A Brave New Cyber-World

by Robbie Dawson

Everyone agrees that our world is increasingly dominated by technology. The question is: What do these changes mean for us? There are two schools of thought about the future. Some say that technology will weaken our brains and cause us to just “go through the motions”. Others argue that technology will inevitably push us to become better, more efficient, humans. I lean toward the latter view, However, I think there are major flaws in both arguments.

In Nicholas Carr’s essay, “Is Google Making us Stupid?”, Carr argues that technology is making harmful changes to our brain that no longer allow us to think as human beings. He says that technology rewired his brain to the point where he is unable to take in information conventionally. “I’m not thinking the way I used to think.The deep reading that used to come naturally has become a struggle.” Carr cites a University College London study suggesting that users rarely spend much time browsing the same page. Although we are in the habit of skimming pages on the Net, Carr neglects to recognize the fact that as our technology changes so does our need for technology. For example, what is the benefit of “old school” thinking processes, like memorizing and making connections, when computers have the capability to simulate the hard decisions for us? Jamais Cascio, a critic of Carr’s essay, expands on this idea in “Get Smarter”, a 2009 article in The Atlantic. “The power of all this knowledge will come from its ability to inform difficult decisions. Most professionals will likely use simulation and modeling in their day-to-day work, from political decisions to hairstyle options,” (Cascio).

Cascio argues that our new access to technology won’t impair our knowledge, but will enhance it. The high speed connections we make on the Internet as information flies across the page are similar to an intellectual disorder we now call Attention Deficit Disorder. Like everyone, people who have this disorder are forced to conform to the obsolete technology (textbooks and lectures, for example) we presently use in our educational system. In the future, however, when everything is intimately connected to the Web, A.D.D. won’t be a disorder; rather, it will be an advantage. This ability to stream information into your brain fluidly has been dubbed by some “fluid intelligence”. Cascio argues that fluid intelligence is the path to the future. “Fluid intelligence doesn’t look much like the capacity to memorize and recite facts, the skills people have traditionally associated with brainpower, but building it up may improve the capacity to think deeply that Carr and others fear we are losing for good,” (Cascio).

Cascio makes good points about the potential that technology has for the human mind; however, he is overly optimistic. “Humans won’t be taken out of the loop--in fact, many, many, more humans will have the capacity to do something that was once limited to a hermetic priesthood” (Cascio). Unfortunately, I think more technology does mean more humans out of the loop. The growing gap between rich and poor, skilled and unskilled, will be greatly accelerated by the fact that machines are doing jobs that lower-class people were doing yesterday. Poor people also lack the means to be plugged in to the new cyber-world. If you’re poor, a computer is not as big a priority as food. Because of this, lower-class families will most likely be torn from the middle and upper class, as only those wealthy enough for technology will be able to stay up-to-date. I believe that technology will be concentrated the way wealth was in the Industrial Revolution, in the hands of a few.

Another point Cascio gets wrong is that he assumes technology won’t be intimately integrated with our anatomy. Cascio feels that implanting computer chips into our brain or getting genetic surgery to boost our psyche isn’t realistic. “As with digital implants, the brain modification you might undergo one week could be obsolete the next...Who would want a 2025-vintage brain when you’re competing against hotshots with Model 2026?” (Cascio). In this statement he assumes that our technology will continue to advance in the same way it always has, which simply won’t be the case. Twenty-five years ago, a gigabyte would be a luxurious amount of memory located in a massive mainframe computer. Today, my pocket-sized hard drive contains two terabytes, two thousand times that of the old mainframe. Twenty-five years from now, is it possible that technology in a bacteria-sized device could be absorbed and integrated into the brain, and then the next year be replaced by the newest model?

Finally, Cascio overlooks how human his predicted “bio-technical entities” would be. After proving that technology has the potential to expand our mind, he fails to analyze how it will affect our heart. Carr however, does touch upon this. He cites the movie 2001: A Space Odyssey. “HAL’s outpouring of feelings contrasts with the emotionlessness that characterizes the human figures in the film...[The humans] thoughts and actions feel scripted, as if they’re following the steps of an algorithm.” Imagine a world where we are so integrated with technology that we no longer have basic human feelings such as compassion.

No one knows exactly what the future will bring. Perhaps we will live in a world of post human bio-computers. Or perhaps technology will drain our brains and leave us like fish out of water. But one thing is for sure. Whether you are an optimist or a pessimist, a believer of Carr or Cascio, an advocate of technology or an enemy, or anywhere in between, we all agree that the future is coming, and its coming fast.