Editor's Blog
Emergent technologies often inspire great excitement attended by utopic visions of how they will transform our lives for the better. Yet all innovations introduce risk and the likelihood of unforeseen consequences. The transhumanity stack of technologies – life extension, medical & genetic modification, brain-computer & brain-machine interface, and virtual & augmented realities – offer great opportunities for human enhancement but pose profound risks for all aspects of humanity & civilization. It is critical to confront these dangers and temper the enthusiasm of tranhumanism with diligent risk assessment and thorough scenario modeling for possible outcomes.
Emergent technologies often inspire great excitement attended by utopic visions of how they will transform our lives for the better. Yet all innovations introduce risk and the likelihood of unforeseen consequences. The transhumanity stack of technologies – life extension, medical & genetic modification, brain-computer & brain-machine interface, and virtual & augmented realities – offer great opportunities for human enhancement but pose profound risks for all aspects of humanity & civilization. It is critical to confront these dangers and temper the enthusiasm of tranhumanism with diligent risk assessment and thorough scenario modeling for possible outcomes.
To wit, here are 5 scenarios that explore the possible dangers embedded within transhumanism. This is, of course, by no means an exhaustive list but is simply intended to encourage further risk analysis. Most or all have probably been addressed by others elsewhere, and this list is not intended as a criticism of those presently active in the transhumanity community.
1. Population growth from longevity & senescence studies
Life extension looks great from an individual or group perspective but it’s a resource nightmare from a national and global angle. Current human population is about 6.8 billion with most linear estimates projecting somewhere around 9 billion by 2050. If life extension is designed to be readily available to anyone & everyone, we can expect two outcomes: considerable population growth as longevity outpaces mortality, and a rise in global GDP and its commensurate resource consumption as working age extends towards the centenarian. People living longer means people will consume more in the course of their lifetimes. Consider the competition for resources & ecological carrying capacity we currently face in 2010 and roll that forward 40 years with a massive global population and members of the workforce that can potentially stay employed for 70 years….
2. Inequity of technology distribution — the Transhuman Gap
The flip-side of the resource consumption issue arises if we admit that transhuman technologies will not be evenly available to all; that socio-economic factors will gate who has access to technologies that extend human capabilities. In this context, population dynamics will not be appreciably influenced by human life extension as only a small subset of the populace will have access to such enhancement. Indeed, genetic modification, brain-computer interface, advanced prosthesis, and access to virtual & augmented realities are all presently gated by economic barriers to entry that are not likely to diminish any time soon. AR & VW’s may become ubiquitous & cheap but real human enhancement through interventionary technologies will mostly fall along class lines, giving rise to a wealthy tier of augmented & enhanced individuals. If only the wealthy are most able to afford enhancement, the socioeconomic divide will be reinforced by the Transhuman Gap, further disenfranchising those already at a competitive disadvantage by their class circumstances. From such economic disparity, reinforced by the inevitable moralizing and judgments from both sides of the gap, social cohesion will be further challenged and class distinctions will begin to take on a biomechanical & genetic aspect with the threat of technology-enabled superiority.
3. Techno-elitism, civil discord, and eugenics
Throughout history elite classes have used their status & abilities to influence the control systems that govern those beneath them. Likewise, the underclass has looked at elites with both admiration & disdain, occasionally rising to join their ranks but, more often, rising up to knock them down. Civil strife is a common outcome of disparity, driven by inequities in access to resources, opportunities, and power. A class of techno-elite transhumans would pose a profound existential threat to the underclass who might very well perceive themselves as being forever cut-out from the Democratic ideal that “all humans are created equal”, no longer able to compete in any capacity without transhuman enhancements. The anger and victimization from such an outlook would very quickly translate into moralizing against the crimes of human augmentation and stigmatizing those who pursue such “un-natural” and “un-holy” enhancement. In turn, the techno-elite may feel inclined to judge the underclass as “unfit” or “un-evolved” – two distinctions that have historically led to great atrocities.
4. Co-option of transhumanity by fascists, oligarchs, and super-empowered individuals
The slippery slope of this scenario posits the rise of a transhuman ruling class who, when challenged by the underclass, recede into their own sense of authority & enhanced intelligence to determine that the only appropriate course of action is to subjugate the masses and shepherd the rise of transhuman governance. If transhuman enhancement is truly advantageous, yet remains available only to an elite class, then in all likelihood those elites will embrace the technology to their competitive advantage. Since it would be folly to assume that human technological enhancement will remediate our most basest evolutionary program of survival of the fittest, the likelihood of enhanced predatory elites seizing global power is not so small. The darkest scenario might see transhuman governance requiring control & tracking implants in all newborns – perhaps a bit hyperbolic but not inconceivable if the type of global predators that currently traverse societies gained access to advanced transhuman technologies.
5. Fractured reality
Virtual worlds and augmented reality offer many compelling experiences across the spectrum of entertainment, socialization, marketing & advertising, collaboration, and modern knowledge work. At their core, these technologies intermediate our experience of the world, giving third parties access to program our sensorium. Brain-computer interface technologies are working to extend this access to the core structures of our brain, kicking off a wave of neurotechnologies able to more specifically & accurately influencing the mind-brain interface. The opt-in path through designer reality gives us the ability to modify the way we interface with the phenomenal world, electing to commit more of our selves to virtual experiences & relationships, or to overlay our environments with the images of our choosing rather than confront the physical world solely on its terms. While affinity groups will accrete around specific worlds & layers the barriers between differing experiences of objective reality will multiply when the world I experience is markedly different than yours. As the Transhuman Gap threatens social cohesion through class, reality design threatens cohesion across all classes by erecting virtual constructions between adjacent-but-unrelated digital worlds. While we may feel a sense of agency in creating such personalized experiences we do so in digital layers most likely owned by 3rd parties or accessible through public APIs. We may inadvertently wall ourselves off from each other but we’ll become even richer targets for profilers, influencers, and governors. The slippery slope in this scenario suggests that governance might enforce realities onto subjects or that dangerous identity groups might create monstrous, all-encompassing layers as indoctrination tools & neuro-propaganda towards the engineering of social movements. Considering how supremely the television has been used to influence the masses with only basic access to eyes and ears, it’s not unlikely that greater access into the transhuman will yield a greater ability to influence and manipulate.
Again, these scenarios are not meant as accusations or designed to arouse a fear of transhumanism but, rather, to encourage critical thinking along the dystopic possibilities of the future transhuman phase space, as it were, in order to better control for such outcomes. As the saying goes, all technology is inherently neutral. But this glib statement does not acknowledge that all technology is born of humanity and wielded by our hands alone. To paraphrase a great modern philosopher, all of the animals are capably murderous.
Chris Arkenberg is a researcher, forecaster, strategist, and systems geek, working to help people & organizations understand & prepare for the complexities of the modern world. His online personae are
collected at http://urbeingrecorded.com. He is currently coordinating the 2nd annual Augmented Reality Development Camp.
45 Comments
Most likely it will be all of the above, and more. Just take modern problems like terrorism, social collapse, corporate rule, enviromental decay, government corruption and multiply it by force of future technologies. Just imagine terrorist with “grey goo” bomb or Google-style megacorp that literally owns your brain and everything inside. Technology will lead to mankind’s death. Or fate worse than death.
These scenarios are all connected – growth of population leads to depletion of resources (formerly nature), it leads to new social stratification based on enhanced/non-enhanced and that leads to new era of world history governed by superevilhumans. It is like some catastrophic, postapocalyptic movie or game, but who knows whats about to come in the end?
These are the reasons that we trans-humanists need to be much more vocal about transhumanism. I believe that we need to fight to make the benefits of technology a human right. I believe the only way that this can be achieved is,that we get the scientists in the frontline to be heard, the only way that this will happen is if we can get the populace to stop focusing on unimportant issues. The battle is for the focus of the peoples. And this is of course just my opinion, and I’m not trying to pretend to know everything.
>we get the scientists in the frontline to be heard
They tend to disgregard flaws of their design both because of euphoria and pragmaticism. You don’t expect GMO-producing megacorp saying bad things about GMO, do you? Science didn’t made our lives better, and, in long term, it’s gonna kill us – or worse. We need to go back to the good old ways. Otherwise, we are extinct.
We differ greatly on the definition of a “right.” Speaking for myself, I don’t support any philosophy of “claim rights” (as opposed to “liberty rights”). The enforcement of claim rights requires an oppressively powerful government to enforce what liberty, property and labor must be taken from one person in order to accommodate the claim of another. I’m of the view that the only way to close a technological divide is from the bottom-up, not from a top-down, government enforced solution of claim rights. All liberty rights have had to be fought for from the bottom-up, against government oppression.
The problem is there is not much to be vocal about. Transhumanism does not address those mostly social problems. It’s restricted to techno-worshipping. Good slogan btw. – “Technology is the right”.
Except these movies and games were made in happy and rich society, so they are pretty optimistic. Reality will be far worse than any dystopian techno-horror we ever saw.
Luddism is the only logical solution. Sure, carefully controlled tech is a good alternative, but in modern chaotic world, this opportunity is lost already. The only way out is to go back. Ludd was right.
Without government who would prevent corporations from making friends with each other and building monopoly? Besides somebody should protect nature, build particle colliders and many other things. There are areas where market doesn’t work at all.
>against government oppression.
Government cannot “oppress” you any more than hydraulic press can “oppress” you. Government is the machine in the hands of those who own it. Who owns it? Corporations. And who owns corporations. Some old rich white males, very specific ones. This libertarian bullshit is just an excuse to let these not-so-nice people own your ass.
One might argue that the “good old ways” were never actually good to begin with. You could say that historically, there has always been more suffering than life in general was worth. Unless that can be turned around profoundly, risks of extinction or disruptions of social order can be preferable to the perpetuation of the “good old” status quo.
A more serious concern could be the possibility of enhanced torture techniques – or of successful space colonization without successful bioethical abolitionism, resulting in uncounted trillions of additional beings suffering involuntarily.
Actually, as extensive research into monopolies has clearly identified– they rarely occur without either the explicit or implicit approval of governments. In practice the decision on whether to enforce anti-trust law is based in part on strategic alignment of interests with government, as is M&A activity. Further, the acquisition and contracting of governments — currently in a crisis situation in the U.S. in the view of many — either absolutely requires or strongly favors supporting monopoly, duopoly, or oligopoly, despite amazingly in recent years that they are acting directly opposing the interests of the nation the government is charged to defend and protect. As for collusion — any senior level exec or strategist competing in dominated tech markets is faced with both formal strategic partnerships– they are everywhere– and invisible collusion in the marketplace, which is probably both verbalized and silent– just very difficult to prosecute even when one finds the rare prosecutor and admin willing to do so.
This a paraphrase of a statement made by Ray Kurzweil, “This technology is coming whether you like it or not, there is a need for world wide discussions of the impacts of such technologies.”. I could’ve really screwed that statement up but, i think it is still very astute. I also think that if we as a people don’t focus on solutions for these issues, we are almost gauranteed dystopian results. I personally believe that our society as it is now, could not handle the consequences of such incredible powers. The singularity if brought about without proper examination, will probably strengthen many of the world’s problems. I look forward to going beyond human capabilities, what I don’t look forward to is a heavier foot being upon the throats of the victims of this current society. But what do I know I’m just an idealistic 21 year old.
This is an interesting area of study. I will link to this on my blog.
carlos
“Good old” is a relative matter. Hardships of low-tech age were quite bad, but that were hardships we humans evolved for: they were tolerable and, in the end, necessary to keep us evolving as species. Or at least not devolving.
As for space colonization – not gonna happen. Space program was a Cold War leftover, a relic of romantic age. The only nation with functional manned space capability left today is Russia – and, hey, we are talking about 60 years old Soyuz capsule here.
>The singularity if brought about without proper examination, will probably strengthen many of the world’s problems.
My point exactly. Imagine G.W.Bush or Larry Page with godlike powers. We think corporate rule is bad, wait till you see cyberpunk-style megacorps. Which own your brain and download ads directly into your subconsciousness. Or nanochips in your cortex that can track everything you do – and even everything you think. And can be used to remotely controlled you – like a meat puppet. Future gonna suck. Orwell’s “1984″ will look like a paradise.
>they rarely occur without either the explicit or implicit approval of governments
Because governments are weak and are easily taken over by corporations.
And when governments are strong (like in China, Russia, India, other Asian countries, etc), they explicitly create state monopolies to decrease costs.
In any case, you get centralization and monopolies. Asian way is more effective – relative perfomance of China compared to USA speaks for itself. On the other hand, Western way gives more individual freedoms, but is obviously unsustainable.
In the end, it is market which will have the final say. The fall of US and the rise of Eastern powers, and, especially, China, will lead to more countries copying their “authoritarian capitalism”. Just like fall of USSR lead to wide market reforms 20 years ago.
Another example is when some weak state is overtaken by corporations and is transformed into cyberpunk-style corporate state – which by definition will have strong government, since it is effective. Most obvious example is Russia, which can be defined as “oil/gas/mil.hardware monopoly with nukes”. Their foreign policy is basically financial interests of Gazprom, Rosneft and Rosoboronexport and other state-run, but privately-owned megacorps.
Either way you get monopolies, but with strong government these monopolies are at least sustainable and efficient.
Besides, strong government thinks in long terms. China plans for decades (some say – centuries) ahead, and US government plans only for the next 4 years at best.
Watch out for BRIC (Brazil, Russia, India, China) countries. They are the model of social development for this century.
Actually i agree with you. One problem is that majority of big corporations depends on state in one way or another, so they will resist really radical liberalization(like cancelling intellectual property protection) with all theirs resources. In fact most beneficial situations for business is in semi-authoritarian states like China or Singapore. Another problem that they learned how to infiltrate any democratically elected government. You mentioned some problems it causes now. Only solution i see here is direct democracy but then you’ll have to face “claim rights” (as opposed to “natural selection rights”).
My point exactly. Transhumanism is circle nerd-jerk on nice techtoys that transhumanists themselves won’t even afford to look at, yet alone own. Yet, somehow, they believe these toys for old rich white males “will solve all world problems”. I guess they watched “Star Trek” too much.
The entire modern democratic form of government was created during revolutions of bourgeoisie against monarchy (backed by aristocracy) and church (backed by peasantry). The entire point of democratic form of government is to put all power in the hands of merchants, i.e. corporations. Democracy = liberalism = capitalism = corporations. Unless you are talking about Theocracy, Monarchy or “people’s democracy” (i.e. communist one-party dictatorship).
I am talking about direct democracy. It’s when any laws or government decisions passes public referendum. It does not equal to capitalism. I can imagine people voting against it in countries were capitalism works against them.
BRIC countries are totally different from one another. Besides authoritarian government doesn’t equal effective government. Or it might be effective in helping to some oligarchs but not in long term development.
Direct democracy as form of government never existed. “Early democracy of small communities” is simply tribal government. What you describe is mob rule. The problem with mob is that you put 100 scientists in the single room and they behave just if they were 100 hooligans. Two men are smarter then one. But 100 – not so much. And several billion… You guess. Mob rule can function in virtual world (Anonymous), but not in physical world, where objects can be broken permanently. That’s why riot police exists. So, “fighting the system” basically runs down to street riots and other disruptive activities, i.e. petty crime, while the system itself pays little to no attention. That’s why, interwar mess aside, there wasn’t a single revolution in democratic (read: capitalist, corporate, liberal, free market, etc, etc, etc) country ever. And, sure as hell, will never be. Social and enviromental breakdown may level the field and give a window of opportunity to build something new. But changing the system from inside? Not gonna work. We will be watching this republicans-vs-democrats bullshit till the end of the world.
You fail to get one thing. Corporate/capitalist form of government is here because it is popular among masses, especially among urban educated class. Yes, they are not capitalists themselves, but they are consumers. And simple message “let’s go shopping” is very tempting. The alternative is tribal warlords, communist dictators, religious fundamentalists and people like that. Of course, there are many Western urban yuppie types who are into anarchism and communism, but none of them would actually want to live in countries like Afghanistan or North Korea (otherwise, they would be living there already). It is mind games for rich white male kids, nothing more. Just like sci-fi and transhumanism. It is cool to dream of solving world problems, but real world is a zero-sum game, there is always tradeoffs. You can’t solve one problem without making a new one. And even easiest solution still require resources to be implemented.
For example, you just proposed to change form of government in the world superpower to something called “direct democracy”. Let’s ignore the fact that “direct democracy” is purely ideological, non-existant construct and focus on question: how the hell do you suppose to do that? You are talking about regime change in the leading world superpower. Who are you? Hu Jintao? Putin? Robert M. Gates? Get real. Even if there was some perfect form of viable social regime, it still takes revolution to implement it. Which means: overthrowing legitimate government. Regime change in some third-world shithole can be hard to do even for CIA and DoD. And we are talking about regime change in the United States. You have to be some sort of comic book supervillain to pull that off.
Sorry, we are stuck in corporate rule till the end of the world. When Western civilization melts down, there would probably be a chance to start over and try something new. Or maybe not. Anyway, the point is: you can’t fight the system from inside. If it didn’t change for the last 300 years, don’t expect it to change in next 300 years either. Everything else is wishful thinking.
BRIC nations are different, but they share model of “authoritarian capitalism” that becomes more and more tempting as China replaces US as premier superpower.
As for authoritarian governments caring only about themselves, here’s surprise: that’s the same everywhere. Elites both in the West and in the East care only about themselves. It is part of human nature. However, if you are elected official, you are only concerned with next 4 years. If you are a president-for-life, it is next 50 years. And if you intend to leave some of your wealth to your children, we are talking about centuries here.
Short-term thinking is the reason why many Eastern countries don’t take Western diplomacy seriously. Think of what is happening around new START treaty. Or Afghanistan force withdrawal issue, which is an invitation ticket for Taliban. If nations were like persons, what’s the point of taking person seriously if he changes his mind every 4 years? Especially in modern, hyperconnected, rapidly changing world.
I am not saying that Chinese Communist Party bosses or Russian KGB/mafia clans are better then Wall Street banksters. I am just saying that they are better suited for postmodern world, and therefore are likely to prevail. As for ordinary citizens, it makes little difference. Ordinary people never decided anything.
I do not understand why you think that India and Brazil are authoritarian countries. Brazil had a president election not so long ago. And states there are quite independent from central government. Besides demographic situation is different in those countries. Chinese methods are not likely to be as effective as in China in countries with smaller and urbanized population. Maybe it might work in India…
You have very special(and wrong) understanding of what communism is. Same about North Korea. And about direct democracy as well. Switzerland is very close to it. They tested digital system of voting some time ago in one of their referendums. So technology is here. If you lived in ancient Rome you would say that there is no alternative to slavery or man can’t fly. History shows that social progress is possible. And why should i care about regime in USA? I said nothing about changing regime there.
>What you describe is mob rule. The problem with mob is that you put 100 scientists in the single room and they behave just if they were 100 hooligans. Two men are smarter then one. But 100 – not so much.
Your analogies are not obvious and does not prove anything.
>We will be watching this republicans-vs-democrats bullshit till the end of the world.
Talk for yourself.
Even if I wrong, it doesn’t mean you are right. The only way to prove or disprove your vision is to test it, i.e. conduct an experiment. And we both know that it won’t gonna happen. So, I just made an educated guess. If you consider my arguments to be incorrect, provide a counter-example. Be constructive.
That’s exactly what I am talking about. You are without doubts a reasonable, intelligent and educated person. But in “bazaar” situation, it all runs down to “talk for yourself” style of argument. Now, imagine that on the scale of a country. Textbook formula of social collapse.
The only reason we consider Russia and China to be “authoritarian states” is that “authoritarian” today is used as political smear-word against geopolitical adversaries, and both Russia and China are pretty much this from the viewpoint of the United States. In case you don’t know, both Medvedev and Putin were elected, and both Russian presidential and parliamentary systems are more open then its United States counterparts. Same goes for China, which regularily holds elections. As for the whole one-party thing, in Japan, single party (Jiyu-Minshuto) has ruled for 54 years, yet nobody claimed that it was an “authoritarian” country. On the other hand, many blatantly dictatorial states are considered to be beacons of democracy – because they are client states of the U.S. Just look at Russia-Georgia conflict of 2008. Such use of words “authoritarian” and “democratic” makes coherent discussion very hard. So, if you consider Russia to be “authoritarian”, but not Japan or South Korea (which have more strict political systems), the discussion will lead to nowhere. As for Brazil and India, it is special cases. During Cold War, India was cooperating with USSR, so US armed and supported Pakistan against India. Now, China is on the rise, so US tries to support India against China, to discourage India from gaining full membership in SCO (NATO-style alliance of Russia, China, and various Muslim countries, where India has only limited membership). For the same reason US supports Vietnam today, even though it invaded it during Cold War. As for Brazil, US strategists try to pit it against Spanish-speaking states, located to the North, which are strongly anti-American. It’s divide and conquer strategy, and it has very little to do with inner political structure of these countries. When India finally joins SCO, it will immediately lose its status of “largest democracy”.
Well, if you want to do some marxist hairsplitting… Communism is a classless society, based on the idea of “from each according to his ability, to each according to his needs”. When I am talking about communist countries, I am talking about socialist countries which claim to be building communism. As far as I know, only countries that fit this description today are China, Cuba, Laos, Vietnam and North Korea. And I am sure as hell you are not citizen of either of these countries.
Switzerland is a federal republic. It is a model capitalist/corporate state, and its corporate brands are known worldwide. It is also very small, smaller than Tehran or Mexico City.
Digital voting is still voting. Next elections in Russia are supposed to be digital and online. That doesn’t make Russia a “direct democracy”. In fact, it doesn’t make it democracy at all.
Rome didn’t transform into slavery-free, human-flying society. It f..cking collapsed. On its ruins, Germanic barbarians built a new, medieval civilization, which opposed slavery on religious grounds, and despite being crude, was more advanced and progressive. Same will probably happen with Western world. As far as I remember, Muslims reject banking on religious grounds.
You described USA as “there”. Where are you from? Europe?
And just to clear things up a bit. I don’t think that countries like Afghanistan, Laos and North Korea are “bad”, “evil” or “less progressive”. They are just not a suitable alternative for Western urban population, which is too spoiled and too accustomed to comfort. As sure as hell Afghanistan has more chances of surviving 21th century than Switzerland or U.S.
North Korea does not have a communist party. They do not pretend that they build communism neither their system reminds communism. State ownership is just a economic model, it does not show full picture. Let say peasants are living in commune. If they are free they definitely have communism, if they are property of feudal they are slaves. North Korea have a ruling dynasty. Among countries you mentioned closest to communism is Cuba.
>Digital voting is still voting. Next elections in Russia are supposed to be digital and online. That doesn’t make Russia a “direct democracy”. In fact, it doesn’t make it democracy at all.
Details does matter. Russians had their last referendum more then decade ago while in Switzerland they have referendums few times in a year. It’s close to direct democracy. Besides state structure is not connected to democracy. It might be federation, why not?
>Muslims reject banking on religious grounds.
Get yourself some education. They even have a special type of credit which does not violate Islamic tradition.
>Rome didn’t transform into slavery-free, human-flying society.
Exactly the same Eastern Roman empire peacefully transformed from slavery to feudalism. It is separation what weakened both eastern and western empires not progressiveness of barbarians.
Examples of what? Of direct democracy – Novgorod republic in medieval. Modern Switzerland is semi-direct democracy. Of communism – kibbutz in Israel, first 10 years of USSR, Chile in 1971-73. Of anarchist communism again kibbutz, modern Freetown Christiania in Denmark.
It’s good argument for cancelling any election – people are stupid so they will elect some blatant populist. It is totally true but in long terms we all learn to vote smarter. Besides there is a special type of direct democracy – with proxy. Let say you do not know much about GMO so instead of voting on it by yourself you delegate your right to vote on this to Egghead party. And let say you do not care much about sport so you delegate your right to vote on sport’s matter to Idiot’s party. And you vote yourself on new tax law, cause it is too important to delegate it.
Sure all this stuff more suitable for rich and educated society. At least everybody should be connected to network and be able to read.
Novgorod Republic is classic medieval city-state, ruled by rich clans. In other words, classic oligarchy. It proved to be totally inefficient against centralized Muscovy state in both logistical and morale fields, as shown in Battle of Shelon. If you want to see modern example of such governmental form, check times of Yeltsin – another “perfectly democratic” age of Russian history. Or interregnum years of Russian Republic between February and October of 1917. Russia is too big for such social models. Kibbutz, Christiania and other communities you noted are extremely small. But try to implement such system on larger scale, and everything falls apart. As for first 10 years of Soviet rule, it was a complete mess. If Stalin didn’t get back to tried and true ways, Russia would be overrun by Nazis. Or Japaneese. Or just about anybody. As for Chile, it is classic communist regime, Soviet-style, just with a bit more high-tech whiz.
That’s hairsplitting. Classic “Lenin is communist, but Stalin is not” debate. “Soviet Union was state capitalist, not communist”, etc. Unless you run opposing communist nation, you don’t have any rights to make such claims. They are People’s Democratic Republic of Korea, for god’s sake. As for Cuba, if Castro passes power to his relatives after death, which is likely, it will be “dynasty” too.
Like I said, it’s because Switzerland is more than twice smaller than Moscow, and 20 times smaller than Russia. Try to run referendums in a family – it is even easier.
As for Muslim banks, they are compliant to Shariah law. They don’t have collateral and interest rate is comparable to inflation rate. Communists also had banks, but failing to see the difference between Soviet and Western economical systems is quite foolish.
Byzantium is not a Roman Empire, it is a successor state to Roman Empire. The difference is like the difference between Russian Federation and Soviet Union.
PS: Ad hominem will get you nowhere.
If elections could change anything, they would be outlawed. Plain and simple.
Elections are necessary to keep population compliant and maintain an illusion of free choice, so that people would play this funny game instead of forming counter-elite and/or participating in decision-making process. The entire idea of elections is to obscure and dumb-down process of political competition. Having smart population and functional elections at the same time is impossible, since smart people don’t vote.
Besides, it will never happen. People grow less smart as years pass, while crowd control and ads grow more and more sophisticated. Of course, if you have more and more control over society, you can make this “direct democracy” stuff you talk about more and more widespread. If you have computer chip installed in your cortex, there is no need to send jackbooted cops to beat you up in case something wents out of control.
Power is constant. If there is less “hard power”, that means that there is more “soft power”. The obvious benefit of being ruled by “hard power” is that it cannot get inside your mind, cannot obscure truth, and won’t bother lying to you. That’s why political process inside dictatorships are usually very transparent, while decision-making process in countries like U.S. and U.K. is so esoteric and obscure that we cannot even start making guesses about it. In short, “soft power” is good for your health, “hard power” is good for your brain. In either case, there are tradeoffs.
You make some good points, and while it’s certainly true that people make exaggerated claims about power of ordinary people in the states commonly referred to as “non-authoritarian”, there are some important differences between what’s allowed in these states and what’s allowed in the states that are commonly referred to as “authoritarian”. For example, let’s look at the difference between China and Japan. While a single party has been in power in Japan for 54 years, people are free to criticize this situation. When Chinese people publicly criticize the Chinese Communist Party, they’re thrown in prison. Likewise, Japanese visual artists, filmmakers, and musicians aren’t harassed by the government. As a result, Japanese artists have been able to create some of the most innovative, eclectic, and daring work in the contemporary creative sphere. On the other hand, one regularly hears about Chinese artists being hassled by the government, simply for being “different”, even when their work has no political content.
Like I said, people are free to criticize the situation because it’s gonna change nothing, and there are American bases on Japaneese territory in case something wrong happens. Also, Japan is island nation, and has homogenous population, so even if some country (China, Russia, Cuba, whatever) tried to do some black ops there, they would run into some serious problems on how to do that. On the other hand, countries like Russia and China are large, continental powers, which, while having single dominating ethnic group, have heterogenous population and lots of rich enemies wanting to do some regime change.
And it is not fate of artists or journalists which is in stake here, it is a life-and-death (sic!) question for tens of millions of people. Here’s an example: Perestroyka vs. Tiananmen square massacre. Soviet authorities refused to employ power to curb protests, Chinese authorities didn’t. The result is transformation of superpower into banana-state, and transformation of banana-state into superpower. Collapse of the Soviet Union: has sent Russia 400 years back in time, created bloody ethnic conflicts that continue even today, and will probably continue for centuries in future, totally destroyed #1 military power and #2 economic power, resulted in millions of death because of poverty, starvation, crime, wars, etc. Results were worse than WW2 Eastern Front, and WW2 Eastern Front was a hell on Earth. On the other hand, China, which was insignificant country back then, turned into new superpower, replacing role of the Soviet Union on the world stage. So, when Chinese authorities repress intelligentsia, arrest journalists, etc, they are not doing it because they are “evil and oppressive”. They just want to save their country from what Russia experienced in 1989-2001 and which they managed to prevent by actions like Tiananmen square massacre.
If you think that Western countries are exempt from such behaviour, think again. When Red Scare was on the rise, United States used just the same methods to curb dissent. And while lack of powerful adversary did made methods more subtle, FBI still continue to infilitrate organizations it labels as dangerous and un-American. If (or, better yet, “when”) Russia or China tries to incite dissent on U.S. territory again, be sure that such methods will return in more blunt, “in-your-face” variety. Check recent arrests of RT journalists, for example: RT tried to highlight issues that both “mainstream” and “radical” (read: “mainstream for losers”) local media refuses to cover, and got good old fashioned repression. While RT is more of troll than of subversive channel or something, the trend is still here.
Modern example: Putin-Medvedev combo in Russian politics. In early years of Putin (2000-2004), state was pretty vegetarian, it only began to create state-sponsored movements and curb dissent when it faced “Orange Revolution” in Ukraine, incited by United States via NGOs. To prevent destruction of Russian state, Putin’s administration employed nasty strongman tactics (2005-2007), but when threat was minimized, Medvedev step in with his image of tech-savvy geeky liberal type of person. It is very un-Russian type of ruler, and it sends a clear message: “Okay, we went a bit too far, let’s backtrack now.”
To sum things up: state repressions are used by governments (any governments) when they face subversion (or think they face subversion), incited by hostile government. Soviet Union was more repressive than America because U.S. had more ways of subverting U.S.S.R. than vice versa. And it was more repressive when it was in actual existential danger, than when it was strong and powerful (Brezhnev’s age). Governments consist of people. Ordinary human beings. If humans feel threatened, they react. There is no reason to think that entire Chinese Communist Party (or Russian “United Russia” party) is composed of cartoonish supervillains who love oppressing artists and journalists just for the sake of oppression.
From Venezuela to Iran, from Palestine to Russia, from China to Belarus, there is a whole range of nations in the East and Global South that try to escape their ill fate as neo-colonies for G-7, and which use pretty brutish methods to do so. But that’s not because they consist of evil people or are run by supervillains. That’s because they have rich, powerful, relentless enemies that use wide variety of methods to send them down. If they failed to employ such measures, they would be overthrown by some CIA-backed “popular front” NGO, lead by some artist, journalist, political activist or whatever. What is worse: a bit of repression against Westernized dissidents or poverty, starvation and civil wars for, wait a second, 90% of humanity? If you lived for 1 dollar a day, you wouldn’t ask such question.
And just to clear things up a bit. I don’t think that such oppression is good. It is bad. But it is a necessary evil to prevent social collapse in emergent powers. It is self-defence. Humans have right for self-defence. And there wouldn’t be any need in self-defence, if these societies weren’t constantly under siege. If you want to find persons guilty in Putin’s repressions, check Langley, Pentagon and White House.
Final note. People in Langley, Pentagon, White House, etc, which use astroturf NGOs to overthrow (or try to overthrow) popular-backed governments in Russia, Iran, Ukraine, etc, are not “evil” either. Like any ordinary human beings, they react when threatened, and they do feel threatened now – think of all this “culture of fear” thing. Western leaders are scared, because they see that Western nations are in the decline, and East and South is on the rise. They are afraid that countries of East and South will treat them just the same as they treated them. Which would probably happen too, at least I can imagine that Russians who grown up in 90ies would be happy to give Americans the taste of their own medicine. So, Western leaders are properly paranoid, and try to keep these nations down whatever the cost. Nations react by oppressing CIA-funded NGOs (or NGOs that look like they could be CIA-funded, or anything that looks suspicious for that matter). It is a vicious cycle that’s not gonna end soon. As long as there is mutual fear and suspicion, human beings will keep torture, oppress and kill each other. Both sides act in self-defence. As for dystopian oppressive regimes and evil supervillains, leave that for comic books and summer blockbusters.
And one more bit. When I said that both sides use self-defence, and both sides are equally brutal in methods, I didn’t said that both sides are morally equivalent. “Can’t we all just get along” rhethoric benefits the overdog and the aggressor. And the aggressor is obviously Western states. India, China, Latin America, Africa and Muslim world did suffer greatly from Western domination and the only reason Russia didn’t is because Russians are notoriously good at winning wars against impossible odds. Both West and East/South try to protect their interests, but it is West which started first. After all, nobody invaded the United States, ever. So, even though methods are the same on both sides (including wars, torture, subversion, lies, etc), it is Eastern powers which are “the good guys” here. Saying that, for example, “both Iraq and the United States are the bad guys in the war” is wrong, because Iraq didn’t invade United States to steal its natural resources. Of course, as citizen of the United States, you can follow libertarian rational self-interest worldview and consider it to be pragmatic choice which tried to improve national security and economic stability of the homeland. It is perfectly explainable behaviour. Just don’t put any moral reasoning here. If you want to rob somebody, you don’t have to label him “evil” before robbing. One of the reason I despise libertarians is that they try support worldview of petty criminal with some moral explanations. Honest jerk is better than self-righteous one.
Check that:
http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/top-stories/2010/11/27/a-new-world-disorder-115875-22743927/
Poor Brits think that India forgot colonization, LOL!
I’ve heard people argue that these types of scenarios are easily imagined only when we consider technological advancements in a vacuum, and not alongside other forms of advancement (political, social, psychological, etc).
In short, these fears ring true when we consider technological advancement alongside stagnation in other realms. The author is right to call for wider thinking “bigger picture” when we consider the transhumanist perspective.
Good stuff!