The human Culture found in Look to Windward is a fascinating imagining of what humanity could become if we had the kind of technology that Banks presents in the novel. Humans are able to build planets (or something close to planets), they have created AI, they use virtual reality, and, perhaps most importantly, they are able to store their minds for re-use if they die. Phil questions this practice in his post this week, saying that the person who comes back is really an incomplete copy of the original because it can never be exactly the same as the old one. This critique is interesting, but not really something I considered too deeply in reading the book. What did bother me in the novel, however, is that it seems that humans have all of this technology and use it because it exists, because they can. There is no question, on their part, whether they should save their minds for re-use or whether they should let everything be run by the Hub.
Quilan comes up with a possible answer to this in his musings over the nature of humans. He proposes that maybe humans left the "running of their civilization to the machines" because "they didn't trust themselves with the colossal powers and energies their science and technology had provided them with" (150). I feel like this is probably more noble of a gesture than humans are capable of given our history with new technology. If it can be used as a weapon, great! In this light it seems both very wise and very unlikely that humans would decide one day that they should not be controlling their own technology. Although, maybe if we were to reach the point that the humans do in Look to Windward, our views would be different. However, even the AIs that control most human worlds were actually created by humans, again, as Quilan remarks on, they were built simply because civilizations had the technology to do so.
So, this once again brings up the question of, if we can, should we? Is it the best policy to trust our biggest decisions to machines? While the Hub in the book is presented as impressively wise and aware of the damage he is able to do, does that mean we can trust him more than we can trust humans? This might not be a fair question because humans certainly haven't been proven to be very level-headed and wise when it comes to running their civilizations effectively and fairly. It is impossible to come to a definite conclusion either way, because neither humans nor machines created by humans can be said to be completely unbiased and competent. One thing is for sure, though, allowing one mind, the Hub, to control all of the functions of an entire world and its pieces scattered throughout the universe is a questionable move to make. One incident, like the one that Quilan attempted, could bring a civilization crashing down. To me, it's the extreme equivalent of putting all your eggs in one basket.
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Hub, as a construct, is a human construct. Not much detail is given to his origin, only that he served time as a ship in the war before settling down on Masaq. Jackie, I think what you're getting at is a fundamental question - do humans imbue their creations with their own faults?
ReplyDeleteFrom what I can tell, Hub is the personification of something like Jane in Speaker for the Dead, just without the emotional outbursts. He seems to be governed by moral objectivity beyond that of a human, yet he is very human-like at the same time. In terms of running Masaq, though, he goes beyond any one humans capacity - he runs the world with machine like efficiency. I don't think it's a bad thing to trust the Orbital to hub.
As you both said, entrusting an entire world to one machine is a daring move to make. Andrew, while I agree that in this instance the Hub did a superb job of managing the world and was benevolent I still think it is a dangerous idea and should not be advocated.
ReplyDeleteThere are simply too many dangers involved in giving an AI machine all the power to regulate the world. While I know that the AUs in Banks' world do not revolt against humanity, as was so in Isaac Asimov's I Robot or The Terminator, they are still a distinct species from the humans to whom we are giving a sort of "power of attorney" over our own lives.
Sometimes superb-like efficiency is not what is called for. Heck, our government often moves at the speed of a snail, but this is all on purpose - to ensure proper diligence and deliberation. If we give our power to one machine we have the potential to live under a tyranny. We should never give up self-governance and regulation, because we run the risk of losing our purpose and direction. Therefore, I think it is a bad thing to trust the Orbital to Hub.