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Literary notes about Tool (AI summary)

The word "tool" takes on a richly varied significance in literature, functioning both as a literal instrument and a potent metaphor. It is often used to highlight how human labor is transformed by technological or intellectual advances, suggesting that each new implement can both ease work and diminish individual exertion ([1]). Simultaneously, authors employ the term to evoke images of constraint or manipulation, as characters are depicted either resisting being turned into mere instruments of larger forces ([2], [3]) or serving as indispensable agents in the pursuit of knowledge and progress ([4], [5]). Whether referring to a tangible object such as a tool chest or to an abstract means of control, the word encapsulates a complex interplay between utility, identity, and power.
  1. At each increase of knowledge, as well as on the contrivance of every new tool, human labour becomes abridged.
    — from The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction Volume 20, No. 559, July 28, 1832 by Various
  2. I prefer to be my own master and not the tool of any blundering universal force.
    — from Man and Superman: A Comedy and a Philosophy by Bernard Shaw
  3. But let him once suspect that he is being made the tool of foreign intrigue, and all his national feeling will assert itself.
    — from Secret societies and subversive movements by Nesta Helen Webster
  4. The advent of the earth satellite provided scientists with a new and valuable research tool.
    — from Rockets, Missiles, and Spacecraft of the National Air and Space Museum, Smithsonian Institution
  5. Not so; the moment a meaning is gained, it is a working tool of further apprehensions, an instrument of understanding other things.
    — from How We Think by John Dewey

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