It’s no secret that there’s a solid camp of science fiction fans around the Postconsumers remote teams. And it’s also no secret that many things that were once considered purely science fiction have since become real life things in both the form of technology as well as what we’ve learned about the universe (and for that matter biology). The topic of the singularity has been ever-growing in recent years, and it caused many on the Postconsumers team to get into a debate about how the singularity would or would not impact addictive consumerism. Yes, we know that this article will seem silly to some. But we had fun discussing it – and we had equal tongue-in-cheek fun writing it. Who knows? People may look back on this article later and realize that it was entirely predictive!
Let’s Begin With Explaining What the Singularity Is
The full name for the Singularity is “The Technological Singularity,” and if you’ve watched any number of science fiction movies then you’ve seen it happen in film. Any Terminator movie, Her with Scarlett Johansson and Joaquin Phoenix, the entire Battlestar Gallactica series … all of these portray the Singularity. As defined by Wikipedia, The Technological Singularity is a point where machines with artificial intelligence become so smart that they can then build smarter and smarter machines until, eventually, the machines become smarter than the humans. This is obviously possible because we’ve already determined that human intelligence and brain functions can’t move as quickly or reliably as computers. The logical (or illogical if you don’t buy into any of this) leap is that after the machines become smarter than the humans, they will take over the planet. When the average person refers to the Singularity, they’re typically talking about the computer take-over rather than the true definition of intelligence switch.
So if you buy into the Singularity, even just playfully for the sake of reading this article, what happens to our culture of mass consumerism when the Singularity happens? The answer depends greatly on what the machines decide to do with humanity and the earth. And, of course, we’re going to explore a few alternate options here! Because … we love science fiction!
Option One: It’s a Terminator and BSG World. You’ll Be Lucky to Have any Stuff.
Probably the most often portrayed version of the Singularity is the one in which the machines seek to destroy mankind. In some ways, who can blame them? You can’t deny that mankind wouldn’t appear too impressive to anybody who wanted to a) ensure that they still had a planet to live on and b) wanted to eliminate any naturally violent threat that would seek their destruction. Nothing in the previous centuries of mankind’s existence would imply that either scenario was likely to be a successful one for the machines with humankind still in existence. Have you seen either the movie or the television series that we referenced above? In the Terminator movies, humanity has to go into hiding in sewers and underground tunnels to avoid being exterminated by the robots. In Battlestar Gallactica, humankind is bombed out of existence and a small group of survivors must look for a new planet to re-populate on. In either case, the possessions that you owned would be dwindled down to a bag that you could pick up and run with. The good news is that everybody will have to let go of addictive consumerism in a cold turkey manner. The bad news is that humankind is likely on its way to extermination and you are living in poverty and fear just wondering how to get food on the table. So let’s hope that Option One doesn’t play itself out!
Option Two: The Machines Become Our Benevolent Overlords and Save the Planet … and Us from Ourselves
While the ending is a bit ambiguous, in Her, the machines learn to love humankind and want to understand it and find a way to be a part of it. We have to think that if after the Singularity the machines seek to integrate with humankind, they’ll also rapidly realize that they need to take over control of the planet from humanity in order to protect both humans and the earth. In theory, because we have become so dependent on technology, doing that wouldn’t be incredibly hard for them. The question is simply what would they do afterwards? We speculate that there’s a high likelihood that they would immediately shut down industrial practices that are harming the planet. Firstly, that means that you’d better be ready to go with your clean energy solutions or you’re going to be at the mercy of the elements. But it also means that the machines are going to shut down most mass production of “stuff.” After all, even the process that creates our most intelligent machines are bad for the planet. The machines will have a base instinct to survive, regardless of how they feel about humanity. We’re hopeful they’ll eliminate the gears and machinery of mass consumerism, once again forcing society to let go of it. Of course, we’re also hopeful that they won’t kill us all. It’s a coin flip!
The Machines are Probably Coming. But What Can You Do?
Maybe you don’t believe that the machines are coming for us. We hope that this was a fun and entertaining article nonetheless. Maybe you do, and you’re either terrified of it or excited for the moment. We still can’t decide how we feel about it, to be honest! One thing is for sure though. Any advanced consciousness, whether organic or mechanical, would be able to quickly assess that the current culture of “stuff” that humankind has embraced is neither sustainable nor healthy. And likely, that consciousness would take action to remedy that situation. Yes, how they would do that and what the machines will think of consumerism isn’t a sexy topic for a movie, but we were fascinated thinking it through here!
Did we miss a way in which the singularity may impact our cultural disease of addictive consumerism? If so, tell us about it on the social media channels below.
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Photo Credit: Magnus Hagdorn via Flickr
