David Krakauer, evolutionary geneticist, complexity theorist and CEO of the Santa Fe Institute (SFI), takes the long view.
In our wide ranging conversation regarding where humanity might head (see the video here), Krakauer shared perspectives on brain scanning a billion people, ethical issues posed by technology such as free will and privacy, and even how ideas like the Calculus change us as a species. “Ideas change who we are in a fundamental sense. They change how we attain energy in the world, they change how we organize our societies, they change how we move. Without the Calculus, we wouldn’t have rocket ships.”
Krakauer also discussed how the experience of being human might change this century as a result of technology. He started by looking back 150,000 years, and first considered what hasn’t much changed. “If you went back 3,000 years to ancient Sumer, you’d meet someone and say, ‘this is a decent human being.’ The timescale over which core human values change is very slow.”
What does seem different in our present century are the scale and pace of change. “If you look at the year 2000 B.C and the year 1000 B.C., there would be some difference, but not dramatic. If you looked at the year 1800 and the year 2016, they would look almost unrecognizably different.”
While evolutionary theory teaches us that genomes change based on the adaptive capacity of individuals to their environments, ideas — and technologies are ideas in physical form — also provide adaptive, or maladaptive, power. Philosopher Karl Popper argued that “all life is problem solving,” in the sense that genes encode solutions to challenges. Evolution favors genes whose organisms survive and reproduce, and eliminates those that fail. Our technologies play similar roles through other means.
Ideas also change our ethics. “The idea that somehow you can separate technology, mathematics, reason from morality strikes me as extraordinarily naïve,” argues Krakauer. “Structures of knowledge always have ethical implications…. Think about online banking… decisions were being made about you that were in some dimensions moral decisions.”
Trading Control For Convenience
What ethical issue concerns him most regarding our next few generations of technological development? Control, whether it’s related to data from our online behaviors or our personal genetic code. “I’m most concerned about unthinking acceptance of convenient short term solutions.” For instance, many consumers claim to be concerned about data privacy — who knows your details, and what they’re allowed to do as a result — but faced with offers of convenience, most people actively or passively cede control.
When was the last time you downloaded an app and simply accepted its terms without reading them? It’s understandable, but illustrates how often we comply. Recently, a senior executive at a major telecommunications provider shared that when consumers were faced with an offer for a 15% discount on internet access in exchange for a license to map their online usage patterns for commercial purposes, 98% of consumers accepted the deal. Ninety-eight percent. While this company opted not to use this information in order to avoid potential legal and brand challenges, the case illustrates consumers’ willingness to trade critical information for short-term benefits.
Krakauer underscores another underappreciated threat we all face: Humans are lazy. Technology makes life easier, allows us to experience and accomplish more. But every time we outsource effort or decision making to other entities, human or otherwise, we relinquish some control. “What I worry about almost more than anything else is a certain kind of mental laziness, and an unwillingness to engage with the difficult issues…. It’s somehow more pressing in a time where there are systems out there willing to make the decisions for you.”
Brain Scanning A Billion People
As we digitalize more of our lives, the scale and depth of information available about us, individually and collectively, is equivalent to brain scanning a billion people. It’s already transforming social, economic and political systems.
Our modern notion of privacy is a relatively recent phenomenon, as Krakauer’s SFI colleague Jessica Flack points out. When humans lived in small groups, privacy was essentially non-existent. Everyone knew what you were up to. As populations expanded and society grew in complexity, privacy in our modern sense became possible. “In that tiny fleeting window of time, we experienced privacy,” Krakauer explains. “So now, we’re returning to a mutant version of that ancient state…. The debate might not be about privacy or anonymity so much as the scale of knowledge.”
Humanity requires new ways to understand collectives, a challenge in which SFI is actively engaged. Computational, network and communications technologies proliferating this century will leverage, shape and be shaped by our social natures. It’s one thing if your neighbor or cousin knows your intimate details. It’s another if Google or a government knows. “That’s something that humans, by virtue of their cultural conditioning are very ill-equipped to deal with,” Krakauer cautions. “We don’t have the right immune system to deal with who has access to our knowledge.”
While human nature may not have changed much over the past 150,000 years, our individual and collective experiences of being human certainly have. We’ll need far more research, diligence and personal responsibility to navigate this century’s rapidly evolving world.
Returning to the long view, Krakauer asks a question central to how we build our futures: “What are those things we can count on into the future to steer a responsible course? What are those things that we think really will no longer be here?”
