Technology has an unmatched potential to fundamentally change our world and ourselves. Nothing, so it seems, will be spared from a digital make-over. Whether it be algorithmic optimization or complete deference to thinking things that are thought to be better at something than us fallible humans, experts on technology and all its related fields are growing increasingly confident that there is little, if anything, that will be spared a digital makeover within the next few decades.
One of the most enthusiastic proponents of such an ideology is Ray Kurzweil—a fascinating mind I’ve been following for a few years now. Kurzweil seems to understand technology and its potential better than any other expert on the topic. He has consistently predicted technological advances with amazing and somewhat frightening accuracy. His most radical prediction is that of an ensuing Singularity—a point where humans will merge with digital machines and the whole universe will return to a state of hyper-intelligent unity. How’s that for a science-fiction thriller? Kurzweil is currently the Director of Engineering at Google and shouldn’t be hard to find more information on. I highly recommend all of his books, ideally read in chronological order. But be warned, you will likely be so persuaded by his intelligence, wit, and ability to make highly scientific arguments sound commonsensical that any opponent to his position will easily slip into seeming like a lunatic. So be critical and don’t get over-enthusiastic. (Of course, part of the reason I mention this is that I am about to challenge some of his ideas.)
Though I admire Kurzweil’s intelligence and unbelievable breadth and depth in thought and intuition, I think we should be more careful and reluctant. I don’t think we should so easily give up on the idea that there are some things outside the reach of technology—some things that are uniquely human. Kurzweil argues that all the things we think are uniquely human are really just products of intelligence—which would necessarily surrender the position that there are things, some of the most valuable things known to humans, outside the reach of artificial intelligence and thus a technological make-over.
I, for one, don’t think intelligence, by itself, is sufficient for the creation of the most valuable things we have: art, literature, poetry, philosophy, and so forth. In fact, it seems that all the things that make a human life worth living are outside the reach of technology, in the sense that authentic experience by biological human beings is necessary. That is to say, as long as technology is unable to have access to the energetic and emotional experiences that make a human being human, artificial intelligence will lack the raw material for the creation of transcendental and meaningful things--the things that make life worth living.
To clarify, I think that there are two components to art: one can be thought of as the raw material of everything transcendental like art and philosophy and the other as the means for communicating that raw material. The first is the energetic and emotional experience that running on biological hardware entails. This direct and necessary relation to the physical worlds effectively ties us to nature and thus gives us access to all its sublime. Without this raw material, songwriters would have nothing meaningful to write about, painters nothing meaningful to paint, writers nothing meaningful to write about. In short, there would be no art or other forms of transcendental creativity.
The second part of the equation is intelligence. Human intelligence is in some important way disconnected from the physical world despite being grounded in biology. Artificial intelligence, however, does not have this direct biological grounding. Kurzweil seems to think that intelligence does not require any direct biological relation (i.e., grounding in the physical world) with the physical world to create art and other manifestations of the sublime. In other words, Kurzweil does not think that what humans perceive as meaning has a necessary connection to our biological roots. I, however, disagree. I think that intelligence without any necessary biological relation to the physical world and thus nature is missing the raw materials for creating transcendental artifacts and can thus only create things void of meaning—precisely the meaning which the intelligent part of our being, namely the mind, then communicates to other minds through packaging these energetic and emotional states in shells we call art, literature, philosophy, and so forth.
Though I am quite certain I am at least picking up on a chunk of truth here, what if I am mistaken? What if there really is nothing more to things like art, literature, and philosophy than plain and potentially artificial intelligence? Look, even if that turns out to be true, I think we should still be reluctant to surrender the idea that being human is nothing other than being intelligent. Moreover, I think we have reason to hold on, as tightly as we can, to the idea that we, as human beings with all our transcendental creations like art, literature, and philosophy are at least partially outside the reach of the complete digitization of our world and ourselves.
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