Your conclusion that it is "a very techno-utopian vision of the world" is spot-on, and that's because of the key Marxist concept of Historical Materialism, an i

Your conclusion that it is "a very techno-utopian vision of the world" is spot-on, and that's because of the key Marxist concept of Historical Materialism, an idea that Marx developed prior to the work in Das Kapital. It says that what people ARE is determined by the specific material conditions that produce their world. [1] Here's a quote that illustrates the idea: "The totality of the relations of production constitutes the economic structure of society, the real foundation, on which arises a legal and political superstructure and to which correspond definite forms of social consciousness." [2] This notion comes from Marx's critique of Hegel and German idealist philosophy. Marx believed that Hegel's notion of history [3] couldn't adequately address it's own basis in time. (You might think of it as Marx asking Hegel 'Why now?'). The ramifications of this idea that consciousness itself and one's very way of being in the world are determined by the current forms of production has far reaching echoes in 20th century western philosophy, with existentialism ("existence precedes essence"), phenomenology, and deconstruction ("any description requires a prior Inscription') being examples. Representative critiques of the idea come from "the outside" by Karl Popper (who says the theory can't be falsified)[4] and from 'the inside' by Walter Benjamin (who says the concept is indistinguishable from theology).[5] But it's still a big idea. [1] See "The German Ideology" https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1845/german-ideology/ch01a.htm https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1845/german-ideo... [2] https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1859/critique-pol-economy/preface.htm https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1859/critique-po... [3] http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/idealism/#GerIde http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/idealism/#GerIde [4] fun animation here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wf-sGqBsWv4 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wf-sGqBsWv4 [5] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Theses_on_the_Philosophy_of_History https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Theses_on_the_Philosophy_of_Hi...