Hopes, Fears, and Limitations

During class, we developed a list of our; hopes, fears, possibilities and limitations of science. I will list the majority of them here in my post but will only explore the ones I feel strongly toward. First of all we explored our Hopes for future science and technology. Our list contained: solving the water crisis, medicinal leaps foreword, creation of new jobs, making things easier, recycling more, less death (which goes along with medicine), and a longer life span (again somewhat similar.)

Hopes.

I will explore one of the hopes for future science and technology that my group came up with. The lowering of death and/or increase in life span. To explore the lowering of the death rate and the increase in human life span i will first start out by taking a look at the movie, "Gattaca". Gattaca is a movie that considers the future of "healthcare/technology" to allow for genetic perfection. A females egg and a males sperm is grown perfectly in a lab, allowing for no imperfection, less of a chance of disease, less of a chance of baldness, etc. No longer do the traits of the child's parents factor into the child itself, the traits are genetically programmed and enhanced by the "scientists/doctors" themselves. Although this increases the life expectancy has made for a stronger more genetically perfect human, it also creates problems. For every new development in technology that is good, something bad always comes from it. The design of perfect genetic humans creates a new level of discrimination. "I belonged to a new underclass, no longer determined by social status or the color of your skin. No, we now have discrimination down to a science." (Gattaca). This hope of genetic perfection and longer life creates a fear of genetic discrimination. Every hope can be turned into a fear.

Fears.

Some fears our group explored included: Artificial Intelligence, apocalypse, less face to face interaction, laziness, technology getting in the wrong hands, accumulation of waste, and lesser intelligence. I will explore two of these topics; Artificial Intelligence, and the lessening of face to face interaction.

To begin, I will be taking the textbook example from the movie, "2001 a space odyssey" to further explore the fear of Artificial Intelligence becoming 'too smart.' In the movie, "2001 a space odyssey" an artificially created computer intelligence is created names HAL to aid in a space mission. HAL 'malfunctions' and ends up killing all of the crew. The crew thinks HAL is malfunctioning irrationally, but really HAL is thinking very rationally. As a computer HAL thinks simply with a one track mind. He factors in the human inability to be perfect and possibly ruin the mission due to human imperfection. There are many movies that explore this topic of AI becoming too smart and/or taking over because of how stupid and destructive humans are. A few examples are, Terminator, AI, iRobot, The Matrix, etc. but "2001 a space oddysey" is the prime and most classic example of this.

Next, I will explore the topic of lessening of face-to-face interaction. Does dependence on technology affect the community in a negative way or a positive way? As this both increases our ability to communicate with the world and the community around us; share, trade, etc. it also decreases our ability to communicate with each other, meaningfully, in a natural manner, face to face. The internet and technology that surrounds us impacts us in a negative way, but presents us with an ability to know more things, to learn more and become smarter through the technology. It is inevitable that we will continue to surround ourselves by technology and that it cannot make a reversal (that we must accept it) even though it may have negatory effects on the nearby community.

We rely too heavily on computers and we keep our eyes glued to an lcd screen the majority of the day we are awake. This may lead to more communication with friends, employees, family members, but in a digital way, not face to face, and therefore we begin to lose our ability to socialize with others in physical form.

Limitations:

We discussed the limitations on future science and technology and came up with a list including: resources, physical laws, cooperation (with other countries), time, and ethics.

First of all, our planet has a limited amount of resources and eventually will be depleted if we keep using them up the way we are. Ironically, we are using our resources on this planet to create/design/develop machines that can transport us to other places to be able to use their resources. A perfect example of this is the new movie, "Avatar". The human race has depleted its resources and is trying to obtain the rare and powerful element 'unobtanium' from the planet Pandora. This is a common theme in many science-fiction movies/novels/stories/etc. A current example is the recent rocket sent to the moon to search for water on the moons poles. The recent satellites/rockets to mars are very similar, and there are also plans on terraforming the planet to enable humans to live there as well.

Not only is there the limitation of resources, but ethics. The ethical limitation on technology/science is very present in todays debate over stem cell research. Whether it be ethical to continue the research on stem cells because one side argues that using of stem cells in these scientific experiments is unethical because they consider it murder of a human life.

Sources

http://stemcells.nih.gov/

Lenhart, Amanda. Social Networking Websites and Teens: An Overview. Pew Internet & American Life Project. 3 Jan. 2007. Web. 14 Mar. 2010. .

Gattaca. Dir. Andrew Niccol. By Andrew Niccol. Perf. Ethan Hawke, Uma Thurman, Jude Law. Columbia Pictures, 1997. DVD.

2001: A Space Odyssey (1968). Dir. Stanley Kubrick. By Stanley Kubrick. Perf. Keir Dullea, Gary Lockwood. Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (MGM), 1968. DVD.

Avatar (2009). Dir. James Cameron. By James Cameron. Perf. Sam Worthington, Zoe Saldana, Sigourney Weaver. Twentieth Century Fox Film Corporation, 2009. DVD.