Hackable Human

In a 2014 TED talk, Professor Nicholas Negroponte made an outrageous prediction.

Knowledge could be ingested rather than learned.

Inconceivable! But in the past 30 years, Prof. Negroponte floated many such ideas (analogue to digital, online news, handheld device, wifi etc.) and most of which we take for granted today. His prediction on this occasion was more about the inside human body than the outside digital world. He argued that the current learning methods to learn are very inefficient, and it will be possible to ingest (something) to learn any new subject.

A few years later, Professor Yuval Noah Harari talked widely about emerging technological capabilities which can influence human psychological, biological and neurological levels—in simple word, making hackable human animal. He asserted that biotechnology and AI would change humanity from all angles — medicine, life expectancy, education, economy, work, politics and even mortality.

In late 2020, Elon Musk showed off Neuralink’s technological breakthrough with implanted brain chip on pigs. More than the chip (some argue that the technology already exists), the robot surgeon's engineering capability to implant such a small device without much human intervention caught people's imagination. This shows the possibility of implant chip in animals to augment the brain and provide stimulation to create an animal-and-machine hybrid.

This could be the early prototype of Prof. Negroponte ‘ingestion of knowledge’ idea or and Prof. Harare ‘hackable human’ assertion.

I think technologies are changing our lives at an astronomical speed and probably faster than what individuals and society can absorb.

We are already hacked!

The question is — how much hack already happened, and is society is ready for it?

The question is not about “if” or “when”; it has already happened, and the speed of the new hacks are accelerating. To understand this — we need to look at this from three angles of human hacking:

• Senses level
• Biological and Neurological Level
• Genetic Level

Let us explore a bit more on these levels.

Senses Level

At the level of the human senses, we are manipulated at an industrial scale. Here are some examples:

• The easy ones: Amazon, YouTube, Netflix, Facebook etc., are making choices on our behalf and recommending things that we don’t know exists. Sometimes these systems know someone’s behaviour and choices more accurately than the individual.
• The subtle but potentially harmful ones: Social media deploying casinos' technology to get people’s attention and hooked into their platform (attention engineering is now a discipline). Video games luring kids and adults into their virtual world and creating a new kind of addiction.
• The evil ones: We see lots of mass media manipulation such as misinformation and disinformation (fake news) campaign impacting election or discouraging people from taking a vaccine.

The impact of this kind of hacking is making our society more divided than ever.

In America, as an example, the trust in democracy is at an all-time low that resulted in the capital riots on presidential confirmation day. The rise of populist politics all over the world may have a direct link to such manipulation. The tussle between the big technology companies and the Government worldwide is another indication that society is not yet ready for the changes.

Mental health issues are also very prevalent in our young population.

The mental health issues with the young population may correlate with social media and video games explosion. The virtual ‘Likes’, ‘Filters’, ‘Followers’, ‘Emojis’ has a real-life impact, and we only need to look at the news to see examples.

Biological and Neurological Level

Vaccine tricks the human body to react and learn to fight genuine viruses. This is our way out of the current and any future pandemic. The advent of vaccine technologies (RNA, Viral Vector etc.) are astronomical and lead us to a COVID-19 vaccine in less than a year. This is technically a hack, albeit a good one!

Wearable technologies giving vital information about the human body in real-time. While these technologies are mostly about getting information, they will soon perform key interventions like the way good old pacemaker. Digital image recognition technologies also deployed at a mass scale in some countries leading to increased government surveillance.

At the neurological level, although physicians can manipulate the human brain with chemical (like psychotic medicine), interventions like the Nurolink chips are still some way from reality.

So is society ready for such profound technological changes?

While many checks and balances are in place for technologies like vaccine and medicine, the same can’t be said for emerging technologies like wearables and their application. An authoritarian government can deploy these technologies to assert more control over its population. Professor Harare once said that dictators could detect people’s emotions (are they pleased when clapping or smiling) and take sinister action.

Having said so, the potential for the Nurolink’s technology could be life-changing — the blind could see, the deaf could hear, Alzheimerimer could be cured. Wearables could detect heart attack or other such diseases much early, giving the medics time for early interventions.

Genetic Level

This is a growing field, and as technology emerges, the impact on humankind will be profound. Everything is up for grab, including hacking the death.

The designer baby's research is a huge ethical issue as technology is probably already there. There was news that Chinese scientists are creating CRISPR babies as early as 2015. General use of such technology could create two kinds of human (natural and gene-edited), risking a more divided society and a wider gap between ‘have’ and ‘have-nots’. One could also argue that gene editing could also help to eliminate the diseases by manipulating associated genes.

Life expectancy has already increased from roughly 55 years at the beginning of the 20th century and to 85+ years now. This is a +50% increase in a century. With personalised medicine and gene manipulation, it is not unimaginable that people could leave 150+ years sooner than we think.

If Professor Negroponte’s prediction comes out to be true, the human will able to ‘ingest a pill’ and ‘learn Shakespear’ (watch the TED talk — link in reference), the future of education will be mind-boggling. Can this be implanted rather than ingested? I guess we all know the answer.

How do we prepare for the change and protect ourselves?

Three things really: Education, Election and Environment.

Education:

Education for the population against the mass misinformation and disinformation campaign is something everyone’s business. Many political parties and state heads are probably promoting such campaigns making it very difficult to tackle. Big Techs have their fair share of blame and responsibility as well. The challenges are immense — how do we educate our children, young, and elderly about the danger of such a campaign? Qanon conspiracy theories are popular with all generations. The fight is nearer to us than most of us realise; it is in our families, communities, religions, and countries.

The future of education and work is also a global-scale problem. How our school education deliver tomorrow’s generation who can potentially ingest knowledge? Paraphrasing Professor Harare’s assertion probably sums this up properly — we don’t know what technology or skill needed by tomorrow’s economy, but some skills will be vital:

• Emotional intelligence
• Ability to learn a new skill and learn continuously
• Adapt to changes

I hope our educational policies and curriculum catch-up soon.

Election

Elect the right leaders. But not all of us has that luxury, so those who have this power — apply intelligently. There is a worrying sign that many countries elected their populist leaders in the recent past. Some elected leaders changed their constitution to give them more power. And many of them spreading misinformation and disinformation. I think President Joe Biden summed it up nicely by saying, “democracy is fragile”.

Are we sure that our leaders understand these challenges and crafting policies for the future?

Environment

It is a no brainer, really — without our habitable planet, the human race will disappear. The accelerating climate change could undermine all other technological advancements after it reaches its tipping point. Why should we move to a dusty, cold planet with little to no water and oxygen and leave this nice blue globe behind?

In conclusion

In our world, humans are the most hacked and manipulated spices. We have manipulated ourselves with Stories like Religion, Nation, Politics etc., and it served us well. But with the new technology, the hacks are getting both personal, biological and neurological. So our leaders will have to wake up and craft policies for the future, not just win the next election.

References

• Professor Nicholas Negroponte TED talk in 2014: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5b5BDoddOLA
• Professor Yuval Noah Harari interview on Hackable Human: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=45FuyCmyvRs&t=588s
• Elon Musk’s Nurolink Demo: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iOWFXqT5MZ4
• MIT Review — CRISPR babies: https://www.technologyreview.com/2018/11/25/138962/exclusive-chinese-scientists-are-creating-crispr-babies
• Life Expectancy Data: https://ourworldindata.org/life-expectancy