Man, Machine and the Future
We humans sit confidently in our position on the food chain, but we are quite inadequate in tooth and claw. We are really just master compensators, nothing more. We think of parasites as creepy-crawlies that sneak into us, but in reality, we are the most successful parasite on the planet. Ideas and opposable thumbs are all we have going for us. We grip things with our mind and grip them in our hands and then grip a whip and make things do the gripping for us. Humans think and manipulate, create things to create for us, or to think for us, or to take us places; we make everything do for us and rarely do completely for ourselves. We belong to a vast network of servants and their servants. In the book The Parasite, Michel Serres explains “Man milks the cow, makes the steer work, makes a roof from the tree; they have all decided who the parasite is. It is man. Everything is born for him, animals and beings.”(Serres). Serres demonstrates throughout his novel the parasitic nature of the world. The parasitic nature of the world isn’t simply a one way relationship but a triangular one. We are parasites, we create parasites, and we allow parasites to infect and depend on us.
The biggest source of promise threat actually lies in the parasites we spawn. Mankind shifts through technological eras. Each groundbreaking new innovation dramatically alters the way we all live. New methods of manipulating the Earth in our favor are discovered every century or so and the infection spreads from there. First, there was the Stone Age, around 4000 BC, when man discovered fire, language, the lever, water transportation and primitive stone weapons. While only a few of these technologies are used today, they propelled us into the Bronze Age. In this age, language evolved into writing, fire lead to the welding of metal weapons, etcetera. Humans then shift through the Iron Age, then the Medieval, the Renaissance and Colonial, then to the Industrial Revolution. Now the Industrial Revolution, where we would have been safe to stop at, gave us Mass Production, steam power, railroads, dynamite, repeating handguns and direct current power (“Technology Eras”). This era, the dawn of the machine, gave humans the power to breed and destroy on a level unheard of in the centuries prior. According to the Population Reference Bureau: “[in the last] 50 years, [the] world population multiplied more rapidly than ever before, and more rapidly than it is projected to grow in the future. In 1950, the world had 2.5 billion people; and in 2005, the world had 6.5 billion people. By 2050, this number could rise to more than 9 billion” (Population Reference Bureau). This was caused mainly by modern medicine, agriculture and mass production and is being sustained by the same. But as technology continues to sustain us, the planet is being used up at a faster and faster rate. What we have depended on thus far cannot fend off certain destruction forever. Looking toward technology to solve a problem it caused could be the equivalent of standing near microwaves to burn off cancer.
This new relationship, like those of previous technological eras, is riddled with positive and negative side effects. Sadly, the negative impacts are less under our control than we would love to believe. Like any meme (replicating nonorganisms), they are self-replicating. They replicate according to demand and it’s done selfishly and ruthlessly. The positives that come with the information age depend a great deal on the wielder, who wields what and how it’s used by the consumer are major influences. Technology can aide mankind in curing diseases, solving complex mathematical formulas, extend human life, store and transmit information, help people communicate around the world, develop sustainable energy, convenience our lives, help create jobs and much more.
As with any parasitic relationship, there are plenty of negative side effects that come with our dependency on technology. Many man-made conveniences have moved from convenience to necessity. For example, while it appears on the surface that cars make our lives easier, what of vehicle dependency? It’s convenient to get in your car and drive to work right? But what about before we had cars? As Theodore Kaczynski, PhD beautifully explains: “since the introduction of motorized transport the arrangement of our cities has changed in such a way that the majority of people no longer live within walking distance of their place of employment, shopping areas and recreational opportunities, so they HAVE to depend on the automobile for transportation, or else they must use public transportation, in which case they have even less control over their movement than when driving a car.” (Kaczynski) The dependency was an invention. Cars, as if intelligently, forced us to create and be enslaved by them. This shows how conveniences become requirements and our inventions, like parasites we birthed, force us to be their breeding devises.
All this correlates to the film Shivers, where a mad scientist, of sorts, engineers a parasite that can take the function of a failing human organ, completely taking its place. Awesome right? But what if the parasite leaves? The host can’t simply return to his or her previous life. What if it wants its own life? What if it takes your humanity all together? This is how technology negatively impacts us. We become reliant on it, unable to go back to the way life was before infection. You don’t need something until you have and lose it. Like the car or the cell phone, etcetera, it becomes a manufactured necessity.
The other grand super-organism that needs to be put under the microscope is the internet and social networking sites such as Plurk, Facebook, and Myspace. The internet is the greatest information network in the world, which gives the user a web of information at their fingertips. But as something’s cause depends on the wielder, a powerful tool can become a powerful weapon. What of the rise of internet addiction? Let’s say heroin costs a user, let’s call him or her You, thirty-five dollars for a month supply through this sketchy guy named Comcast (he lives just passed the mall, you’ve probably met him). The user has to use it every day and will some time do it for days on end, without eating or sleeping or leaving the house. The user doesn’t have to use it all the time, but he/she just need a taste every day. Now replace heroin with internet and Comcast with some better internet provider—is there much of a difference? Internet addiction is on the rise and it’s negatively influencing the lives of many. According to a recent study done by the American Academy of Pediatrics, internet addiction among children and teenagers is becoming a serious issue. It’s leading to internet cravings, isolation, depression, and interfering with social life, which are all synonymous symptoms of drug addiction. (Waldron)
What of those people who rely on social networking sites to create their self worth? You can have a hundred friends on Facebook but not have a single friend in the real world. You can reach nirvana on Plurk, but be in perceptual limbo in the waking world. Our avatars (your virtual self) can be out living the really kick ass life we couldn’t dream of. Artificial satisfaction leads to artificial pleasure which leads to all too real depression. A recent study done by researchers at the International Center for Media and the Public Agenda at the University of Maryland found, in a study of 200 college students, when their electronic devises were taken away they were “not only unwilling, but functionally unable to be without their media links to the world.” (Jindal) In follow up surveys, the students also used words that parallel those of drug dependency. (Jindal)
Our online self parallels a Futurama episode all too well. In episode two of season three the planet express crew stops at a truck stop in space to fill up on the way to deliver a package. Fry eats an egg sandwich from the bathroom and is infected with worms. Instead of destroying Fry like the traditional tapeworm, the worms make their home more comfortable and ensure it will remain a stable home for years to come. They make him super smart, strong, charming and charismatic. Leela falls in love with him for this—everything he is not, his artificial new self, his avatar if you will. At first he was excited. Excitement turned to frustrated depression as his newly intelligent self realized Leela hadn’t fallen in love with him at all. She loved the worms. If this happened exactly like this, most of us would probably choose to keep the worms, but as a metaphor, the worm infestation parallels the social networks infestation. You eat a dirty egg sandwich and are infected with this cool new persona. Online, we can take glory shots for our profile pictures (or lie all together for that matter). We can become a double-chin-less God with way cool “interests” and attributes and have sex with cheerleaders through Facebook applications. Then what of our host self, the pale flabby puppet master, stuck inside behind the computer, in the dark, controlling the Marionette of your virtual you.
I use these examples not to outright condemn technology, but to bring attention to it. We are getting dangerously close to something without thinking about all the repercussions. Mankind and machine are in an interesting position. They need us to build them and we need them to survive. Together, we are a self-sustaining cancer of this planet. We need technology and it needs us, but the whole symbiotic process barely uses the tapping source. Our paper currency doesn’t even stand for the gold that was once mined in its representation, and the unreplenishable planet can now be bought with plastic. We must be careful not to let the intruder write the story for us. While losing ourselves to technology is a purely personal issue on its own, it’s the fact that our actions are destroying the world we do still rely on that makes this everybody’s problem.
Now what we humans need to do is evaluate our parasitic relationship with technology. As technology advances faster and faster, forcing us to rely on more and more, we need to get our priorities straight. We need to weed out the unhealthy parts of the relationship and allow the healthy to replicate. Now for the good news, techno-memes replicate according to demand, and until we demand practically, our future looks empty, stifled and void. We know this. It doesn’t build itself yet and it doesn’t seek and destroy humans like so many over done sci-fi movies. We need to rebuild a level symbiotic relationship with us, technology and the Earth, so this era, the most potentially destructive or creative era can shift safely into the next.
Works Consulted:
Jindal Neha . "Cell phone, internet addiction on rise among teens--study." The Med Guru. a7 April. 2010.
Michel, Serres. The Parasite. Minnesota: Univ Of Minnesota Press, 2007.
Population Reference Bureau. “World Population Growth, 1950–2050.” PRB, 2008. WEB. 29 Apr 2010.
Shivers. Screenplay by David Cronenberg. Dir David Cronenberg. Perf. Paul Hampton, Joe Silver, Lynn Lowry, Allan Kolman, Susan Petrie.Image Entertainment. 1976.
Waldron, Heather. "Internet addiction a real problem for U.S. kids". American Academy of Pediatrics. 27 Apr. 2010
Kaczynski, Theodore PhD. “Unabomber Manifesto.” Newshare.com. 29 Apr. 1010. < http://www.newshare.com/Newshare/Common/News/manifesto.html>
Saul-Gershenz, Leslie S. "Phoretic nest parasites use sexual deception to obtain transport to their host's nest." 38. 14039-14044 (2006) 27 April 2010.
"Technology Eras". igeneral. 28 April 2010
