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These are excerpts and elaborations from my book "The Nature of Consciousness"
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The Evolution of Technology The US journalist Kevin
Kellypoints out that there is
another evolution at work. Kellydraws drawing a parallel
between organic life and the life of technology. More precisely, he compares
the biosphere with the "technium", the set of all interconnected
technologies collectively created by humans. He argues that the evolution of
the technium is driven by forces that are similar to the ones that drive the
evolution of life. He disagrees with Gould: biological evolution does have a direction. The direction is towards
complexity. Kelly believes the same kind of law and direction is at work in the
technium. Technology is inevitable.
Many inventions were "invented" at the same time by different people
in different places: those people were just the practical vehicle that
technology used to emerge; but it would have emerged anyway. Basically,
technology parasites on human minds in order to survive, reproduce and evolve,
just like memes do. The supremacy of technology
is becoming obvious: we depend on technology. Our extended phenotype (to use
another biological concept) contains an increasing component of technology
without which we would not survive. However, the net effect of
the growing complexity and diversity of technology is, in Kelly's opinion, positive. What technology "wants" is progress
towards more and more freedom for us. The more technology we have, the more
choices we have, and the more freedom we enjoy. Technology increases our free
will. Technology, in fact, allows human genius to emerge and prosper. Without
technology the human race would not have had Mozart and VanGogh. Kellyeven develops a sort of ethics
for technology. A technology can never be bad just like an animal species
cannot be bad: they are the product of evolution. It makes no sense to ask
whether a species is good or bad. It makes no sense to ask whether a technology
is good or bad. Kelly thinks that we have a duty to maximize technologies in
society at large, i.e. to invent everything that can be invented, because
technology gives us more freedom. Back to the beginning of the chapter "The History of Language: Why We Speak" | Back to the index of all chapters |
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