Does it still make sense to talk about progress? Did two World Wars splinter those certainties, causing progress to become separate from the idea of advancement? And can we still, nowadays, after and during an all-encompassing technological revolution, talk about progress? According to Schiavone, the financial crisis of 2008 proved a turning point, the moment when governments and people found themselves forced to act just to defend and keep what had already been achieved. The only possible solution to the ensuing political and cultural deficit is a global response that transcends the particular interest of this or that country. Completed just before the start of the coronavirus crisis, and with the addition of a chapter dedicated to it, these pages interrogate the progressive function of technology, not as an alien power but as an integral part of what makes us human.