Technocracy: Difference between revisions
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We slid, subtly, from [[Anthropomorphism|discussing technology in human terms]] — anthropomorphising — to [[Robomorphism|evaluating humans in terms of technology benchmarks]] — ''robo''morphising — and finding the [[meatware]] wanting: humans were, it transpired, irrational, illogical, inconstant, prone to bias, and they took up space, needed holidays and cost a lot of money. | We slid, subtly, from [[Anthropomorphism|discussing technology in human terms]] — anthropomorphising — to [[Robomorphism|evaluating humans in terms of technology benchmarks]] — ''robo''morphising — and finding the [[meatware]] wanting: humans were, it transpired, irrational, illogical, inconstant, prone to bias, and they took up space, needed holidays and cost a lot of money. | ||
In the name of efficiency, everything that ''could'' be managed by algorithm ''was'' assigned to algorithm, and so it came to pass we were progressively relieved of the inconvenience of making our own decisions. Salve, the age of [[The Unaccountability Machine|unaccountability machines]]. | In the name of efficiency, everything that ''could'' be managed by algorithm ''was'' assigned to algorithm, and so it came to pass we were progressively relieved of the inconvenience of making our own decisions. | ||
Salve, the age of [[The Unaccountability Machine|unaccountability machines]]. | |||
====The moral maze==== | ====The moral maze==== | ||
{{Drop|P|rogressively — if you’ll}} excuse the pun — | {{Drop|P|rogressively — if you’ll}} excuse the pun — our technical ability to micromanage some things well enough by code became a path of least resistance and we began to micromanage everything by code. {{Author|Lawrence Lessig}} saw the opportunity for ''commercial'' [[Code: Version 2.0|technological regulation]] early: what need was there for ''legal'' enforcement of contracts in an [[online world]] where real time compliance could be enforced by code in ''practice''? | ||
The world was still largely in swoon to light-touch, [[principles-based regulation]]: congress was busily dismantling [[Glass-Steagall]] and throwing the economy into the arms, tooth and claw of nature, but that all changed in [[Global Financial Crisis|September 2008]]. | |||
A two-decade long leeching of administrative power from the executive to the market was quickly reversed. Politicians and central bankers regained their swagger. They bailed out the bankers — didn’t really ''punish'' them as such; the good old tax payers took all that — but the politicians got their pound of flesh. The cost was detailed, technical, code-level regulation regulation of ''everything''. And an end to bankers lecturing politicians. | |||
So the bankers started lecturing their staff. | |||
The regulators’ interest was at first technocratic, but social justice movements — notably Occupy Wall Street and the various Arab Spring movements began to exert influence and inject a moral dimension into debates, while at the same time new faces opened up on the burgeoning professional administrative class — call it the era of unfettered [[human capital management]] — allowing previously quite radical social justice agendas to escape their traditional confines in liberal arts faculties and accumulating in the engine rooms of corporate bureaucracy. | The regulators’ interest was at first technocratic, but social justice movements — notably Occupy Wall Street and the various Arab Spring movements began to exert influence and inject a moral dimension into debates, while at the same time new faces opened up on the burgeoning professional administrative class — call it the era of unfettered [[human capital management]] — allowing previously quite radical social justice agendas to escape their traditional confines in liberal arts faculties and accumulating in the engine rooms of corporate bureaucracy. Human resources had more or less computerised the business of recruiting, so they got busy social engineering instead. | ||
For the first time there were technological tools to enforce agendas. The irony was they were the same tools that the anarchists thought would finally set us free. | For the first time, there were technological tools to enforce agendas. The irony was they were the same tools that the anarchists thought would finally set us free. | ||
Communication being instant, effortless and free proved a boon and a bane. Screwing up a relationship by miscommunication was instant, effortless and free too. Who has not forwarded a sensitive communication to the wrong account, or sent a withering reply to the whole group by mistake. Communications became dangerous. They were ''immortal''. They had a lie off their own. | Communication being instant, effortless and free proved a boon and a bane. Screwing up a relationship by miscommunication was instant, effortless and free too. Who has not forwarded a sensitive communication to the wrong account, or sent a withering reply to the whole group by mistake. Communications became dangerous. They were ''immortal''. They had a lie off their own. | ||