I have just written an e-mail to New Scientist magazine. The text is as follows:
Dear New Scientist,
I would like to offer some comment on Ray Kurzweil's article in the September 24th issue of New Scientist, 'Human 2.0'(Sep 24th, 2005, p.32).
Mr Kurzweil describes a future in which human beings will 'merge' with the technology of artificial intelligence, having brains and bodies enhanced by nanobots. He posits this future as quite close, specifically, he mentions the 2020s, the 2030s and the 2040s. Towards the end of the article he wisely makes the reservation that "[t]his is not a utopian vision".
I would call that an understatement. As a person who has to share the same world with Mr Kurzweil, I would have to describe the scenario he puts forward as a nightmare, or, to try and use more 'objective' language, a positive dystopia.
Mr Kurzweil further states that, "some commentators have questioned whether we would still be human after such dramatic changes. These observers may define the concept of human as being based on our limitations, but I prefer to define us as the species that seeks – and succeeds – in going beyond our limitations."
I would say that the scenario Mr Kurzweil puts forward is dehumanising not because it shows us exceeding our limitations, but for precisely the oppostie reason, that it ties human destiny forever to the thread of a single type of technology, therefore limiting us further. We all know how IQ tests may be culturally biased. How much more so the software of 'artificial intelligence'. The limitations themselves may prove to be 'exponential'- one of Mr Kurzweil's favourite words, it seems – in their implications.
The very title of the article gives a clue to the kinds of limitations we might face. If we are all to be permeated with software, how can we be free of the values of those manufacturing the software? We know already of Mr Gates' monopolising practises in the field of software, and how ineffecient Windows and Word are. Must we have such corporate forms of corruption actually built into us?
Mr Kurzweil argues that this future is inevitable and that we must make the best of it. It seems to me that people often argue that a certain future is inevitable in order to demoralise all resistance against it when they have a vested interest. I cannot help but wonder whether that is the case here.
Yours,
Quentin S. Crisp
HI Quentin,If you get a reply would you please post it?? I would be interested in seeing what they said.You’re the best ! Eve
Well, they don’t usually write replies, though it may be printed in the letters section of the magazine. Ray Kurzweil is a pretty good example of what I hate about science. People wonder why scientists have a bad image (and specifically, some people have challenged me on this subject on this blog), but it seems fairly straightforward to me when we have the likes of Kurzweil around. The kind of future he’s basically championing is JUST PLAIN EVIL. But if you object you’re a luddite or a crackpot or something. I really, really hate it. People should stop being afraid to stand up to this sort of nonsense, but we have all been, as it were, blinded by science.And since, no doubt, there will be people reading this who get the wrong idea – no I don’t hate all scientists. I even live – I think fairly harmoniously – with someone who is a great advocate of science. But we should be able to determine what happens in the world in which we all live, instead of having enslaving technologies forced upon us by a scientific elite.In the same issue of New Scientist there is an article about stereotypes of scientists, which is fairly balanced. It remarks, in passing, that some of the anxieties about science are quite valid, though it doesn’t really explore the ways in which they are valid. At the end, though, there’s a very interesting quote from Carl Sagan, which is similar to what I’ve been saying on this blog – and what some people have been poo-pooing here. It goes as follows:”We’ve arranged a global civilisation in which the most crucial elements… profoundly depend on science and technology. We have also arranged things so that no one understands science and technology. This is a prescription for disaster.”Need I say more?
Preach it, Brother! You know where I stand!Peace,E
HI Quentin,Carl Sagen was a true Genius I remember seeing him on TV shows and reading articles in magazines he has written..He was an outspoken man on many issues and NASA and other Scientific organizations always snubbed him.. There are needs for technology in science however, it shouldn’t be based on it only.. What happened to the mind and reseach?I just read another posting on Opera from Ole, who was writing about Global Warming also. It’s nice to see some people taking the lead in bring it to light.Thank you for being one of them..Eve
“….. forced upon us by a scientific elite.”-Is this your opinion, Quentin? – or is there cogent “Evidence” for this assertion, other than the article to which you refer? I am reminded of the “Eugenics” debate that has been taking place in one form or another since Plato, Galton, Alexander Graham Bell and others right up to the present ongoing development of the Human Genome Project. Now, of course I cannot argue that all scientific (including biological) research is carried out with an altruistic motive, or is predicated with a ‘pure’ intent -nor can I put forward a reverse, one sided argument either. The problem I have with my acceptance -my understanding- of your premise, on the specific matter you detail so thoroughly, is that I infer more ’emotion’ at work than rational thought. I admit that I might be very mistaken about this, but I only can read and interpret the words on the page, and not debate with their author, were he sitting with me -and that is of course the problem with all our written articles (mine included) so I must set this to one side. I would like to read more about this from various sources. I would like to see the debates ‘for’ as well as ‘against’ the propositions being mooted by everyone -including your good self. On the face of it your anger and dismay is understandable but using words like “EVIL” do nothing to put forward a good rational case for dismissing what Kurzweil is stating.In your reply to someone else who posted here,you say “and specifically, some people have challenged me on this subject on this blog”, you also say “And since, no doubt, there will be people reading this who get the wrong idea”. Later, you say “…which is similar to what I’ve been saying on this blog – and what some people have been poo-pooing here…..””If the cap fits” I suppose I should wear it, for I infer that the implications of your statements, as I have quoted them, include myself, in the context of those remarks. I can only say -in my own defence- that I am not pro-science, to the extent that I am unable or unwilling to see the ‘just conclusion’ of a rational debate that places firm evidence, firmly to the fore of any argument. I do not and never have, nor will I, “poo-poo” any proposal or discussions where I might find myself not completely convinced, or aligned with the assertions that are being made -though I could and would come around to joining a consensus, if I can accept all of the ‘”evidence”, as being incontrovertible.That being so, you may be absolutely right in your own position -and I admit that I too am affected by the emotions of many of the ‘great debates’ of our time (some of them echoing on from when I was an ‘angry young man’) and I do not find it easy to surpress my feelings when my instinct tells me that some of what is taking place, or is being proposed, is contrary to ‘natural justice’ or ‘the good of Humanity’. and so on.I am sorry this comment is overlong. I am interested in what you have to say and felt I had to offer my unrefined and intellectually inferior response.Peace.lokutus
I’ve just come back from a night of Chinese poetry and Italian food, and it’s past one in the morning, so I’m afraid this won’t be long. Thank you everyone for your responses. For now I will respond in turn, specifically, to what some of Lokutus has said.Hello Lokutus.Your response is neither unrefined nor intellectually inferior. However, I would challenge your assumption – a very common assumption these days – that there’s something wrong with an emotional argument. Do we then, wish to live in a world without emotions? Do emotions have no value? The assumption that emotional arguments are invalid is precisely the kind of assumption that I personally believe to have been sneaked in through the back door by the kind of people whose ideology I am attempting to criticise in this blog. Please do ask yourself why you think there’s something wrong with an emotional argument.As to theings being forced upon us by a scientific elite, that is my own opinion, yes. I would say that it’s self-evident. Did I ask for any of the technologies that determine every aspect of my everyday existence? No, I did not. Am I happy about them – increasingly the answer is ‘no’.
I do not plan to have last word on this but I cannot see where I have condemned ’emotion’ per se. Heaven knows (an emotional utterence) I use it often enough, in the verses and so on, that I pen, from time to time in my blog. And yes -you are right -none of us, I assume, wish to live in a world without emotions and yes, again, emotions have their intrinsic value, as part and parcel of who we are and how we express ourselves. What I said, if you go back and examine the sentence/paragraph is ” The problem I have with my acceptance -my understanding- of your premise, on the specific matter you detail so thoroughly, is that I infer more ’emotion’ at work than rational thought.”The implied emphasis is on “more” in that sentence and then,following, on “rational thought”. perhaps I should have applied the Bold to those words. As to ” Please do ask yourself why you think there’s something wrong with an emotional argument. The simplified answer is that I don’t. I distinguish between an ‘impassioned debate’, where rational argument is brought into play and an ’emotional debate’ where rhetoric is the underlying defence, or attack, and ‘reasoning’ is subdued, or partly hidden, by the rushing tide (another emotional phrase) of strong emotion.There is a place for all of these things in one’s oratorical skills (though I am aware that, strictly speaking, we are not taking part in a ‘public oration’, in the generally accepted meaning of the term) but I when I read your dissertation it seemed to me that there was rather more emotion and rather less rational thought, an imbalance surely? -though I hurry to add that I do not say you are an irrational writer or thinker, only that the ‘intensity’ of your emotion, as I perceived it to be, seemed, to me, to swamp the message you intended, in some of your specific decalamations.Apropos your last paragraph, above. I agree with you. I concede your point. Your comment says quite clearly how you feel and where you stand, it is, I believe, both impassioned, logical and rational. Personally, I do not accept that all technology is improving the ‘quality of life’ (though that phrase is always open to universal debate) but I can write out two lists, separately titled “Like” and “Dislike/Hate”. I am uncertain as to which list would be the longer one, but I am certain that I have ‘mixed feelings’ on the whole topic, hence the two ‘lists’.Peacelokutus
Okay, another quick reply, I’m afraid, for the usual reasons, so please forgive me if it’s not thorough.I can see that calling something ‘JUST PLAIN EVIL’ might be seen as an argument that is more emotional than rational, in a bad way. After all, it’s very easy for anyone to call anything they don’t like ‘evil’. I hope that the overall context of my comments explain why I have such feelings, however. Perhaps, for some people, it doesn’t.There are some people who have no trouble with the idea of ‘designer babies’ for instance, and I have heard claims that such use of technology reduces human beings to commodoties dismissed as ’emotional’ and ‘sentimental’. However, I would say that the very ability to treat humans as so much genetic material to be manipulated, to treat them as mere codes in a catalogue of genes, in fact, in simple language, to treat them as objects, is the attitude that eventually annihilates compassion. If we have to eradicate our emotions and sentiments – which may or may not, from a cosmic viewpoint, be meaningless – the consequence is that we live in a world where anything is a legitimate object of vivisection. Something wrong with the experiments of Dr Mengele? Pure sentimentalism. This is the logical conclusion that society must come to if we exclude emotion from our arguments.My assertion that the future advocated by Kurzweil is ‘just plain evil’ represents a straightforward, uncensored expression of my feeling. Ultimately, logically, there is no reason I should object to the future he proposes. What logical objection can one have? All objections must be based on emotion. I do not want that future because it destroys our freedom to have individual emotions. In that sense there is certainly more emotion than ‘rational’ argument what I have said.Consider the scenario in one of my favourite films, Invasion of the Bodysnatchers. The bodysnatchers are a species of aliens that arrive on Earth in pods and been to replicate and replace the humans. The pod people have no emotions. Their motivation is pure survival. When finally they corner the hero of the film and his lover, his former friend (now ‘bodysnatched’) holds up a syringe, about to put them to sleep and replace them.”We are building a world in which there will be no crime, no conflict. Everyone will cooperate and will be content with their lot,” he says as he looms above them.The hero, knowing about he is about to lose his humanity forever, has no argument against this, all he says to his former friend is, “I hate you.” Then he turns to his lover and says, “I love you.”His ‘friend’, moving forward with the syringe, says to him, “Well, I don’t hate you. I don’t love you either. Very soon you won’t love or hate anyone, either.”Can you tell me, in such a scenario, why the hero is so intent on holding onto his worthless emotions? Why? There really is no logical reason. But what would you say about the bodysnatchers? Do you think they are the agents of evil or good? Personally, they represent to me the ULTIMATE EVIL. I would describe that ultimate evil as The Impersonal. Perhaps you see things differently.
Is there yet another bug in the Opera system which means you can’t view these comments? I am testing to see if I can post this, just for a start.
I don’t really have time to do a proper post, I just feel the need to comment here, in case anyone’s listening, that, yes, the chances of this latest disaster in Asia being linked to global warming are very high. I haven’t seen it mentioned much in the papers and on TV. A higher rate of earthquakes, and more violent earthquakes were predicted as an effect of global warming. As things heat up, the Earth’s crust expands, causing tectonic friction. Now, some people are talking about suing the oil companies, or any companies that go on ravaging the environment in which we all have to live. And I think that’s a very good idea. If the scientific evidence can be made to stick we should sue the fuckers into oblivion, but also, those tens of thousands of people who have died in Asia, well, it’s very likely that we’re all responsible for their deaths. Cars. Waste. Junk food. Greed in all shapes and forms. It’s a killer. We have to give it up.