Techtopia. What it is & Why It’s Important
The idea of techtopia comes out of the idea of utopia. Neither will work, but it's important that we understand and debate such an idea.
We humans have some fairly common modern day beliefs about our ancestors. New evidence is reshaping our history constantly. One aspect is how we want to organise our cities, towns and communities. We’re exploring what seems like new ideas a lot lately. But often they’ve been tried before.
In this article I explore the idea of techtopia, starting first with the idea of utopia because as always, looking backwards, while seemingly boring, is the only way to look forwards.
Starting With Utopia
One fascinating aspect of modern humans, Homo Sapiens, is how we’ve constantly been exploring ways to evolve our societies. This has been going on ever since we started singing songs and telling lame jokes and stories around a fire a few hundred thousand years ago.
That’s about when we realized hanging out together was much more fun than wandering around alone and being eaten by a large predator. We also adopted technologies from our predecessor species and figured out that too, helped us live a bit longer too.
Humans cannot survive without technology. Even though most technologies can be used for rather nasty things. Like killing one another. Which is a decidedly nasty thing to do.
We have used technology to build at first, little villages and today, mega metropolises. Around 500 years ago, English lawyer, saint and statesmen, Thomas More came up with the idea of Utopia in his book of the same name. This, one supposes, was before he was beheaded by Henry VIII.
The idea of Utopia was an island of the same name where everyone lived happily ever after and lead wonderful, fulfilling lives. In Greek the word means “no place” although some suggest this was a pun on “Happy place.”
More wasn’t the first to think about such an ideal way of life. Plato in 380 BC wrote his famous “The Republic”, which was a very early communistic ideal. In 1405, Christine de Pizan wrote “Book of the City of Ladies” who built a city meant to be a refuge from the patriarchy. Smart lady.
Such writings and especially More’s have influenced philosophy, artists and science fiction writers ever since. Anthropologists and sociologists have long explored the idea of Utopia and are largely in agreement that while it is a nice concept, it’s highly unlikely to happen.
You can read an interesting and lengthy article on the evolution of Utopia here. And while the idea has mostly been shaped by men, women too have played a very important role in deepening the concept.
Humans have been playing around with various types of societies for a rather long time. We even inherently do this as children, spending more time arguing about who’s going to play whom and how everything is going to play out than actually playing. It is an important social skill to learn.
Social organising concepts that have been taken more seriously than utopia include democracy, communism (Marx’s type, not the real concept), socialism, libertarianism, neoliberalism and so on. These ideas have always been developing and evolving.
The Idea of Techtopia
One of these ideas that’s gained a bit of prominence lately is the concept of techtopia. A utopia that is fuelled by the fusion of technology and human sociology. Where, thanks to Artificial Intelligence, the internet, genetic engineering and autonomous vehicles, among other technologies, we can live an ideal life.
The idea of techtopia fails on the face of it for one simple reason. What I call Pseudocomputational Thinking. Which is attempting to like a computer. But computers don’t think. And if they ever do think (unlikely), they will not think like humans. Because they are not, and never can be, human. It is, ergo, impossible to think like a computer. But it is a worthwhile exercise anyway. Why?
In part because technology is part of the human experience. Technology is a part of human culture and culture is the operating system humans use to survive and thrive. Fire is a technology. Try surviving a night in the arctic in shorts and a t-shirt without it.
Also in part because exploring different ideas of how humans can and should organise themselves, what we might term as societal governance as part of culture, is important. This influences various systems of reciprocity (economics), kinship (family and friends etc.), political systems and so on.
Unlike the idea of utopia, there isn’t a manifesto or singular book we can point to like More’s book. It has evolved in a typically human way, a variety of ideas blending into a broader concept promoted in large part by Silicon Valley elites and their ilk.
Techtopia is the sort of ultimate goal of the Humanity+ or transhumanist (not to be confused with transgender, two entirely different concepts) movement. Transhumanism is essentially where man and machine blend perfectly together and we go on to live happily ever after.
The Problem with Techtopian Thinking
Before we look at the value in thinking about techtopia, we need to look at the inherent problems and challenges of techtopia.
Those promoting techtopia would find it uncomfortable to admit, and may squirm a bit, as their idea of techtopia is closer to socialism and communism than to libertarianism than they realise.
Some of them, such as Marc Andreeson, Elon Musk, Ray Kurzweil, all take the libertarian approach that free markets will solve everything. They haven’t so far and the idea that no regulation is needed has been debunked more often than one can list here.
Techtopianism is, as I’ve indicated above, largely driven by Pseudocomputational Thinking. Which can be loosely defined as trying to think computationally. In other words, purely rational, with little to no emotion, rather lacking in empathy, ignores the sociocultural aspects of humans and applies a problem solving approach to just about everything while largely ignoring the application of critical thinking needed for a complex society such as ours.
Techtopians tend to shy away from what is referred to as the “soft sciences” of anthropology and sociology. But they will leverage the fields of psychology and economics as the two social sciences they will borrow from where it benefits the idea of techtopia.
The scientific fields of engineering, computer science, chemistry, genetic engineering are highly vaunted. This is fine, but entirely misses what it means to be human.
Perhaps the best way to show the failure of this singular mode of thinking is the current state of social media and the internet in some ways. The current form of social media is largely a failed experiment in terms of society. Although it is not to blame for all of what ails society today, the free market ideology and use of of problem solving as an approach has failed us too.
So the problem with techtopian thinking is that the mindset sees technology as solving every problem of humanity. The thing is, technology doesn’t solve problems. Humans do. Technology is simply a tool, to be used for both good and bad. That Psedocomputational Thinking alone, while ignoring human nature, doesn’t work.
The Value of Techtopian Thinking
So if the thinking behind techtopia is wrong, why shouldn’t we just ignore it and send it to the rubbish heap of failed social experiments? Because it’s also very important. Just as the idea of utopianism is over 500 years later. Why?
Because it is important to always explore new ways of how human societies can evolve. Utopianism has helped us imagine possible futures and ideals. Techtopianism helps us explore how we might live better and longer, through the application of advanced, digital technologies.
And because technology is a part of human culture, of who we are. We can’t explore very deep underwater without technology. We can’t explore space without it. We are living longer because of technology. We can’t deal with climate change without technology. The reality is, technology is inextricably bound with modern humans.
So ideas like techtopia are important to explore, to understand potential dangers, risks and opportunities. Adherents to the idea of techtopia aren’t inherently wrong or bad. They just have an idea. And ideas are what drive innovation and come from our imagination.
Humans have been arguing about and debating various forms of social organising for a very long time. We will continue to do so.
Techtopians look ahead with a deep understanding of digital technologies that most in society don’t have. When they communicate their ideas, they are telling stories of a human future. Storytelling is a critical element of how humans survive. Stories are as necessary as language and advanced technologies.
How We Should Approach Techtopia
It is easy to see a dystopian future weaving through the narrative of techtopia. A surveillance economy, loss of human agency and privacy. An autocratic system of governance (which it is) and living forever. The displacement of cultural elements such as ancestor worship, spirituality and religion (it is.)
But that doesn’t mean that will be the future. It is highly unlikely. For all it’s ideas within the concept of techtopia, like utopia, it will struggle when it meets humanity at scale. The idea of democracy may not be perfect, but we do know it’s far better than autocracy.
Capitalism in its current form is failing society. It has shifted from the original idea of delivering a social good to delivering shareholder value. The idea of the customer today is simply that they are part of the means of production to deliver dividends. Techtopianism lays this bare and helps us to see it in a better light. So that we might evolve a new form of capitalism. A process which is already underway. Even economists are saying capitalism has gone wrong
In academia and political systems, techtopianism should be explored, debated, discussed and researched. Leading thinkers who are good at communicating with the public should talk about it. Media too.
There are some ideas of techtopianism that we can use to navigate the coming decades as we enter the Cognitive Age amidst the revolutionary technologies of genetic engineering and Artificial Intelligence.
We must engage techtopians like Bostrom, Andreeson, Musk, Rothblatt and Vita-More. Today, they mostly speak within the bubble of techtopian enthusiasts. Their ideas should be explored in more open spaces.
Through research and dialogue we can find the path forward. Techtopia may be as unattainable as uoptia, but as an idea, it is no less important.