Man is a curious animal. Thinking and being curious is a function of man’s immortal soul. Our curious nature is what makes us superior as compared to animals and machines. The opening sequence of the film 2001:A Space Odyssey, projects this very nature that has been a part of us since the beginning of time. In a world that is ruled by apes, one particular group discovers a mysterious rectangular monolith near their home, which imparts upon them the knowledge of tool use, and enables them to evolve into people. Man has always been coupled with technology to carry out activities and survive. We have in a way reached a point where technology is not a separate entity to aid our activities, but has become a part of us. The relation we share with technology is very different from what it was even 25 years ago. I am a part of the generation that grew up to the Internet, ipod’s, iPhone’s and robotic pets. The Internet changed the way information is exchanged and the iPhone redefined our relationship with our phones. Robotic pets are a topic of common discussion and many people are moving towards adopting robotic pets as compared to real animals. How then do we define what is real and what is artificial.
The more the essence of humans is sought, the more the lines between human and non-human blurs.[1] Teresa Haffernan made this observation during her attempts to ‘improve’ the human through ‘Artificial Intelligence.’ Although John McCarthy coined this term in 1956, Alan Turing’s famous paper ‘Computing Machinery and Intelligence’ and particularly its section on the Imitation Game, have resonated throughout the world of Artificial Intelligence (AI). This, without doubt, is the most significant publication in the entire history of AI.[2] The Imitation Game, also known as the Turing Test discussed in this paper, demonstrates the machines ability to demonstrate intelligence. As scary as it sounds, I think we are headed in that direction.
The movies we watch in the cinema are only a reflection of the thoughts, ideas and experiments conducted by scientists, philosophers and artists. Rick Deckard uses the concept of the Turing Test to identify the clones from the humans in Riddley Scotts much acclaimed film Blade Runner. Human nature and human capacity to grasp reality are questions that are posed to a society that is dominated by digital technology. The psychological implications of films such as Blade Runner, Terminator and now Avatar are proof of the studies that are being conducted. After the release of Avatar, CNN created a wave when it published the article ‘Audiences experience Avatar Blues.[3] People are actually depressed that they live in the world that is a result of their own harvest. Videos are uploaded on YouTube by a group of young people who paint their bodies blue and role-play the film.[4] Simply watching the video and listening to them talk informs us of how distorted their vision of reality is. Avatar is considered fictional world depicted on the big screen. It becomes a problem when we allow fiction to affect us and want to make it reality. We fail to see the big picture, to understand the underlying message in the film. We take it at face value and bring it into our ‘real’ lives. People are not disturbed by things, but by the view they take of them.[5] That’s when the line between what is real and fiction is blurred.
As we try to understand what our purpose of life is and sharpen the line between real and fiction, we are not only experimenting with our surroundings but have also started experimenting on ourselves. From being as analog as painting one’s body the color blue to ‘relive’ Avatar to the other extreme of connecting our bodies to machines and becoming a hybrid, man is trying it all.
One such hybrid that I recently became aware of are the cyborgs. The term ‘Cyborgs’ was coined in 1960, when Manfred Clynes and Nathan Kline used it in an article about the advantages of self-regulating human-machine systems in outer space.[6] This term was used to describe an organism that has both artificial and natural systems. In Donna Haraway’s words
Cyborgs came into being when boundaries – particularly those between animals and humans or between self-controlled, self-governing machines and organisms – become blurred.[7]
Sounds familiar? The film industry does it again. Such organisms are constantly projected in Hollywood films such as Spiderman, Terminator and Blade Runner. In more than half of the science fiction films that are released every year, technology is projected as being politically, environmentally and socially disastrous. For example, in Avatar, Robots controlled by humans are used against the Na’vi tribes. Another example is the film Spiderman. The character Dr. Otto Octavius is initially an obsessed and brilliant scientist. When involved in a freak scientific accident, he becomes the dangerous Doctor Octopus. This character is inspired from the concept of cyborgs and is portrayed as a threat to mankind. It almost feels like he directors of Terminator felt the need to show a cyborg that is not all that bad and decided to make Terminator 2. While Terminator 3 in a way informs us that only metal can cut another metal, a cyborg is required to destroy the other. I find it very interesting that in spite of repeated reminders of the adverse effects of technology, we continue to move towards a future that will lead us to a dead end at some point.
It is common knowledge that as humans we use only a minute percentage of our brain capacity. Using machines to upgrade humans is in a way trying to use our brain to its fullest capacity, if that is even possible and If human will be able to handle that level of intelligence? Is that why we continue to experiment irrespective of what the result might be? Technology, in a lot of ways, provides a very seductive way to extend ones abilities and senses. Are we that mesmerized by the seduction that has resulted in the line becoming a blur?
Characters such as Dr. Octopus do not live only in the world of cinema. It almost feels like these characters are trying to mimic scientists and artists who are experimenting on themselves in their quest to becoming that hybrid, a cyborg. One such cyborg STELARC[8], an Australian based performance artist whose work explores and extends the relationship between the human body and machines. While designers write about how a style today becomes obsolete tomorrow, STEALRC makes, what I think is a bold and provocative statement, ‘The Body is Obsolete’[9]. Even if one had to visit the artist’s website, I personally feel it is a very disturbing experience. In a way he justifies his actions and thoughts by stating that as humans we have always been coupled with technology. However, what we are forgetting is that initially technology was a means to an end, a means to simplify our living conditions. It was only a matter of time that technology became a norm and we are now completely dependent on it.
Another example is Prof. Kevin Warwick, a Professor of Cybernetics at the University of Reading. Prof. Warwick used himself as a guinea pig and connected technological implants to his central nervous system, in his quest to enhance human capabilities and to become the worlds first Cyborg. Correction! first human to become a Cyborg. This hybrid between the natural and the mechanical has been tested on apes before and has been successful in the past
While on one hand we have STELARC and Prof. Kevin Warwick for whom the line between humans and non-humans is blurred, on the other hand we have MIT students such as Pranav Mistry who are trying to push boundaries and redefine the line while keeping it sharp and visible. Pranav Mistry, invented what he calls the ‘Sixth Sense’.[10] The idea behind this device is to use gestures and translate the information into a digital substrate to further our knowledge. We are no longer confined to a particular physical space and a computer, but we now carry the digital substrate with us everywhere.
Apple also pushed boundaries to a large extent with its iPhone. We do not use the phone only to communicate, but for a million other reasons. Apple’s slogan – ‘There is an app for everything’ says it all. We have almost forgotten what the world was without an iPhone. Applications such as iCry Translator translate a baby’s cry and inform the mother what the baby needs.[11] Personally I find this shocking. Understanding a baby’s needs comes instinctively to a mother. Now we need a digital substrate to tell us what our baby needs. What’s next? iBlink to tell us that we need to blink or iBreathe to tell us that we need to breathe. In a way it make me wonder if people designing these applications for the iPhone are blurring the line, maybe not the same way as the cyborgs, but in the same direction that might result in something unexpected.
A vision that many scientists continue to have is a world in which robots and machines will take over, a time when machines will have intelligence more powerful than that of humans and when machines will make the important decisions. As humans we are comfortable with being the most superior race, however, we seem to be in a spot where we are now competing with machines and it almost feels like it is becoming our fight for survival and our fight to remain the superior being. This can be considered as a very male chauvinistic attitude. However, to a feminist, it is inappropriate, eccentric and only natural to distrust any new technology endangering the bodily integrity of the women. To the religious, it is not acceptable and to the spiritual it might be considered as an act of paying for our own karmas, i.e. paying for our own past doings. However, the existentialists would say, we make our selves what we want to be’.
To an existentialist, If Man is, then man becomes the creator, preserver and the destroyer. We created machines to preserve ourselves, which in turn has backfired and is destroying us, in a lot of ways. If Man is, then man as an individual has freedom, Freedom of expression and Freedom of choice. Each individual decides for himself what is right from wrong. There are no set rules and everything becomes subjective. With freedom comes responsibility. Freewill results in a lot of anguish, which has a direct impact on the world we are a part of. This accumulated anguish forbids man to become a leader. Is man ready to bear the burden of such responsibility where our decisions and actions have a direct affect on mankind simply by ruling God out of our lives?
Our tomorrow is the encounter of our today. Scientists and artists like STELARC and Prof. Kevin Warwick seem to be only the tip of the iceberg. By catering to their sense of freedom and self-expression they are reinventing the forms of artistic expression, communication, stimulation and the meaning of being human. They are responsible for their actions and their actions will result in an affect on mankind – positive or negative.
[1] Afterword, The Human in the PostHuman, N. Katherine Hayles, www.jstor.org
[2] Robots Unlimited, Life in a Virtual Age, by David Levy, Page 40.
[3]http://www.cnn.com/2010/SHOWBIZ/Movies/01/11/avatar.movie.blues/index.html
[4] http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yk2vR8w2sjc
[5] http://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/authors/e/epictetus_3.html
[6] http://www.scribd.com/doc/2962194/Cyborgs-and-Space-Clynes-Kline?autodown=pdf
[7] The Ethics of Hybrid Subjects: Feminist Constructivism According to Donna Haraway, by Baukje Prins, Page 352, www.jstor.com
[8] http://www.stelarc.va.com.au/arcx.html
[9] http://www.stelarc.va.com.au/arcx.html
[10]http://www.ted.com/talks/lang/eng/pranav_mistry_the_thrilling_potential_of_sixthsense_technology.html
[11] http://www.crytranslator.com/
