Steve Smith wrote at 01/15/2013 05:43 PM:
a fatally wrong assumption underneath: that "we" can be distinguished
from "technology". I'm pretty sure we've covered this ground as well.
I can sum it up with the aphorism:
"The problem with communication is the illusion that it exists."
My turn to be puzzled. Is this a non-sequitur?
Well, _I_ don't think so. But many others have accused me of committing
non sequiturs on a regular basis. That's the trouble with thoughts
(including logic), you could rightly accuse me of the fallacy if the
progression in your own head is missing some pieces. But that does not
mean the progression in my head is missing any pieces. In the end, it
all boils down to the axiom of choice (the discretization of concepts).
In any case, my point is that communication is supposed to occur by the
reification of the thoughts of the sender into a medium and the
reconstruction of those same (or similar _enough_) thoughts inside the
receiver.
The reification into the medium is _invention_, specifically the
creation of a tool. But I'm arguing that an inventor's tools are merely
abused if used by another who is dissimilar enough. The conclusion is
that communication between dissimilar people does not exist. The
application is that guns and 3D printers are natural to some and
unnatural to others. [*]
I do agree that since Homo Habilis (or even earlier) that our phenotype
has been extended by the technology which we have developed and/or
mastered. We can only separate ourselves from our technology in that we
*can* choose what technology we pursue development of and what
technology we adopt once developed. We can choose it for ourselves, but
I contend, not for each other (the crux of gun control).
I try to be empathetic when I read e-mails. But I am driven to point
out that the way you use that language picks at me. You say "our
phenotype has been extended by the technology". But I mean "we are our
technology". I.e. technology is as much a part of us as, say, eyeballs
or arms.
I don't follow this entirely, but I do agree with the gist of it. While
I may sound like a Luddite of the highest order, I'm not. I'm merely
caught in what I perceive to be a paradox which I think effects us all
once we consider it.
Perhaps a more formal statement of the paradox would help?
This is precisely what I'm trying to illuminate:
1. To make and use tools is irreversibly our nature.
Agreed.
2. Our tools and toolmaking is on the verge of facilitating our
self-extinction.
I disagree. I would agree to a softer, more neutral statement, though
... something like this: Our tools and toolmaking can and do
participate in both positive and negative feedback loops that inhibit
and facilitate our survival.
3. We have choices in *how* we extend our phenotype but no methodology for
That seems unfinished. Perhaps you mean "...for choosing"? I think I
disagree to some extent, as I'll address below.
The last century has shown a quantitative and perhaps qualitative (with
the introduction of stored code/data computing machinery) acceleration
in our toolmaking. Our "tools" for addressing items 2 and 3 above are
fairly limited. They appear to be combinations of religious zealotry
and corruption fueled lobbying and lawmaking.
I definitely disagree with this. I don't see any acceleration. (I
don't buy the "singularity" or "Abundance" rhetoric either.) What I do
see is an accelerating _awareness_ of the effects of our infestation of
the earth. Our toolmaking should (and I think does, though I have no
serious evidence) track tightly with our biological evolution. So, if
there is an acceleration, we should see a correlate in the acceleration
of our biological evolution.
A more likely speculation is that, as we increase in population density,
it becomes more and more (combinatorally) obvious what effect any one of
us (mostly others, but ourselves for the more reflective amongst us) has
on their environment. E.g. the fact that my neighbors' houses are so
damned close to my house makes me very aware of when they use their leaf
blower.
The acceleration in toolmaking you perceive is really caused by
collective behavior, an order or more beyond the making of tools. In
other words, these collectively produced artifacts are not tools (by my
definition) because they don't really serve any pass-through purpose.
In many cases, they have become ends in themselves.
This can be considered a pathology. E.g. A CEO whose objective is
simply to _grow_ a company. If that's the case, the company (a human
created artifact) is no longer a tool. It's now an end in and of
itself, at least to that CEO. But it might also be considered healthy
in some circumstances.
In any case, I don't see an increase in our toolmaking so much as an
increase in our awareness of the impacts of our toolmaking.
Ultimately, what technology we develop and use is a personal choice,
even if we want to dictate or legislate it for others, the nature of
technology is no longer easy to control and in many cases, the
*individual* is becoming capable of developing and executing amazing
technological feats without the aid (permission) of society at large.
As I said after #3 above, I disagree somewhat. The extent to which we
have a choice in our toolmaking is debatable. I think Nick's been the
champion of evidence showing that our feelings are are really the after
effects of our behavior. Analogously, we can the same way about free
will and the choices we actually have or don't have. To what extent do
we really have a choice in which tools we develop?
[*] The problems come when we have unrealistic impressions of ourselves.
Most of the yahoos I met at the gun show two weekends ago _think_ guns
are natural for them. But I think they're wrong. My guess is that a
large percentage of those people are completely incompetent handling guns.
