Well first of all, I have only just realised that I completely forgot to post a link to one of my favorite websites as requested in the introductory blog (Probably due to over-indulgence in my Peacock story).
To be perfectly honest, I don't spend a lot of my time surfing the web so I don't have a favorite web site but for the purpose of the weblog, I will post a link to the reason I am feeling scared.
I have being doing my research for the webliography and Iv come across a man called Kevin Warwick who is Professor of Cybernetics at the University of Reading. This man not only has an extensive list of awards for his contributions to the scientific world, been placed on an intellectual and achievement level as major historical scientists but Kevin Warwick is also labelled the first real Cyborg, using himself as an experiment to connect technology to his central nervous system by means of surgical operations.
Take a look at this; ---> http://www.kevinwarwick.com/ICyborg.htm and
this; ---> real cyborg ( I really hope these links work).
Coming across this guy has left me feeling confronted, challenged and scared. I'm not scared of him, I'm scared of his ideas, I'm scared of his research, where it will lead and scared because it all challenges my personal ethics and confronts me on spiritual level (If past lives exist, then I think I was a tree-hugging hippie or... a plant).
He also wrote an article for CNN describing some of his plans and future ideas, one of which is phasing out the traditional passport and having chips implanted into the body wherein lies all our personal information. So with one sweep and beep we are registered in and out of wherever and whatever.
I apologise at this point if my blog becomes "emotional" I will keep it as calm as possible but the truth is; I am emotional about such ideas. They scare the security out of me.
Reading about Kevin Warwick and Cyborgism (if thats a real word) got me thinking. I think Cyborgism and the evolution of technology is interesting. Its different and new, so to that extent I think its pretty cool but then I started to wander; what if what is cool and interesting becomes commercial and if it succeeds commercially, what if it can then become forced?
What I mean is, take the idea of the passport/information chip. It starts off as cool, because its different and new, then what if it works? People might want to have it. What if government thinks its a brilliant way to monitor human activity. What if it then becomes forced? It can be possible, no?
So its the future of Cybernetics scares me. Something inside me, when I read about the direction the relationship between human and machine is taking, sets off the warning signals inside telling me this is not right, not human as well as ethically and morally insane. But how do I back up an argument of "this is how I feel" academically or with authority. I cant, and this frustrates me because all I know is this is how I feel. Then again, this is what is most human about me I guess, that I feel.
Following on from this, I thought about gender & cyborg. I thought, what if social and technological evolution eventually merges human and machine to the point that "completely human" no longer exists, would gender even have a purpose if machinery itself is not gendered? Is there such a thing as male machine or female machine? and if gender is made redundant then I think the same goes for race. (note: this is not my assignment, just thoughts freaking me out as I think them).
Like I said, I just feel so scared about the possibility of all this and that it threatens our human species. I might be alone on this side of the digital spectrum and that's OK. Warwick speaks of how these advancement are only a decade away. I really don't want to live in a cyborg world. I cant help think that if it gets carried away with itself, it might end up as something with consequences to regret.
I don't think that cybernetics is necessarily anything to be feared. I think it has potential to help people who have lost limbs/function in parts of their bodies. I don't think that we'll lose our humanity through fusion with technology. People already have robotic limbs. We've been doing similar things for years already; through pacemakers, for another example. I think that the issue depends on how we define humans. Is the presence of a body so important? Is it our emotions which set us apart, our conscious mind?
ReplyDeleteAs for the gender of machines, I think that they can still be gendered. I'd suggest that we still tend to associate big engines with masculinity (perhaps because men have traditionally been more involved in their construction/maintenance/operation).
If we adopt a more extreme form of assimilation and essentially become a brain inside a robot body (a somewhat frightening thought) we may even be compelled to show gender in some way, as they did with the Borg in the Star Trek example. Abolishing gender identifiers will take a while - maybe long enough for them to translate into any possible robotic form?
Hey Sally,
ReplyDeleteI do see your side of the argument. I agree that cybernetics can (and does) assist people in a number of positive ways. Like the example of braces for teeth, I had those way back when. So I have to ask myself, how can I get so wound up over it if I use the technology myself? So I do see the good side of it.
What frightens me the most is Professor Kevin Warwick. Did you watch his video? He reckons the next step is the creation of cyborgs who have an intelligence more powerful than humans. If Humans have always been so intelligent to create tools to make us navigate through our world with ease and convenience, why on earth would we want to create something that is essentially better than us? What would this imply? I cant see that being an intelligent move at all. Professor Warwick IS adopting that extreme position as he has the authority to push it onto society. Still, I guess I like being a fleshy and flawed human and I wouldn't want the world to be different from the way it is now. I wouldn't want to live in the post-biological ear. But I do know that im probably part of a minority here.
After doing much reading I realise now disintegrating gender boundaries would never be possible because I agree with a man called Steve Dixon who says, cyborgism and the non-gendered utopia is a paradox as metal would be gendered by virtue, in the way that they are programmed to live and ultimately cyborgism is an extension of the real.
oh my hat... what a challenging unit. I totally did not expect to be so challenged by this unit so to that extend it cool!
Peace
:)