… Only the very poor and downtrodden really needed religion, to make their laborous lives more bearable…  Happily for the governing class, a well-formed faith also kept people from seeking recompense in the here and now, through riot, insurrection or revolution. A temple was worth a dozen barracks; a militia man carrying a gun could control a small unarmed crowd only for as long as he was present; however, a single priest could put a policeman inside the head of every one of their flock, for ever.

Iain Banks – Matter

But what if you could do away with the religion as well by using technology?

If there’s something we’ve learnt from Senator Conroy’s Macarthy-esque paranoia about anyone using the internet being a pro-kiddy-fiddling, Google loving terrorist, or the previous Liberal government’s insistence that over $16,000,000 was well spent on a filter that a 14 year old with only intermediate computer skills was able to bypass in under 45 seconds, or city councils insistence on dry suburbs or pub-curfews, or the continued illegality of commercialization of sexual favours in all but two US states, or the still non-legal status of homosexual life partnerships the world over… *deep breath*… it’s that governments of all stripes love to legislate morality and social correctness.

And they would love nothing more than to be able to put a chip in your head (or, for those that love a good conspiracy, chemicals in your water supply), that would do this job for them and make us all good, happy and obedient people living free of vice of any kind.

So what would happen if they could?

In the amazingly awesome cartoon version of Aeon Flux, the episode titled The Purge sees antagonist Trevor Goodchild implanting a violent (Australian) criminal with a robotic conscience. Within the context of the show it worked by wrapping around his nervous system and forcing him to behave in the most moral and selfless manner one possibly could. The character becomes such a good samaritan that at one point he cuts off his own arm for a small boy to take. Aeon and Trevor then proceed to have a surreal argument during a gameshow about the morality of Authority enforcing morality on its citizens, or if free choice should include the right to act in an antisocial, criminal or violent manner if that is what one so chose.

The video game Syndicate Wars presents a utopia for its citizens. This is done by implants that actively alter citizens perception of reality, so in place of the real dystopia they live in they are presented with an ideal 1950s world of fluffiness and apple pies. Living in such a state of contentment, the citizenry has no reason to commit crimes or behave “immorally” (which makes it doubley as fun when you blew them away).

After all, crime is a symptom of discontent, and morality is a system of social control (and generally polite behaviour). Direct control of contentment = direct control of crime and social behaviour.

But can this sort of control be exerted over people with today’s level of technology?

The short answer is no… at least not your ability to make moral decisions without interference outside of lab settings. But various behavioural science labs are keen to change that, if only to understand the workings of the human mind and social interactions en masse.

Various experiments have been successfully carried out on the direct control, via implantable devices, of the motor functions of lower order mammals. The results are applicable to humans after some tweaking for differences in the motor cortex. That’s only direct motor control that can already be manipulated… But if someone else is controlling you and you’re aware of it, will you feel morally responsible for actions committed by your body? You’ll certainly experience any psychological traumas that may happen as a part of it.

Further experiments have also revealed a basic understanding of how to disrupt people’s ability to think coherently, alter choices in what the experimental subjects considered in accordance to their moral principles, and even to some extent completely alter the choices that people would normally make under certain circumstances to those that are opposite. This is simply with electrodes placed on the correct spot and / or magnetic fields around the head of the subjects. We haven’t even spoken about the potential of post hypnotic suggestion (say, potentially as part of primary school curriculum) or chemicals known to alter decision making processes.

Wrap the three together in a nice little brainbox and you’ve got the perfect device for citizen control.

If they don’t like their reality, chemically reinforce that they do like their reality or alter their perception until a sunny disposition is reached whether they want it or not.

Sure this technology isn’t currently available in a form that’s subtle enough for people not to notice it being done to them. But we are getting there, and much like the bionic eye, there is human level testing already taking place with “promising” results.

So given that we know that every government basically runs off somewhat Machiavellian principles, some questiosn arise:

1. If the devices can be used to alter the way you feel about certain decisions, are you morally responsible for any decision you make in the future? Or are you simply acting in accordance to the general whim of the programmer?
2. Considering the nature of current wireless communication tech, it’s a safe bet to assume that if these devices were put into use they’d be wirelessly controlled. Which would leave them open to hacking. How far would hackers go in controlling other people?
3. Are we likely to see entire armies of what are effectively mindless drones? After all, you could put these on prison populations, and no one would care much. BAM! Instant mindless army that’ll do what it’s told.
4. 

   "They installed this brain box on me, and gave me cool lazors! PEW PEW PEW!"

   If there were tax benefits for having one, would you get one installed? And does it come with free Foxtel or a chocolate hamper?

5. Do you honestly think you’d be able to recognise these devices for what they are in a near future where people are seriously considering having neurological interfaces to computers and/or networks installed into them ala Ghost in the Shell?

Cyberpunk is one of those genres that is clearly defined by it’s elements. It’s always got some form of post humanism, some form of technology corrupting society, some form of secret cabal that controls the rest of the world, some form of societal degradation, and always, always there has been a massive shift in the economy to either total collapse, or brink of collapse with everything controlled by the aforementioned secret cabal.

I know that most of these posts on cybperunk have been concentrating on technology that already exists, and me calling out the scoffers who claim bullshit on the tech. Well, what about the societal concepts as well? Having been paying attention to the crap that’s going down both here and abroad lately, it’s beginning to make me seriously think that perhaps Ben Elton, William Gibson and Masamune Shirow were onto something. (more…)

Remember way back in the very first post in this particular series of ranting how I said I’d be writing about technology that people think is SciFi bullshit, except for the fact that it’s only a few years off from becoming a commercial reality, and in some cases actually already exists but isn’t widely known about?

My very first rant was on replacing your pathetic human eyes.

Well, booyah, you disbelieving mother fuckers! Prototype Bionic eye should be ready for the first human implant by 2013. Looking at some of the more advanced articles out there really makes me wonder why the hell the design doesn’t have a microSD slot for capturing video.

Perhaps the most exciting part of all this is that it’s an Australian team and and Australian invention. Considering people forgot that we invented photo-voltaic solar panels and the disposable wine-skin (aka goonbag), it might get some money flowing back into Aussie R&D.

I think what shits me the most is that there are people that get paid to progrnosticate, and they’re usually wrong… Considering how often I’m right about this stuff, it makes me wonder how I can get a sweet job like that.

No, I’m not talking about the amazingly good movie, even if Jude Law was extremely sexy stuck in a wheelchair.

Nor the first 7 chemical elements that certainly define us as actual human beings either.

Today’s post is about the society presented by the film The terrible terrible society (with impeccably good taste in reviving art-deco styles) portrayed in the film is on the cusp of becoming a reality.

A quick synopsis for those of you out there that are such philistines (or if you’re Jewish, filasteins): in a very near future, society has become obsessed with whether or not you are genetically valid thanks to a very liberal program of eugenics. It all starts with insurance companies getting people to take genetic tests and then basically not insuring for certain things, or entirely, because it was an unacceptable financial risk for them (basically the ultimate in insurance companies being able to fuck over their customers… We can’t cover you for this medical condition because you’re likely to have it). In the storyline of the film, since this discrimination set a precedent, it opened up into other walks of life. Schools no longer had to take students because they didn’t have the genetic aptitude to excel (although we can already determine that with league tables, IQ tests and NAPLAN!). Employers could now refuse to employ people on the grounds that they were genetically predisposed to anti-social behaviours, or not excelling in their fields. Dating basically becomes obsolete because you just need to spit in someone’s general direction and they can find out if your suitable for what they want out of a child, with minimal genetic tampering required… and allthose that don’t fit these wonderful biological stereotypes, regardless of what they actually manage to achieve are called “invalids”.

It’s kind of a more up to date, smarter version of Aldous Huxley’s Brave New World, where the best people were actually just average, and everyone else was made inferior by pouring booze into their gestation tanks.

And right now it is starting with insurance companies that want to screen people so they don’t have to insure them! From there, it’s a slippery slope not to let it go further. And in some parts of the world, such as the United States, it already has. Many high tier firms are requesting genetic samples from their employees, often under the guise (and here’s the sick part) of screening them for what the company’s insurance is actually going to cover.

The idea of breeding out unwanted traits, and then actively working in a way that enriches society seems good, especially if you are like myself, genetically superior to a large proportion of the population. Intellect, decent health, not predisposed to anything major… Why wouldn’t I want to discriminate against those that are not amazingly great, or better?

The truth is, I don’t, and a lot of people are probably right now thinking I’m some kind of Nazi loving monster. Yes, thank you Nazis, you’ve ruined yet another area of research for everyone.

I actually do believe in liberal eugenics like this, but the operative word here is “like”. Let’s face it, as much as we all would love to believe the pap that everyone is born equal, there are those that are simply more equal than others andsomehow manage to get a few extra digits tucked in on the right hand side of their equation. I don’t think people should be negatively discriminated against because of random acts of how they were born. It’s my belief that a society like this can only be fair and functional if everyone, not just the rich, has access to technology allowing them to tamper with their potential children’s make up, adding some non-present genetic code to improve them, and removing code that is faulty. To that end, we can use genetic manipulation technology for a very positive form of eugenics.

After two or three of generations of succesful breeding in such a manner, it would then be possible to institute discrimination like this without it being inherently unfair. Admittedly you will get morons who insist on not improving their genetic stock, or think it’s all some gub’mint program to plant tracking devices in their genes so the aliens can monitor them because the president’s really a lizard from Neptune … however, they’re likely to not only pass on inferior genetic material to their progeny, but also a lack of education which they fully make up for with various prejudices. And societies as a whole are generally better off without those sorts of people.

Of course, the flip side of all this is what I like to call the Mike Judge theory of current human evolution, but everyone else calles Idiocracy. The sad fact of the matter is that certain people are breeding a hell of a lot faster, and these are usually people that are in the lower echelons of the social heirarchy. And let’s call a spade a spade here, it’s often due to some genetic inferiority *coughinbreedingcoughlikeinSouthAustraliacoughagainwiththeGermanscough* So is it really so terrible if we decide that it’s time to start handing out the good stuff to everyone? It would certainly be a more cost effective and substantially less traumatic way of improving the human species compared with other options, such as cybernetic adaption. As much as I techno-fetishize, I’d actually much rather have been born a hell of a lot better than I currently am, rather than have to have my eyes replaced to deal with my myopia, and better muscle tone instead of stealing some poor monkey’s 3rd arm.

So this brings us back to the old time of me posting these rants where I’d actually ask some rhetorical questions for you to ponder over for the week:

• We’re already tampering with animals and foodstuffs to ensure superior product, and not just for food. Is it really so different to tamper with people if they’re not actually people yet?
• If you had to submit to a genetic test in order to get insurance, would you actually go out and buy someone else’s genetic material to do it, like someone that buys urine to pass a drug test?
  • Would you be desperate enough to close your eyes and suck it through a “hose” if it was the only way to get quality black market material?
• Assuming you could tamper with phenotypes and appearances of your children, would you give them that Eurasian look and a fine arse, knowing that those are things in life that would actually get them further with minimal real effort?
• As genetic defects due to inbreeding are now gone, what happens to the whole incest taboo?
  • Was it ever really a taboo with identical twins? Cause, really, let’s be honest, that shit is kinda hot… Not so much a question, just something I had to get out there.
• Would such a society simply become more an more pretentious about the “quality” of someone’s genes, like in the anime series Geneshaft?

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