"When we can create an artificial intelligence that can not only think, but also feel, it will be a real breakthrough. At present, AI can't do it, but uploaded intelligence will have the ability to establish emotional connections, because it is human.
" The words come from the sci-fi film "Pantheon", which was released in September this year. The film is adapted from the novel by Chinese science fiction writer Liu Yukun. Contrary to allowing machines to acquire intelligence, uploading intelligence directly digitally simulates human thinking. Human brains are scanned and uploaded to the cloud. Humans live on the Internet in the form of data, and their consciousness and emotions are preserved.
People who have transformed into uploaded consciousness have broken through all kinds of biological limitations, and their productivity and creativity are far beyond what a mortal body can match.
But is such a person still human? If not a person, what is it? The characters in it can't explain themselves. Extending from this: in what way will a person who has lost his body and exists as a consciousness be organized? What kind of impact will it have on human society? The film is here, leaving people with endless imagination.
In addition to sci-fi themes such as space exploration and alien creatures, sci-fi works such as artificial intelligence, uploaded consciousness, and cyberpunk, which are discussed around people and human society, are appearing more and more intensively. This shift reflects a collective consciousness about technology.
When scientism became the yardstick for the development of human society, technology became the "correct" means to solve problems, and human beings, as an imperfect existence, became an object that urgently needed to be improved. As shown in bold and predictable science fiction works, technology will eventually point to the biological nature of human beings. It not only helps people prolong life and cure diseases, but in the end, it also transcends people themselves, making people exist in another material form and making people a "new man".
Perhaps unseen, what the struggle to overcome biological constraints and reject natural influences shows is that humanity is increasingly turning its attention away from the outside world after a climactic period of geographic discovery and interstellar exploration , placed in the person itself. As a tool for people to explore themselves, technology has already surpassed the means and is connected with meaning.
Our question is based on this: Why did the eyes of science and technology turn to people themselves? More importantly, what will happen if the biological boundaries of human beings are breached?
prison of progress
The difference between man and other living beings is that man is a meaning-seeking animal. Since meaning is not an objective law, but a product of construction, people understand and seek meaning in different ways in different historical periods.
In the classical period before the scientific revolution, human understanding of the world was holistic. Who am I and what is the world? These two questions were combined and intertwined in the pre-modern world. The answer to who I am is related to what the world is. Similarly, the understanding of the world is also to confirm who I am.
That is to say, people understand themselves and give themselves meaning by determining their position in the world. In ancient China, people lived between heaven and earth, and the way of heaven provided the legitimacy of orthodoxy and political order. In ancient Europe, natural law was the fundamental source of the kingdom of power and moral concepts. The transcendence of human beings is established in the overall picture of the universe.
The process of modernity begins with the disintegration of the entire cosmic picture. When man establishes his own subject status, he splits from nature, from others, and finally from himself.
It is quite a modern idea that people are so obsessed with transforming themselves and surpassing themselves. The advancement of science and technology is the turbulent waves rising after the sea of modern concepts has rolled.
Kant said at the beginning of the article "What Is Enlightenment" that enlightenment is to come out of the state of immaturity that he caused himself. The so-called state of immaturity is the inability to use one's own intellect without the guidance of others.
So he yelled the loudest slogan of the Enlightenment: "Use your own reason bravely!"
In the following era, people opened their eyes, began to face themselves, and re-examined their position among all things in the world.
The modern process after the Enlightenment is the history in which man has established his own absolute subjectivity and continuously strengthened it. The relationship between man and nature has undergone earth-shaking changes. The meaningful connection between them has been cut off and replaced by the relationship between subject and object. Nature has become a landscape and an object of governance.
The pursuit of progress has even become a kind of compulsion: if the pace of progress slows down, history will end, and human beings will lose the meaning of existence. Under this impulse, technology has the legitimacy to transform everything.
All the opposites of people can be surpassed, and the implementation of self-will makes people unprecedentedly confident. It wasn't until Nietzsche announced loudly that "God is dead!" that people recovered from this passionate state and found that they had stepped into a field of nothingness. A person who is alone begins to feel lonely and asks himself: What is the purpose of life?
The desolation of meaning has become a deep current hidden under the ever-changing human society and a shadow cast in people's lives. Man is no longer a subject at the feet of the gods, but the myth is shattered, the other shore is destroyed, and man is thrown into the present world. Man has become a temporal existence with a beginning and an end, and there is nothing outside of man.
Therefore, man has to turn to the only carrier of meaning: man himself. Existentialism is a set of meaning philosophy born under such circumstances, which tells people: meaning can be given by oneself. But conversely, meaning is also trapped in human time and space.
The entire history of man becomes meaning itself.
The question is, what kind of history is meaningful? Technology has provided ready-made answers to human beings. If the use of reason is the greatest achievement of the Enlightenment, then technology is the brightest pearl above it. There is no reason for people not to be proud of the achievements of science and technology.
At this time, a "progressive narrative" that binds time, technology and the human condition comes into play. The development of science and technology is regarded as the embodiment of progress, and progress provides meaning support for human beings.
The history of progress is interpreted as the progress of history, and progress is promoted as a kind of morality, which becomes a prison for people to prove themselves. The pursuit of progress has even become a kind of compulsion: if the pace of progress slows down, history will end, and human beings will lose the meaning of existence.
Under this impulse, technology has the legitimacy to transform everything.
Under the gaze of science, the earth is no longer a mother, the sun no longer has divinity, mountains and rivers have become a kind of resource; the sky full of stars is no longer a guide for people to understand and arrange their lives, but a kind of The object of aesthetics; people go to the moon and explore the universe, not to admire the palaces where the gods live, but to find the future habitat of human beings.
Wherever technology goes, all meanings are rewritten, and the outside world has become a material reality. Now, technology is turning its attention to the last piece of land left alone: people themselves.
A transformation of human beings with hopes and dangers has begun. And the fundamental ethical issues of scientific and technological progress have also emerged: scientific and technological activities seeking meaning are constantly eroding the foundation of human meaning, and it has begun to challenge the question of what makes a human a human. This is the paradox of technology to people.
The ancient Greek philosopher Protagoras said that "man is the measure of all things", which is now transformed into: "man is the measure of progress". It's just that the modern "person" is already different from the "person" of integrity in the classical sense.
denaturalization of man
Looking at the history of scientific and technological development, the previous technologies mainly focused on the breakthrough of environmental and social constraints, and achieved such achievements as cutting off rivers, reclamation of lakes, informatization, and globalization. " way to realize the transformation of nature and society. With the further development of technology, it began to challenge human biology.
Some breakthroughs have occurred in the fields of gene editing, in vitro embryo culture, etc., and the decomposition and reorganization of human nature have become technically possible. Creating new people is something that humans who have taken over the "fire" from Prometheus have always longed for. Now, with technology, people have seen the light.
The capital giants are also gearing up to actively explore "human transformation" technologies such as brain-computer interfaces, neural chips, and prosthetic body transformation, and prepare to take control of the future world at the moment when the technological singularity is crossed and newcomers appear.
An experimental video released by Musk in April 2021 showed that a modified monkey can play a simulated table tennis game through ideas
"Technology madman" Musk has invested a large sum of money to support the research and development of brain-computer connection microchips. Judging from his experimental video released in April 2021, the transformed monkeys can already play simulated table tennis games through ideas. According to his vision, the application of this technology to humans is already within reach. Perhaps as Jobs said: "The greatest innovation in the 21st century will be the combination of biology and technology, and a new era is beginning."
In the eyes of visionaries, the progress of biotechnology seems to point to a bright future , cure diseases, strengthen the body, and free people from the pain of life and death fatigue.
"Brave New World", published as early as 1932, has already imagined a "technical utopia", where society can realize the deep transformation of people through biotechnology: people are no longer conceived through mothers, but cultivated through test tubes; Man receives and expresses emotion by means of drugs and sensory organs; domination over man is achieved by seduction, not persecution. This is a "brave new world" free from conflict, pain, disease, and depression.
The breakthrough of biotechnology means a huge change in concept. Human nature is no longer the essential characteristic of human beings, nor is it limited by the classical morality of "body, hair, skin, and parents".
However, technological prospects such as artificial organs, prosthetic body transplantation, human cloning, and uploaded consciousness seem to vaguely arouse people's inner unease. Like Huxley's "Brave New World" sends chills down the spine. Behind the biological improvement, the integrity of human beings as a natural creature seems to be threatened. The more technology develops, the more people deviate from their own nature.
The transformation of people is like the problem of the "ship of Theseus" raised by the Greek writer Plutarch. If you replace the first plank, the ship will remain the same ship; The third piece, the fourth piece, the fifth piece... until all of them are replaced, is it still the original ship? It doesn't seem like it's the same boat anymore, but you know when it started, it wasn't the original boat anymore?
In the same way, think about the reinvented people in Cyberpunk Kerry. If you replace an arm, a leg, or a piece of internal organs, you will still be the original person. people. In this process, people know that there is a limit to transformation, but the limit can always be tested until the limit is really reached.
The breakthrough of biotechnology means a huge change in concept. Human nature is no longer the essential characteristic of human beings, nor is it limited by the classical morality of "body, hair, skin, and parents". Modern performance artists have long regarded the transformation of the body as a common method to explore humanity and human possibilities, and they experimented without any ideological burden.
In fact, the process of human denaturalization did not start with biotechnology. After the information revolution and the digital age started, human beings are already rushing in this direction. From the birth of the Internet at the end of the last century until now, it has realized the interconnection of all people and completed the basic steps of digitizing people. Afterwards, the metaverse came into being, and began to truly create a new digital world. It can indeed solve many practical problems, and its ideological support is just like what the scientific madman in "Pantheon" said: Think about it, The human world is full of so many sufferings, which are rooted in population explosion, resource scarcity, and environmental destruction. Once people can no longer rely on the natural conditions needed to nourish their biological nature, they can fundamentally solve their predicament.
On May 20, 2021, the Brain-Computer Interface Technology Application Research Project of the University of Pittsburgh in the United States stimulated the brain to evoke the sense of touch through a two-way brain-computer interface, improving the ability of the paralyzed to operate artificial limbs
That’s right, if people who are far from nature can be called new human beings, then new human beings can completely live in artificial landscapes and be indifferent to the original “natural” outside world, because people no longer need nature. In this way, in the digital world, people will become omnipotent supermen.
In other words, the result of this wave of digitalization may be to push people into a closed world composed entirely of people.
Only people are left.
class as physical seal
Once the conceptual barrier of "people need to maintain integrity" is broken, it means that technology can unimpededly transform and govern the human body. As a historical progress defined by technology, this kind of transformation of people will be promoted. power, thus having a real impact on human society.
It is no coincidence that the sci-fi works that focus on this theme all express pessimism about it. They often regard the transformation of the human body as a kind of alienation of people, and then strengthen it as a class consequence. A typical cyberpunk world: highly developed technology coexists with a highly miserable life.
In such a world, the transformation of people does not mean happiness. Transformed people usually live in a cold, damp, chaotic, and dirty underground world. Transforming their physical bodies is their way of breaking through class barriers and escaping from the underground. Just like in "Cyberpunk: Edgewalker", David, the homeless orphan after his mother died, went further and further on the road of transforming himself into a powerful violent machine out of a strong will to survive against the sky .
The transformation of the physical body no longer serves the perfection of human beings. The scientific ideals and technological capabilities that were originally intended to help people transcend limitations, in turn force laborers into a more complete alienation situation.
In "Alita: Battle Angel", the transformed people exist as playthings, and they are the bargaining chips for the upper class to play gambling games. Winning the game is the way for the lower class to go to the upper city of Salem suspended in the sky and start a new life. only chance.
What's more, in "Pantheon", the poor in the slums of India voluntarily become the experimental subjects of uploading consciousness, just to provide living space for their families. The engineer himself, who did not master the means of production and only had technology, was cut open by the boss of the group, and his consciousness was forcibly uploaded, becoming a tool for writing codes around the clock.
The pictures depicted in these works are all gloomy. The transformation of the physical body no longer serves the perfection of human beings. The scientific ideals and technological capabilities that are intended to help people transcend limitations, in turn, force laborers to fall into a more thorough depression. alienated situation.
The core problem is that the people in these works are firmly kidnapped by the identity of a "production unit", and the transformation of people by technology has resulted in the further transformation of people as an irreducible whole. Decomposition, the function of a single human organ, can be separated and strengthened individually to increase production efficiency. This almost goes to the extreme of "Taylorism".
Therefore, the powerful group that has mastered the means of production is precisely the one that has the least urgent need to transform itself.
At this time, the paradox of science and technology to people mentioned above is reflected in people's transformation of themselves. The transformation of human beings was initially driven by a concept of progress. However, the object of the transformation—the low-level people—was destroyed by technology in the process. The so-called progress, the so-called history, and the so-called meaning are seized by the powerful group that preserves their own integrity, and the people at the bottom have become a kind of non-historical and non-human existence. The inward exploration of human beings, with the help of science and technology, makes the class nature go from the social level to the biological level, and becomes the physical stamp of human beings.
Until here, people realized that the progress of history has been narrowed to one-dimensional progress of science and technology and material, and this one-way progress will actually be distorted by social reality including class. Confident anthropocentric optimism, that is, improperly placing technology in a dominant position that governs all aspects of human beings and human society, and measures human progress, may cause people to lose not only their meaning, but also their bodies and everything else. . The nothingness of human beings reminds human beings of being lost. If the history of progress is the result of human construction, then the progress of history itself is also illusory.
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