So much for harm – what about technology? Accepting that technical artefacts have a dual physical and intentional nature tells us what technical artefacts are, but not what they can do. Of course, even speaking in terms of what artefacts do risks the charge of technological determinism. Doesn't saying that artefacts do things to us elide human agency, treating us as pawns to our smartphones, spoons and shovels? Not necessarily, though the pull of technological determinism looms large when we address the technology– harm nexus. So too does its cousin and occasional co- conspirator, reductivism. Reductive accounts of technology offer similarly reductive accounts of the technology– harm nexus. Often, such accounts typecast technology, arguing that there is a single role that it can play in harm. Technology's role in harm is reduced to that of a neutral means, an extender of our capabilities, an afforder of our actions, a translator of our ends, or part and parcel of our practices.

To avoid this kind of reductivism, the three chapters of Part II review a variety of influential approaches to understanding technology. In reviewing these approaches, I undertake a symptomatic reading of them that addresses their underlying presuppositions and the implications they have for understanding the technology– harm nexus. In particular, I am interested in understanding what these approaches do not, and cannot, say about harms implicating technologies. What kinds of harms are they able to speak to? What harms sneak outside their purview? In answering these questions, I examine two further issues that have a significant bearing on what an approach can and cannot say about harms implicating technologies.