THE UNVEILING OF THE UNCANNY VALLEY

We are integrating so quickly into a technological hyper-reality that the simulation is far more real than the mediocrity of the real. Everything is so intensified that our stimulation sensors need upgrades in order to sustain the kind of stimulation we are seeing today. In order to do this we may have to face voluntary human extinction with the promise that a better life awaits through technological advancement.

Science fiction illustrates the extremes of transhuman form. Even though the idea of transhumanism extends the promise of neutralized pain and suffering, we must understand that it is pain and suffering that makes the joy of the human experience more meaningful. It has been demonstrated in science fiction that while transhuman technology may prolong the life of one man, he still remains a slave buried in a technological prison. In Star Wars, Darth Vader was enslaved by technology and his ego. In Robocop, the protagonist was fighting to regain his lost humanity.

Nietzsche’s description of the ‘Übermensch‘ is one who has surpassed humankind, but still cares for the transience and vitality that humankind represents. We all know the story of Pinocchio wanting to be a real boy – and yet there are many humans that feel that they need to become Pinocchio’s. The need for love and the need for humanity can be found in the movie A.I. The story was haunting, the creepiness compelling, and served as a warning to those who believe that full evolution from MECHA to ORGA is possible.

While there are pacemakers, titanium heart valves and now bionic limbs in order to improve life, there are people that believe that voluntary conversion to machines will help in creating a heaven on earth. The new evolution is being prepared as we speak and many people are ready to convert. The question is: “How far will you go?”

We have sped up our evolution with the use of drugs, bodily enhancements and technology. The human we will see in the not too distant future, will be an advanced human, maybe even something that has a semblance to humanity without being human.

We are now entering a new phase, of what Stephen Hawking has called “self designed evolution,” in which we will be able to change and improve our DNA. At first these changes will be confined to the repair of genetic defects, like cystic fibrosis, and muscular dystrophy. These are controlled by single genes, and so are fairly easy to identify, and correct. Other qualities, such as intelligence, are probably controlled by a large number of genes. It will be much more difficult to find them, and work out the relations between them. Nevertheless, Hawking is sure that during the next century, people will discover how to modify both intelligence and instincts like aggression.

Hawking also says that in order for mankind to stretch out to into cosmos we will have to modify our bodies. Hawking believes, that we will have to employ intelligent machines based on mechanical and electronic components, rather than macromolecules, which could eventually replace DNA based life, just as DNA may have replaced an earlier form of life. From the ooze came a primitive form of life, from that life came man, from that life came modified human forms and enhanced bodies, and the future will be full of beings that are either nonhuman or human mechanized hybrids that can have super abilities.

Ever since man walked the earth he has made his world, destroyed it and made it all over again. As it is written biblically that God made man in his own image, it must be said that man has made things in his own image to his own liking in ways unprecedented for thousands of years. It has been speculated by many theorists that as man realizes his power he most often sees himself as a God and develops technological creations that imitate what is termed “natural“ or “human.”

By the time we get to the postmodern world that many human beings inhabit today, the lived-in, physical environment is for the most part, culturally produced. Reality is encountered mostly as virtual, or produced as an effect of human enhancements and operations. We are kept constantly surrounded by human productions and technology that is indistinguishable from magic. We are transported everywhere by machines within a realm totally fabricated by human engineering. We remain mesmerized by phenomena that are electronically simulated. We lose ourselves in virtual worlds.

Most memories now, and collective unconscious thought has been pumped into you through electronic transmission. You accept reality through the electronic medium. All things both real and simulated have had an effect of your brain. You have retained everything based on what a controlled electronic dictum has given you. Our rational minds are now far from rational because we have had most of the objective reality replaced by hyper-reality.

Many of us now may or may not know that we have already crossed what is known as the ‘uncanny valley‘ where something that appears human is really not human or something we see in a movie looks natural or real but in reality is simulated.

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