful impulsiveness highlighted by proactive and intent
aspects through the diversity of living.
By referring to Miki, this report suggests that the social corporeality of
institutional formations can bring an open, rather than self-centered or self-assertive,
creativity. This creativity is apprehended as a tact to survive current restrictions or
problems, passing their pathos to the changes that follow. Sometimes, this creativity may
seem irrational. However, the impact is necessary for tolerant social concepts to avoid theuniform expansion of valid techniques for all.

Conclusion
This report critically examined the tendency of education today, which
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rationally drives children or newcomers to acquire the necessary techniques or skills forsocial life. The verification of the word “Gijutsu (art/technology)” has reaffirmed someprinciples of corresponding and emerging “channels” for the technologicaltransformation usually covered by psychologistic and subjectivistic “ruts” for rational
technical acquisitions.
Kimura’s theory of technological corporeality discusses a remote extension thatpenetrates into an environment like a “chisel-like” tool, launching new channels of“transportation,” “communication,” and “propagated report.” From this perspective, thetechnological transformation of human corporeality is not regarded as the formation ofsubjective individuals suitable for uniform techniques. Human corporeality isreconsidered as a medium that receives constraints or difficulties woven into its will,
purposes, and motivations and then converts such unexpectedness into new keys toopen the next channels of technology.
Miki examined the social corporeality related to social networks, which
immediately replaces limitations or constraints with its driving force of institutional
formation. His logic of form/formation focuses on the practical corporeality, whichgains its social concreteness through conflicts arising from cultural differences and theirmutual negations. Under his argument, human corporeality is reconsidered as a medium
of open creativity for impulsiveness provided by the diversity of living.
The corporeal theories of the Kyoto School propose, first, a conceptual shift ofthe meaning of “Gijutsu” learning, from the previous value-accumulated view oftechniques to the notable value-inquiring view of technologies. In the former, one isencouraged to simply acquire predetermined skills and desirable techniques, in the latter
one is encouraged to gain trial tact derived from carefully examining motivations andprocesses of learning acquisitions.
Second, the Kyoto School’s arguments show the need to generate an interactive
institutional design of social promotion to provide new technologies. Institutional
design always prepares a premised outlook. Therefore, it should be formed withattentive and reflective thinking on unexpected difficulties or contradictions around the
expected effects of new changes.
As above, education can overcome technical rationalism by attaching areasonable value to possible or arising failures, conflicts, and imperfections of technicaland technological changes. The key would be to convert such specific nuisances toactive resources of coming technological transformations in accordance with thehistorical nature and social corporeality.

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Thematic Research: Corporeality and Education: Reconsidering the Basis of “Experience” and “Connection”