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Media Constructed Universe. Marshall McLuhan once referred to as "Oracle of the Electronic Age" said we shape our tools and they in turn shape us. 1 That definition was applied to the Technological Determinism Theory. According to Marshall McLuhan the technological progress determines the society development and what is more, it is the primary cause of the social processes development. According to the Theory of the Technological Determinism the technology is the prime mover of the social and historical changes of the society 2. To which extend can technological process change the society? According to the Technological Determinism Theory we acquire the extensions of our natural tools given to us by the nature by inventing and applying the new tools.
It is all correct while speaking of vehicles which help us to move faster, typewriters; they accelerate the process of writing. When we speak on the artificial intellect development, is there a danger that such achievements may get out of control? The mankind, unfortunately has already got sad experience when the technological inventions had been implemented long before their possible negative consequences were studied properly. Such situation was with the nuclear energy (Chernobyl Catastrophe) and other technological achievements. The same thing could happen to the information development of the society. The computing machines help us to solve complicated tasks.
Nowadays the society depends upon the information systems greatly. One can hardly find any side of our everyday life without the computers. The information progress is going on rapidly. People try to make machines really intellectual ones to solve complicated tasks. Could the computing systems replace the poetry, art, human written literature etc?
Could they denote our feeling like pain, joy, love etc? The future of the mankind will depend upon the information technologies and artificial intellect. To what extend these technologies and machine intellect may influence the humanity? It is worth to recollect the history of creation and development of the Internet. It does not belong to anyone and though it is under the control in a way, it may be used both for the benefit of the mankind and for the harm. The Internet is a splendid type of communication for the people of the good will as well as for the terrorists and the criminals worldwide.
It is the excellent source for the information providing the access to the cultural treasures of humanity as well as to the violence and pornography. The Internet is used by the students, artists and by the terrorists. The World Wide Web provides the education and the human hating propaganda. This is the first example when the technological achievement may bring the harm globally and the mankind being familiar with this fact is not able manage it properly.
The global terrorism and 9 / 11 attacks made people change their attitude towards the uncontrolled IT development. The global terrorism uses the Internet and other IT in its criminal aims thus creating the real threat for the society. Meeting the new challenge the FBI introduced the program of "Carnivore" Diagnostic Tool. Carnivore is a very effective and discriminating special purpose electronic surveillance system 4.
Carnivore system finds its implementation in combating the terrorism, espionage, information warfare, child pornography and sexual exploitation of children and serious fraud. On one hand the introduction of Carnivore may be considered as the civil rights violence, but on the other hand the terrorism declared the war to the civilized society and the society needs to reevaluate the norms and standards of freedoms and their implementation. The introduction of Carnivore indicated that the Internet became self developed uncontrolled media channel and may be used to harm the society. The Carnivore system is developed to prevent the possible negative consequences of the uncontrolled spread of the information. Echelon is another system aimed to control the intellectual IT technologies. The European Parliament in its report admitted the existence of the global system of interception of private and commercial communications (ECHELON Interception System) 6.
This system may be based on the satellite technologies only and taking into consideration the limited number of countries owning the satellite technologies and close cooperation between these countries the system becomes a real threat to the civilized community. The Committee of the EU states, on the basis of the information obtained by the Temporary Committee, that the existence of a global system for intercepting communications, operating with the participation of the United States, the United Kingdom, Canada, Australia and New Zealand under the UKUSA Agreement, is no longer in doubt 7. Thus, all our communications might be under the control, the privacy of the life is no longer personal issue. In spite of the declarations of the human rights our correspondence is the subject of revision by the third parties.
The ECHELON indicates that the technical means became powerful enough to control the communications globally. It could be assume that this supervision of the communication may get out of control or on the other hand if human beings may control the communications globally, then it is possible to forecast possible terrible consequences that may happen because of the technical failures of the equipment. So, if we assume that the Internet is the utmost extension of the human capabilities of the natural communicative means, the Echelon is shows that the technological progress leads to a dead end, because the mankind needs some hi tech system to restrict such capabilities. Echelon shows that people need to limit their capabilities. That means that our capabilities have been developed beyond our needs and we should find the alternative tools to limit them because they became uncontrolled and may bring the harm for the society.
The modern artists, particularly in cinematography try to forecast the possible ways of the society's development and the role of the artificial intellect in it. Even now we face the phenomenon when the computer systems may take some actions which do not depend upon the users. Such situations are observed with the computer viruses which may destroy the entire system causing the unpredictable consequences. According to the Report of the European Union the Echelon system is functioning globally and may monitor and record practically all communications, both private and governmental.
The personal signatures have been verifying the identity of people for all the times. Nowadays a number of countries have adopted the regulations identifying the digital signatures as the method of the personality identification. The USA adopted the UCITA (the Uniform Computer Information Transactions Act). This Act regulates the usage of the Internet as the means of the commercial transactions and enforcing the digital signatures.
A number of the US organizations and companies are against the UCITA regulations. Only two states have adopted UCITA. Three other states have adopted bomb shelter legislation attempting to shield their states residents from UCITA being applied to their contracts. UCITA continues to be opposed by consumers, computer professionals, librarians and even insurance companies and brick and mortar companies like Caterpillar and Boeing 8. One of the main reasons defining the society's strong protest of UCITA is that it violates the basics of business, the identification of the transaction participants. People see the danger of their misidentification by the digital means.
One of the most critical issues is the attitude of the society towards the cloning. It is horrible to think that the scientists may clone the human beings and the society has the perspective to get an army of hitlers, usama bin laden's, hussein's and an army of terrorists just by the scientific experiments. It is wrong to think that human cloning is the exaggeration. The first steps were taken by introducing the genetic modified products. The technology of the genetic modification in agriculture indicates that cloning is possible. The future of the mankind in the digitally created universe has been the subject of the plots of the numerous movies.
One of the latest hits The Matrix narrates the gloomy picture when the civilization is divided into two worlds, cruel artificial virtual society that started affecting the real lives of the people and the world of human beings trying to combat the virtual world to survive. All the human truths are reveled in the brilliant movie which is a warning for the civilization. The main hero Neo is coming to the real world to combat the virtual one as Messiah and a saver. The Neos mission is to liberate humanity from 'the Matrix; a vast virtual reality system which up until the time of narration, Neo had thought was 'the real world' 9 The most important question that could arise is if the Matrix possible in the future. It is difficult to say, but the warning by The Wachowski brothers is impressive. The Matrix shows the consequences of the artificial intellect when it gets out of control.
The heroes of the Matrix are the machines deprived of any human feelings on one hand and people who created these machines and have to combat them to survive on the other hand. If the movie is analyzed properly one may note that some of the indications of the Matrix we have in our everyday life. The Internet is capturing our consciousness. It really becomes the Matrix to hide in from the everyday problems. The Wachowski brothers created the Matrix as the community of the future ruled by the ugly new order. The mankind has already experienced attempts to introduce the various modifications of the new orders, from communism with the worldwide proletarian revolution to Nazism with the concentration camps and the paradise for the God chosen nation.
The background of all those inhuman philosophies was aimed to create their own Matrix in which people would live according to the laws of the Matrix. The most dangerous threat outlined in the brilliant movie is that the Matrix is managed by itself. There are no any leaders or rulers heading the Matrix. The Matrix is the self sufficient system that has been created by the people, got out of their control and develops according its own laws. At the same time it is worth noting that the Matrix and its half people, half machines agents are invented by the human beings. It is interesting to note also that the society in which the cultural, spiritual values are neglected can not be human.
The brave people combating the Matrix are the people who want to defend and preserve the spiritual values of the humanity. The rest are narrated as the mob of senseless, faceless creatures that follow the Matrix rules. Is there a real threat of the matrix in the future of mankind? The Matrix is the artists warning of the danger of annihilation of the human values.
The people who are fighting the Matrix are the people who are controlled not only by the technological achievements, but by the human values like love, friendship etc. The film shows that these human values are more powerful than the technical process. The level of the technology will never define the victory of the cold inhuman rationalism over the human values. The authors of the Matrix completely crushed the theory of the technological determinism showing that the technological determinism causes the regress of the society but not a progress. Almost the same idea of the society's development is in the plot of the Terminator.
The idea of the machine domination is expressed even more distinctively in the Terminator. There is an idea that in the future the machines constructed by people to extend their capabilities may get out of control and start developing themselves bringing the real threat to the society. The machines inherit the peoples worst quality, the aspiration to dominate over everybody and everything. The example what the society may become like if it is leaded by the technological determinism is narrated in the video clip by Pink Floyd The Wall. This album has a very special meaning. When the people are associated with the marching rows of hammers it is a real warning what we may become if we develop according to the technological determinism theory.
We may all become small parts of the big machine and the machine will define our destinies and our development. More narrative example of how the technological achievement may get out of control is narrated in the film by Andrew Niccol Simone. The brilliant American actor Al Pacino and director of the film created a good comedy based on the story that may be considered to be real. The director of the film (Al Pacino) creates the virtual actress and includes her into his film. The success was overwhelming. The only one thing, the virtual actress began living her own life.
The paradox was that Simone (the virtual actress) influenced the life of her creator greatly. Apart of success in his professional activity he received the recognition from the people. He renewed his family and the only one thing that was difficult to admit was that the virtual actress got out of control of her creator. It seemed to be a very easy thing to cancel everything connected with Simone, but the hero can not to do it because his entire reputation depends upon Simone. Simone was created by the director of the film. He put all the best features typical for women according to his understanding to Simone.
Simone was accepted by the public with the overwhelming success. Simone shows the real talent of her creator. The trouble is that the public could not even admit the possibility that Simone was a virtual creation. Simone got out of control of her creator and he needed to do something to restore the status quo.
There was a problem for the hero, if he revealed the truth he would loose his reputation because public needs idol which is real, made of flesh and not the virtual one. It is like a dream and such dream may exist if it is mysterious. The story shows that the virtual creations may exist independently and what is more, they may impact the lives of their creators greatly. The hero of the film accidentally got a mighty tool for his professional activity intended to improve real actors but this tool substituted the real actors, later this tool got out of control.
The creator resembles mythic ancient Greek sculptor Pygmalion who created the sculpture of Galatea, which was so real that the author fell in love with her and Venus took pity on Pygmalion and brought his statue to life, and he and "Galatea, " as he named her, blushed, embraced, and married with the goddess's blessing 10. The artists applied to relations of the creators with their creations from the ancient myths. In all the literature works dedicated to this issue the writers describe the humanization of the created masterpieces. The developed information technologies made such myths come true.
The developed society may face the challenge of the great impact of the high technologies on the peoples existence. The commercialization of the information technologies makes people consume the information products without their consent. In this regard we may observe that the tool (IT) may really shape people in the most alarming way, their perception of the reality. The presentations of such masterpieces of the cultural treasures as the works, for example, by W. Shakespeare became out of interest for the representatives of the modern IT because they do not bring immediate financial benefits. One may hardly find the works by classic literature expressed by modern means.
This fact may indicate that the modern information technologies are not capable to express real treasures of the mankind. The developers of high information technologies bear the great responsibility before the society over the possible consequences. But until people control their IT creations the mankind has the chance not to loose its moral values. As for the future of the mankind, we have only two options, to control our tools or let them shape us according to the technological determinism and create the Matrix of our own.
Bibliography Marshall McLuhan (1911 - 1980), available at web Daniel Chandler, Technological or Media Determinism web Donald M. Kerr, Assistant Director, Laboratory Division, FBI Testimony before the United States Senate, The Committee on the Judiciary, September 6, 2000, "Carnivore Diagnostic Tool" European Parliament, REPORT On the Existence of a Global System for the Interception of Private and Commercial Communications (ECHELON interception system) (2001 / 2098 (INI) ), available at web Consumers STILL Oppose UCITA In 2003, National Consumer Law Centre, available at web Leong, Anthony, The Matrix Movie Review, retrieved 6. 03. 2005, available at web Citation. Daniel Chandler Ibid Marshall McLuhan Ibid Donald M. Kerr European Parliament Ibid National Consumer Law Centre Leong, Anthony The Mirror of Fiction, excerpted from The Pygmalion Project, by Dr. Stephen Montgomery, available at web
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