Ok, two weeks since my last post…It’s cool though…Finals are over, I’ve started working full time, and (drumroll!) I’ve been commissioned to create a feature-length documentary.
Thanks to trusty ol’ Moore’s Law (and a very special person) I am now the proud owner of a professional High Definition video camera. I’m blogging it and living it! This is where the REAL fun starts. By next year Moore’s Law will allow me to upgrade my editing workstation.
So…what about this documentary? It’s about these two street-racing Laotian brothers who are struggling to beat the competition.
How do I connect this to the Singularity? Well, every time I drive I think of how cars are like transport pods in our cells. Our cells use transport vesicles to transport proteins across the cell membrane in a process called Exocytosis. We use vehicles to transport ourselves from building to building in a process called commuting.
And what else could better show that we are on our way toward a merger between man and machine? Are we not cyborgs when driving our cars? Where do we end and the machine begin? Most would say where our nerves end, but I don’t think so. We ‘virtually’ graft our nerves to the car by sensing when to shift, press the gas, or receive information from the gauges. We essentially become one with the mechanical beast.
And so far it’s crude; we just grab a hold of the wheel and look at gauges. Due to the exponential nature of technological development that won’t last much longer. Research and practical testing is being done now to tie directly into our nervous systems. Just as the machine-age made way for the computer age the ‘grabbing the steering wheel and physically typing’ age will give way to a much more intricate, intelligent, and intimate forms of human interface with machines.
And I was going to relax, you know - take it easy this summer…yeah right! This is me we’re talking about..which reminds me I’ve been itching to come up with another podcast. Look for it soon.
-Chris
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May 31st, 2007 at 2:00 am
“Are we not cyborgs when driving our cars? Where do we end and the machine begin? Most would say where our nerves end, but I don’t think so. We ‘virtually’ graft our nerves to the car by sensing when to shift, press the gas, or receive information from the gauges. We essentially become one with the mechanical beast.”
I cannot more agree with you. Have you ever heard of the french thinker
Michel Serres ? (also teaching at Stanford University). He describes technology (from the first spear to the lastest satellite) as a direct extension from our biological bodies. a hammer is an arm with its closed fist, an aircraft, a man with wings, a car, a man with “rolling feets” and a shell etc…
and what’s the most amazing is that you can play this little game with every gadget you want, it still works.
it’s like technology has always been about body enhancement. from the very beginning. we always were cyborgs in a way, but it seems to me we’re accepting this only today because we’re reaching a point where Nature is asking humanity to take the next step of its evolution and global awarness of what we are towards our machines is needed.
and congratulations for your site. keep going
J.
June 29th, 2007 at 11:12 pm
[…] do I love about it? Well, if you read THIS post then you know my stance that when a human is operating a car, the line between man and machine […]