|
A peer-reviewed
electronic journal published by the Institute for Ethics and ISSN
1541-0099 17(1)
– March 2008 |
Artificialisation Of Culture:
Challenges to and from Posthumanism
Kurmo Konsa, Tartu University, Estonia
Journal of Evolution and Technology -
Vol. 17 Issue 1 –March 2008 -
pgs 23-35
http://jetpress.org/volume16/konsa.html
Abstract
Human societies
reorganize both the surrounding environment and themselves. As a result, society
is becoming more and more artificial. The driving force behind this process is
constantly renewing technologies that are developed to increase welfare.
Technology has moved from the reorganization of the physical environment to
man’s biological body, genome and consciousness. Transhumanist concepts
concentrate on the biological and genetic amendment and improvement of the
human being. By contrast, questions concerning culture have been insufficiently
discussed. Culture, which greatly determines how to be a human being, is
something very special to the human species, and appears to have been greatly
undervalued in discussions of a possible posthuman future. Very obviously,
culture is the factor that determines whether we will reach such a future and
whether we will be able to use all the opportunities that it would offer to us.
This study deals with culture from the viewpoint of artificialisation, and
indicates some of the possibilities for creating artificial cultures.
Keywords: artificialisation; environment; culture; posthumanism
1. Artificialisation of the Environment
One of the most evident
characteristics of the contemporary world is the disappearance of borders
between what is natural and what is artificial. It is not only that the
influence of mankind on nature has dramatically increased. The term “nature,”
which once used to be so clear, is rapidly losing its original meaning
(Robertson et.al. 1996, 1-4). However, instead of differences between natural
and artificial, we should talk about the process of artificialisation - the
vanishing of a fundamental boundary
between natural and artificial, as a result of the use of modern technology.
The disappearance of such a clear distinction on human nature is most evidently
influential in biotechnology, where the borderline between man as a natural
being and man as the outcome of technological production has become vague
(Sagoff 2005, 67-98).
Artificialisation can be
defined as an anthropogenic transformation of the environment that
predominantly takes place under the influence of technological systems. At this
point, the environment comprises the physical, biological and genetic
environments, as well as human culture. The concept of artificialisation
enables us to more easily cross the still unchanged semiotic border between
nature and everything that is artificial, as stated by Christina Ljungberg
(Ljungberg 2001, 183). The term “artificialisation” is not about borders, but
rather concerns a complicated process. This concept is not as politicised as
the categories of technology and nature. (Chase 2001; Forsyth 2003; Huber
1999).
Analysing the relations
between culture, technology and environment, and their meaning, is crucial for
the normal development of modern society. It is obviously very difficult, if
not impossible, to anticipate the potential consequences of all new
technologies.
Nowadays, transhumanism
and posthumanism have together become one of the most important concepts, in
the frame of which the influence of technologies on people and human society is
discussed. Transhumanism and posthumanism have been described differently in
scientific literature, but all these definitions involve the idea of changing
and improving the mental and physical capabilities of people by the use of
different technologies (Krueger 2005, 78-79).
Among these technologies
are what are nowadays still considered to be completely utopian ones, or
technologies that are still in the initial stages of their development, such as
nanotechnology or uploading human consciousness. Besides such radical
technologies, different methods have existed from ancient times for changing
and improving the human body. Some technologies that can change the human body
are used in all human cultures for medical, religious, social and ethical purposes
(Gilman 1999). In modern Western culture the view that the human body is a
means of self-expression, and because of that the place for cultural
experiments, is widespread. Body perforation, cosmetic surgery, physical
training programs, etc., have been created to change the human body according
to the requirements of the individual. This implies the objectification of the
human body (in other words, the human body is turned into an object), but on
the other hand individual human nature will be tied more closely to the body,
and therefore what a person thinks and feels will be directly expressed in the
body. Art, especially performance art, is actively engaged in defining the body
and finding the borders of corporal existence. The French artist Orlan can be
considered as one of the most extreme examples of this, using plastic surgery
to create works of art where she designs her face based on different classical
examples (Venus, Europe, Diana, etc) (Popper 1993, 52).
If the human body could
be changed at any time, then what kind of changes would take place with human
“self-consciousness”? If the human body is considered to be the husk or the
container of “self-consciousness,” then what will happen if we change the husk
( Davis 1997)? Projects that use the body as a means of achieving art are
trying to find answers to these questions. Sport should be included as an
entertainment, which, with permitted and non-permitted chemical substances,
with physical and psychological influences, is being widely used to redesign
the human body. Sport and art are also changing the cultural understanding of
corporal existence.
Medicine, which concerns
us all, has been one of the most influential means for designing and
influencing the human body. The transplantation of organs and tissues, together
with the use of artificial organs, has become a very normal part of medicine in
Western societies. In the USA, 68 people receive organ transplants each day
(White House 2003). In the year 2005, 28,110 organ transplants and approximately
one million tissue transplants were carried out in the USA (United Network). By
means of xenotransplantation, live animal cells, tissues or organs could be
introduced into the human organism. Xenotransplantation is basically in the
research phase today, but experiments in transplanting the pancreas have been
promising (Taniguchi and Cooper 1997). Replacing human organs, or complementing
them with artificial additions or systems, has become commonplace in recent
decades. Appliances such as dialysis machines, which help compensate for
decreased kidney function, or artificial cardiac valves and cardio stimulators,
have saved millions of lives.
The modification of the
immune system can be tracked back to the beginning of vaccination, two
centuries ago. Vaccinations are one of the main methods of protecting human
beings from infectious diseases. Thanks to their discovery, infectious diseases
such as smallpox, diphtheria, lockjaw (tetanus), yellow fever, whooping cough,
poliomyelitis, measles, mumps, and German measles are under control. The
development and introduction of effective vaccines would have a great benefit
in the fight against AIDS.
Connecting the human
body to various technical devices is one option for supplementing and improving
it. The term “cyborg” was initially brought into use in the sixties,
celebrating the incorporation of the biological organism and the cybernetic
system into one body (Tomas 2001, 175). To such a technical approach the
literal and philosophical background has been added later on. Donna Haraway is
one of the most famous writers in this field. In her masterpiece, “A Cyborg
Manifesto,” she develops the feminist theory of cyborgs. The category of
cyborg, which unites the human being and the machine, is not only a vision of future
technology, but also a description of reality today. According to Haraway, the
very concept of a cyborg enables us to surpass the differences between the
human being, the machine and the animal, and, with that, also all the
traditional binary and oppositionist discourses in society (Haraway 2001; Dusek
2006, 152-153).
Actual achievements
incorporating the human organism and technical devices are scarce when compared
to predictions by visionaries. There is nothing new in transplanting ordinary
microchips into the human body, but as a rule these devices are not directly
connected to the body. They involve radio frequency identification devices
(RFID), which are similar to devices used with domestic animals. These can be
used to identify people, as well as to monitor their health (Murray 2002;
Ethical aspects 2005). It is a much more complicated task to put the human
organism and technical appliances into direct communication with one another.
In one case, Professor of Cybernetics, Kevin Warwick, allowed the
transplantation of an implant into his left arm, which connected his nerve
fibres to a computer. Signals from the nerve fibres were caught and then
directed to the computer and back to the arm. Warwick's aim was to prove that
direct communication between the human body and the computer is possible
(Warwick 2002). Great success has been achieved in the area of electronic brain
implants. These neuro-prostheses turn brain commands into electrical impulses,
with which devices outside the body are conducted; the the aim of this is to
help paralysed patients communicate with the world and hopefully regain control
of their limbs (Editorial 2006).
New reproductive
technologies are one of the means of controlling and artificialising human
biological processes. Among these are artificial fertilization, the process of
supplying donor sperm or eggs, embryo transplantation, preserving sex cells and
embryos, and most obviously, human cloning. Although the human genome project
has been successfully completed and has given us a map of the human genome,
very little is known about the influence of particular genes, about relations
between genes and the interaction of genes and the environment. The
opportunities offered by gene technology in changing the human body are promising.
Gene technology investigations into the human brain are considered to be one of
the most promising areas. In addition to the treatment of neurological diseases
such as Parkinson’s disease and Alzheimer ’s disease, these studies should also
enable the increase of human intellectual capabilities. Although our technology
develops exponentially, human abilities are still limited and do not grow over
the course of time. Our neurons do not work faster, memory capacity does not
increase, and we neither learn nor think faster than before. Changing the human
being using the techniques of gene technology is one possible way to decrease
this gap. What will be the consequences of this development?
According to the
supporters of transhumanist philosophy, different technologies (gene, nano, and
infotechnology) should essentially be used to change the human being as a
biological species , and with that bring mankind onto a new level. New
technologies, above all bio, info, and nanotechnology, will change the world so
much that our descendants will not be human beings but posthumans. The process
of embracing the human body and mind with technology is constantly increasing,
and in the not-too-distant future will result in the development of a new human
race, living in complete symbiosis with machines.
As we have seen,
transhumanist concepts concentrate on the biological and genetic amendment and
improvement of human beings. By contrast, questions concerning culture have
been insufficiently discussed. Culture greatly determines how to be a human
being, and is something very special to the human species. It seems to me that
its role of culture has been greatly undervalued in the discussions to date.
Very obviously, culture is the factor that determines whether we will reach a posthuman
future and whether we will be able to use all the opportunities that such a
future would offer to us.
Below, I will deal with
culture from the viewpoint of artificialisation, and will indicate some of the
possibilities for creating artificial cultures.
2. Artificialisation of culture
“Culture” is a term that
is used very widely in the arts and social sciences, and the treatment of
culture is clearly becoming more and more important. The term “culture” has
been considered one of the most powerful and widely-spread analytical tools in
contemporary social sciences. At the same time, it is one of the most
complicated and complex terms - with almost countless definitions and
explanations. Several researchers have had the feeling that because “culture” means
everything, the term is useless as an explanatory tool. However, culture in a
broader sense is an unquestionable precondition for the survival of the human
species.
There are probably as
many metaphors to describe culture as there are definitions. Culture has been
seen as “The Other,” Group Self, Machine, Computer, Organism, Personality,
Code, Text, Game, Story, etc. All these metaphors render one or another aspect
of culture. In today’s post-industrial society, the term “culture” is about to
obtain yet another meaning. It can be said that culture has come to be seen as
a unique wilderness. This metaphor has a long history during which the meaning
has considerably changed (Rolston 1989,118-143). From an opposite standpoint,
Henry David Thoreau, one of the wilderness apologists, speaks about the wild
nucleus of culture, about the core around which real culture is based (Thoreau
1862, part 2).
However, when we use it
to describe culture, “wild” still means something hostile towards man: a
strange area of darkness, hostility and desertion; an area impossible to
understand. It is not a safe and pleasant place. On the contrary - it is an
unfamiliar area full of dangers. Today it is cultures and not nature that are
intimidating and awesome and provoke hostility, aggression and violence. The
natural environment that used to be described with the metaphor of wilderness
has lost all the characteristics used in that description. Wilderness has
become a positive concept. In fact, wildlife was domesticated a long time ago
and turned into parks and objects for sightseeing. We make leisure trips into
wilderness and no longer consider it a source of danger. Describing culture
with the wilderness metaphor puts culture in a new, slightly strange
perspective and provides new opportunities for understanding it. There are a
number of reasons why culture is seen as wilderness and they are related to the
development of modern societies. Declining and aging populations, increasing
immigration, globalization and an explosive growth in tourism – all this leads
to a continuing expansion of variety, even in countries with a relatively
monolithic population. After the successful expansion of the liberal democratic
cultural model, it has become clear that cultures alien to it (e.g. Islam) have
intruded into our societies. We enter another culture as tourists, researchers,
consultants or immigrants.
Either way, we are
unable to escape other cultures in today’s world. The world has dramatically
shrunk and mixed different cultures, thereby making groups of people define
their cultural identity. The global domination policy of western capitalism
inevitably leads to local resistance movements that, in turn, facilitate the
separation of local cultures. Culture provides the justification of ethnic,
national, sexual, religious, regional, etc. identities and limitations. The
variability and uncertainty of the global world has caused, on the one hand,
the need to reinforce identities and, on the other hand, the flexibility of
those identities. Ever faster globalization happens simultaneously with local
ethnic and cultural rebirths. The desire to belong and know one’s roots keeps
producing ethnic conflicts and even wars. Declaring a culture – usually one’s
own – sacred and superior inevitably leads to fundamentalism and nationalism.
Culture affects politics and ideology in many unpredictable ways by
incorporating patriotism, historic memory and national, ethnic and regional
identities. Surprisingly, it may seem at first glance that globalization has in
a way even facilitated those developments and resulted in separations. As
Dorothèe Bauerle-Willert writes: “We might point out that today culture is no
longer part of the solution, it has turned into part of the problem and into a
battlefield.” (Bauerle-Willert 2003, 151). Cultures lose their compactness and
endurance; already for a long time, their boundaries have ceased to coincide
with those of nations, countries and states.
The spread and promotion
of liberal democracy has triggered, as a reaction, the formation of a number of
closed cultures. However, pluralistic ideology sees this phenomenon as
something that increases cultural variety. At the same time, from the global
viewpoint, the western world does not seem to hold as good a position in
cultural wars as commonly believed. While elite culture is too hidden to act as
an effective political power, most of the post-modernist culture is too
fragile, rootless and depoliticized. Neither seems strong enough compared to
Islam, which has a historically well-grounded, and thus inevitably political,
culture (Eagleton 2000, 81).
The spread of cultural
relativism makes it difficult to identify a culture by opposing it to other
cultures, or to define the functioning of cultural hierarchies. Reorganization
of the existing system causes frustration, increases nationalist tendencies and
may even lead to intercultural violence. Cultural relativism, which expresses
the identity crisis of the post-modernist western world, is associated with
separatism and principality in post-colonial countries. In the Third World, it
has provided a theoretical basis for and generated the progressive appearance
of fast-spreading anti-modernist, nativist and cultural-religious rebirth
movements. The globalization of information systems and a considerable rise in
information generation and exchange have made it possible to reflect and create
cultures. The internet leaves the impression that the number of different
cultures is endless. Despite “cultural pluralism” and “political correctness,”
or perhaps because of them, we will never understand most of these cultures. To
a great extent, our own culture is also produced and delivered by the media and
there is no way to establish direct contact with its origin and nature. Most
modern societies are a collection of subcultures entangled with each other
(Eagleton 2000, 75). Deciding which subculture originates from which normative
culture is getting harder and harder. It even seems inappropriate to use the
term “subculture”, because it presumes the existence of a superior culture.
Groups with common
interests gather into real or virtual communities that have spread all over the
world with the help of computer-based communication tools. The values and
identity that hold the communities together are becoming more and more
specific. Since cultural relativism is generally recognized, there are no
suppressions or “cultural wars” between different stakeholders. The emerging
communities are independent and flexible, usually not very numerous, and with
unstable memberships. Such communities have little influence on their members
and few ties to other similar communities. Subcultures are linked by antagonism
towards other cultures, introversion and communitarianism. Sub-cultural worlds
are fragmentary. Figuratively speaking, from a distance a culture looks like a
nebula which, on closer observation, breaks down into independent stars.
3. Artificial cultures
The transformation of
culture into “wilderness” inevitably leads to the recognition that, at least
for western society, the domestication or taming of culture, as Heiner Mühlmann
(Mühlmann 1996) has put it, has become the greatest challenge. In reality, it
means the artificialisation of culture as the last stronghold of naturalness
and the creation of artificial cultures.
Along with scientific
development, it has become irrelevant to distinguish between metaphysical
nature and culture. Both are seen as specific forms of information and its
processing (Sloterdijk). The idea of treating culture as an object of
technology comes from the development of technologies and society. Achievements
in the field of information technology provide a technological basis for the
creation of a civilization with an artificial culture. Technical metaphors are
extended to culture. Contemporary communication and information theories offer
attractive metaphors for redefining cultural phenomena. Such a linguistic shift
is extremely important. In principle, the idea of correcting culture is no
different from the idea of improving a computer program. New programs are
created for new tasks, and the more the program are improved, the more new
opportunities will arise – which will again create new tasks.
We can talk about two
approaches to artificial culture. The users of the “bottom-up” approach resort
to agent-based computer simulations and try to reproduce the system, in our
case the macro-behavior of culture, by changing the properties of micro-agents
and of interactions between different agents or between agents and the
environment. This is not direct modeling of real cultures. More likely, the aim
is to understand the fundamental processes that may occur in very different
situations. This approach relies on a rather solid theoretical and
technological basis, but practical achievements have been modest so far
(Gessler 2002, 1995, 1994).
With a “top-down”
version of synthetic culture, methods-modelling begins with largescale cultural
events. Such culture-modelling events are represented by virtual worlds or
synthetic worlds, and the term “digital worlds” has also been used. Online
games, the Metaverse, cyberspace, etc., are also included. Ideas about virtual
worlds appeared first in science fiction. Neal Stephenson’s novel, Snow Crash (Stephenson 1992, 23-24), a
classic of the cyberpunk sub-genre, espouses the idea of such a technical
virtual world as follows:
Down inside the computer are three
lasers - a red one, a green one, and a blue one. They are powerful enough to
make a bright light but not powerful enough to burn through the back of your
eyeball and broil your brain, fry your frontals, lase your lobes. As everyone
learned in elementary school, these three colors of light can be combined, with
different intensities, to produce any color that Hiro's eye is capable of
seeing.
In this way, a narrow beam of any
color can be shot out of the innards of the computer, up through that fisheye
lens, in any direction. Through the use of electronic mirrors inside the
computer, this beam is made to sweep back and forth across the lenses of Hiro's
goggles, in much the same way as the electron beam in a television paints the
inner surface of the eponymous Tube. The resulting image hangs in space in
front of Hiro's view of Reality.
By drawing a slightly different
image in front of each eye, the image can be made three-dimensional. By
changing the image seventy-two times a second, it can be made to move. By
drawing the moving three-dimensional image at a resolution of 2K pixels on a
side, it can be as sharp as the eye can perceive, and by pumping stereo digital
sound through the little earphones, the moving 3-D pictures can have a
perfectly realistic soundtrack.
So Hiro's not actually here at all.
He's in a computer-generated universe that his computer is drawing onto his
goggles and pumping into his earphones. In the lingo, this imaginary place is
known as the Metaverse.
As can be seen,
technical solutions for virtual worlds are concentrated on the fact that a
person perceives the artificial environment created by the computer as being as
real as possible. For that purpose, efforts are made to transform the world
generated by the computer (and above all the world’s visual side), so that it
matches (and is corresponding and relevant to) the real world as much as
possible, and can transfer data to people via their sensual organs. From that
idea, monitors situated in front of the eyes came into being, with these
usually being connected to virtual reality and data gloves that mediate
information related to (bound by) touches and the position of objects.
However, it has been
discovered that technical solutions are not primary in creating a feeling of
being–in-the-world. It seems that what is happening in this world is actually
much more important. There is nothing strange in this, as it is well known that
a spellbinding novel will draw us into its fictional world without any
technical devices. When we consider a world as a place where human
communication takes place, the first virtual worlds were based on text, being
more similar to a book than to a common understanding about the virtual world.
In such worlds, all worlds which possess activities and communications are
delivered by the text. When computer networks became common at the end of the
1970s, the first online virtual, multi-player worlds, which were based on text,
appeared (Bartle 2003). The worlds that came into being were quickly
transformed into places with real and complicated dynamics (Dibbell 1999).
With the advent of a
game called “Meridian 59,” which came onto the market in 1996, the visual side
was added to these worlds, making them more easily acceptable. Experience with
these games showed that a game which was attracting people need not be a
fighting or adventure game. People often prefer a communications environment,
and players want to participate actively in creating a game environment and the
objects in it. The game “Active Worlds,” which entered the market in 1995,
provided users with the opportunity to create for themselves the essence needed
by them inside the game. In that game's synthetic world, each person is
represented by an object called an “avatar.” Avatars are used in the virtual
environment, which is within the computer network. An avatar can communicate,
indicate to other avatars, to other objects, drive a virtual motorcycle, etc.
Written communication between avatars is being replaced by audio interaction,
and, thanks to the development of 3D technologies, the visual interpretation of
worlds is becoming more perfect.
Nowadays, the synthetic
world can be defined as a physical space that has been generated by the
computer and which many people are experiencing simultaneously (Castronova
2005, 22). Synthetic worlds use communications technology based on computer
networks in order to interact with the new cultural medium. Synthetic worlds,
being initially born from games, are gaining wider meaning and use. These days
they are created for very different aims: entertainment, social communications,
for learning or for scientific purposes, etc.
The popularity of
synthetic worlds is growing steadily. It seems that they are better places than
our world in which to spend time. Social synthetic worlds (SSW) have become
especially popular in recent times, with the aim of creating a communications
environment for people. The players do not have certain roles in these games.
People visit clubs and art exhibitions, study, go shopping, make objects and
bargain with them, and of course, there's the main idea – to communicate with
other players. In that way, societies of players come into being with their own
languages, cultures and norms.
The leading SSW world at
the moment is “Second Life,” whose number of users is increasing by an average
of 20% a month. The game's own money is valid in this world (its currency being
Lindens, $L). This can be used to buy objects, and a vast range of virtual
objects can be bought and sold within the world of Second Life. A simple
programming language exists which enables users to build virtual objects; with
this it is possible to make whatever the user wants - houses, cars, clothes,
weapons, etc. The trade taking place within synthetic worlds has merged with
real world business: for example, Lindens can be exchanged for dollars and vice
versa. The digital objects in a synthetic world can be sold and bought. At the
time of writing, the turnover of virtual trade is approximately 100 million
dollars a year throughout the world.
Synthetic worlds are
more than games. Where they are considered to be games, we can speak about a
very special kind of game that would better be termed “communicating in
places.” What happens in these places is, in fact, neither a game nor
communication. It could be considered to be a combination of real
communications and a game-like context (Castronova 2005, 68-69). An activity
can take place in a medieval world or in a space station. Characters can be
wizards, witches, dwarfs, aliens. The way they discuss the killing of dragons
or conquering the planet is absolutely real communication, with planning and
coordinating activities. The fact that real people act in the synthetic world
means that in these worlds, independent of their physical shape and the
environment that has been created, communications, trade, sex, and any other
human activities can and do occur. These worlds could, in a physical sense,
differ greatly from our real world. In spite of that, human worlds are still
very much concerned, because people, who can be represented by avatars with
different appearances from their own, act in these.
As a result, fully working virtual
worlds, where hundreds of thousands of people constantly spend their time, have
come into being. While the early understanding of the virtual world
concentrated on techniques, technology, and manipulation with human sensory
input, a present-day virtual world such as Second Life concentrates on the
society that evolves within it. It is not necessary to imitate the real world completely to create
a feeling of reality, but events that interest us in the real world and make
the world worth living in must happen, in some form. As with computer
simulations that are based on agents, the processes are researched at the micro
level, and then in synthetic worlds at the macro level. These virtual societies
serve as laboratories in which it is possible to investigate social and
cultural processes.
Basically, the synthetic
world enables us to investigate any theories and hypotheses regarding human
society. Present-day synthetic worlds are so complex and sophisticated that
they can reflect all aspects of the real world. In addition, they enable much
that is not possible in the real world. Synthetic worlds have been created by
people, but the people and societies and cultures in these worlds are real. The
conditions in which these worlds will come into being and operate can therefore
be predetermined. For example, we can allow each citizen to have cash money and
observe predetermined hyperinflation. We can change the rules of the world and
see what happens after that. Experiments can be repeated, and we can choose the
people participating in them.
Areas in which the
methodology of an artificial culture can easily be applied are modelling the
interactions between cultures, the division of cultures into subcultures, how
they influence each other, and the formation of hybrid societies. The given
methodology can be used to play through alternative scenarios in cultural
evolution and to carry out experiments of the “what will happen if…” type.
Investigating cultural variety, which especially characterises modern
societies, and dealing with cultural conflicts, collisions, competition and
invasion, are particularly relevant and attractive research topics.
4. Discussion
Culture is a phenomenon
that concerns humans alone. Of course, it has not developed only alongside
human development, since other animal species may also have their
“protocultures.” However, Homo sapiens
is the only species whose culture-transmission is steady enough for
co-evolution with the genetic heredity system.
If humans are the
creators of culture in a direct or indirect way, then how can we speak about
artificial culture? If for us the word “artificial” means something created by
humans, then the whole of culture is artificial. Nevertheless the real
situation is not at all so simple. The relationship between humans and culture
is very complicated. On the one hand, humans create culture, but at the same
time culture designs humans. The cultural reality seems to exist apart from the
individual person. We all live within culture, but every one of us is quite
limited in our ability to direct and influence it. Cultural information is
being forwarded from person to person and from generation to generation without
anyone intentionally directing it. So, culture is similar to language.
Fundamentally, natural language has been created by humans. Every person can
invent words. At the same time, language is something more and is somehow given
to humans. It is the same with culture. We can create some parts of culture,
but culture as such has been given to us.
Heiner Mühlmann is one
of the authors who describes the development of culture as a natural process.
In many ways, the cultural process is similar to the natural one. Humans have
not consciously initiated it, nor do they design it. We do not know exactly how
the development of culture is dependent on human activity. Mühlmann (1996:5)
writes:
Culture is a living system. It is,
so to say, an animal, a wild animal whose behaviour can not be directly
influenced by mankind. If it were conceivable that rational people could
beneficially influence this wild animal, then this form of influence would
correspond to the act of domestication. We would have to tame culture.
Robert Ornstein and Paul Ehrlich
also write that cultural evolution is still developing in an undirected way,
and that it is too slow to meet the demands of contemporary society. According
to Ornstein and Ehrlich, biological as well as cultural evolution is
inappropriate to adapting humans to the environments which we ourselves have
created around us. These authors see the only solution as turning previously
unconscious cultural evolution into consciously directed evolution by humans
(Ornstein, Ehrlich 2000: 4, 12, 64). They write:
The potential exists for a new kind of educated
evolution, which we call conscious cultural
evolution, or conscious evolution, to supplement unconscious cultural
evolution. There is nothing
magical or bizarre about conscious evolution, it is a step that is already being taken by some. But we need to
teach children about what is “natural” in our evolution
and what now needs to be changed. (Ornstein, Ehrlich 2000: 202).
I use the wilderness
metaphor to indicate and stress that culture does not have a direct dependency
on humans. Nature has always been a metaphoric parallel to society ( Franklin
2002: 49). They have always reflected each other, as well as being tools for
constructing each other. Metaphors change our concepts about problems,
broadening discussion and introducing new analogies to indicate new relations
and connections.
Natural metaphors have
always been used to describe culture. Analogies from nature speak about
culture's emergence, birth, bloom, growth, development, vitality and
extinction. Of course, these analogies are not just accidental, but reflect
culture's extreme complexity, abundant and various relations, and ability to
adapt to the environment. Like nature, culture is essential for humans; without
it humans as such would not exist.
In recent years, the
idea of culture has clearly moved from that of a reality controlled by humans
to something more like the exterior distinct world. Culture which was ordered -
being useful and beautiful - has changed to become disordered, and a malignant
source of risks. Nature and culture have changed places as the sources of the
main risks to society. An obvious necessity has come about for human beings to
intervene in the natural development of culture and to start directing it
according to human needs. However, it is far from clear which way the essence
of current cultures should be changed. Changing culture is a complicated task.
According to Eagleton: “the transmutation of a whole culture would be more
laborious than damming up a river or destroying a mountain. At least in this
point nature could be processed more easily than culture”(2000: 93).
The main difference
between artificial and natural cultures lies in their adaptability to our
purposes. We can compare this with the phenomenon of language. In addition to
natural languages, human beings have created several artificial languages that
have definite, delimited functions. Taking into consideration the
ever-increasing accumulation of problems related to culture in the world, the
development of artificial cultures has become a significant task. Yet is obvious why developments in that direction
have been quite scanty - culture is the most complicated phenomenon that
science has ever had to deal with.
The more technology
develops, the more the ever-expanding ethical and philosophical questions
related to it arise. Whilst mankind has not entirely prohibited any of its
developed technologies - not even weapons of mass destruction that could
undoubtedly extinguish life on the whole planet - it is crucial that we learn
to adapt to new and ever-faster changing technologies. Paradoxically, to be able
to manage with contemporary technologies we have to know not only the
technologies themselves, but their impacts on people. For that reason, it is
becoming increasingly important to give due consideration to the cumulative
effect of culture and technology. From the viewpoint of
posthumanist/transhumanist theory, culture has been left out. It seems to me
that the role of culture has been greatly undervalued. Very likely, culture is
the factor which determines whether we reach a posthuman future, and whether we
can make use of all the opportunities that such a future would offer us.
5. Conclusion
Human societies
reorganize both the surrounding environment and themselves. As a result,
society is becoming more and more artificial. The driving force behind this
process is constantly renewing technologies that are developed to increase
human welfare. One characteristic of technological development is that it moves
inwards from the outside world: closer to man, closer to the intimate core of
an individual. Technology has moved from the reorganization of the physical
environment to manipulation of man’s biological body, genome and consciousness.
There is only one more border area to colonize - the cultural resources of
mankind. The culture that we have always considered man’s naturally evolved
environment should be redefined as an artificial environment with countless
opportunities.
The artificialisation of
culture necessitates actually creating artificial cultures according to our
aims and needs. Two directions for creating artificial cultures are being
evolved. The first is the computer modelling of cultures, with which completely
artificial simulations of cultures are being formed, while the second is with
synthetic worlds, which are simulated communications environments with which
people are interacting.
Progress in the arts and
information technology provides a realistic opportunity for mankind to
reorganize the cultural structure of society. The goal of artificial cultures
is clear – technologically modified or constructed cultures. One day in the
future it may mean totally new, artificially constructed cultures. For now, it
means the modification, alteration and adaptation of the existing ones.
Acknowledgements
The work was partially supported by
a research grant from Estonian Science Foundation (6686). I am very grateful to
an anonymous referee for detailed comments and feedback.
References
Bartle, R. 2003. Designing virtual worlds. Indianapolis:
New Riders
Bauerle-Willert, D.
2003. Culture, place and location. In Place and Location. Studies in
Environmental Aesthetics and Semiotics III, ed. Virve Sarapik and Kadri
Tüür, 149-153. Tallinn: Estonian Academy of Arts.
Castronova, E. 2005. Synthetic worlds: The business and culture of online games. Chicago
and London: University of Chicago Press.
Chase, A. 2001. In a dark wood: The fight over forests and
the myths of nature. New Brunswick, N.J.: Transaction Publishers.
Davis, K. 1997. “My body
is my art”: Cosmetic surgery as feminist utopia.
The European Journal of Women's Studies 4: 3-37.
Dibbell, J. 1999. My tiny life: Crime and passion in a virtual
world. New York: Owl Books.
Dusek, V. 2006. Philosophy of technology. Oxford:
Blackwell.
Ethical aspects of ICT
implants in the human body . Opinion of the European Group on Ethics in Science
and New Technologies to the European Commission. 2005. See:
http://www.libertysecurity.org/IMG/pdf/avisgrouponeticsen.pdf, retrieved
12.04.2007.
Eagleton, T. 2000. The idea of culture. Oxford: Blackwell
Franklin , A. 2002. Nature and social theory. London,
Thousand Oaks, New Delhi: Sage Publications.
Forsyth, T. 2003. Critical political ecology: The politics of
environmental science. New Tork: Routledge.
Gessler, N. 2002.
Computer models of cultural evolution. See: http://www.sscnet.ucla.edu/geog/gessler/cv-pubs/02comocultevo.htm.
retrieved 12.04.2007.
Gessler, N. 1995.
Ethnography of artificial culture – Specifications, prospects and constraints.
In Evolutionary programming IV.
Proceedings of the fourth annual conference on evolutionary programming,
ed. J. R. McDonnell, R. Reynolds and D. Fogel, 319-331. Cambridge: MIT Press.
Gessler, N. 1994.
Artificial culture. In Artificial life
IV. Proceedings of the fourth international workshop on the synthesis and
simulation of living systems, ed. R. Brooks and P. Maes, 430-435.
Cambridge: MIT Press.
Gilman, S. 1999. Making the body beautiful. Princeton:
Princeton University Press.
Haraway, D. 2001. A
cyborg manifesto: Science, technology and socialist-feminism in the late twentieth
century. In The cybercultures reader,
ed. D. Bell and B. Kennedy, 291-324. London and New York: Routledge.
Huber, P. 1999. Hard green: Saving the environment from the
environmentalists, a conservative manifesto. New York: Basic Books.
Editorial. 2006. Is this
the bionic man? Nature 442, 7099,
109.
Krueger, O. 2005. Gnosis
in cyberspace?: Body, mind and progress in posthumanism. Journal of Evolution and Technology 14: 78-79.
Ljungberg, C. 2001.
Wilderness from an ecosemiotic perspective. Sign
System Studies 29.1: 169-186.
Murray, C. 2002.
Injectable chip opens door to human bar code. EE Times. See: http://eetimes.com/story/OEG20020104S0044, retrieved
12.04.2007.
Mühlmann, H. 1996. The nature of cultures: A blueprint for a
theory of culture genetics. Wien, New-York: Springer-Verlag.
Ornstein, R., Ehrlich,
P. 2000. New world new mind: moving
toward conscious evolution. Cambridge, MA: Malor Books.
Popper, F. 1993. Art of the electronic age. Thames and
Hudson.
Robertson, G., Mash, M.,
Tickner, L., Bird, J., Curtis, B., and Putnam, T. 1996. FutureNatural: Nature, science, culture. London: Routledge.
Rolston, H. 1989. Values gone wild. New York: Prometheus
Books.
Sagoff, M. 2005. Nature and human nature. In Is human nature
obsolete? ed H. Baillie and T. Casey, 67-98. The MIT Press.
Sloterdijk, P. (undated)
The operable man. On the ethical state of gene technology. See:
http://www.petersloterdijk.net/international/texts/en_texts/en_texts_PS_operable_man.html
retrieved 12.04.2007.
Stephenson, N. 1992. Snow crash.New York: Bantam.
Taniguchi S. and Cooper
D.K.C. 1997. Clinical xenotransplantation - A brief review of the world
experience. In Xeno-transplantation: The
transplantation of Organs and Tissues Between Species. 2nd ed., ed. D.K.C.
Cooper, E. Kemp, J.L. Platt and D.J.G. White, 776-792. Berlin: Springer-Verlag.
Thoreau, H. 1862.
Walking. Part 2 [18, 28,31] See: http://thoreau.eserver.org/walking.html,
retrieved 12.04.2007.
Tomas, D. 2001.The
technophilic body. In The cybercultures
reader, ed. D. Bell and B. Kennedy, 175-189. London and New York:
Routledge.
United Network for Organ
Sharing website. See: http://www.unos.org/ retrieved 12.04.2007.
Warwick, K. 2002. I,
cyborg. London: Century.
White House. National
donate life month: A proclamation by the president of the United States. News
release April 2, 2003. See:
http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2003/04/20030402.html retrieved
12.04.2007.