Contemporary Fascination with Technology and Artificial Intelligence
Introduction
The reflections of contemporary fascinations with the emergence of artificial intelligence technology of the postmodern ideas globally create more questions than answers. Grewal (13) reviews Thomas Carlyle’s 1829 seminal essay that posted a variation of issues. He argued that if one had to group the oncoming age dispensation in the world, what might it be? The straightforward answer he gave was “machinery” innovation and inventions. But how, then, are we to single out particular changes prompting the emergence of technology, its concept, and the purported thigh itself? My assumption on the matter is that those changes resulted in a semantic (conceptual) phenomenon that is void and free space yet to be filled. Meaning, an awareness of specific novel developments in the entire society and culture has since emerged.
Presumably, the word technology in its modern and extended meaning will eventually fill the gaps in the society, economy, and industry as fostered by the influence of artificial intelligence. The new change agents and precursors received terminologies such as mechanic arts, inventions, the machine and machinery improvements, and new mechanisms resulting in the machinery age. As noted by Thomas Carlyle, in the mid-19th century, most of the so-called modern technology became unsuitable and characterized by numerous adverse effects. But why? Why did technology prove to be preferable? To attach any solution to the question, we need to identify the specific character of the concurrent changes in the mechanic arts, within and in the interrelations between them, society, and culture at large. Gender, as an essential part of the community, cannot be left untouched since artificial intelligence operates out of the sexual paradigm.
In the context of ICT influence in the postmodern ideas, Grewal (12) reviewed Professor Kevin Warwick that gained global popularity through the series of experiments called “Project Cyborg (1998 – 2002)”. Kevin Warwick is known to be the first human being to have a microchip inserted in his body and used technology in the restoration of lost human functions (sight, impaired hearing, or motor action limb). The result of such cutting-edge heavily reflects on society’s ethical issues. According to Marx (20), the significant concerns revolve around whether humans are destined to be a subspecies with machines becoming more intelligent than human beings. Philosophically, Warwick was relevant in posing the question of a fixed human notion of machinery emphasis instead of looking at its constant and dynamic evolving opinions.
According to Glascher et al. (4706), intelligence refers to the mental ability of problem-solving, learning, and reasoning. The various cognitive functions, such as attention, perception, language, memory, or planning, are integrated to function uniformly. The neuro- emerging studies (functional and structural) have backed the front-parietal network that is relevant to the intelligence in general. Therefore, artificial intelligence enables the performance of functions associated with human information, such as reasoning and optimization.
Currently, the future reflection relies upon the West technological advancements dominating the world of business and professional forecasting. Most of the activities in the business world have undergone technological transformations. As a result, they were enhancing performance, product diversification, area coverage, and ethical understanding. Society transformations, as aided by technology, come on board with sets of disadvantages, including a post hierarchical perspective. Lead feminist and womanist thoughts have since exposed the sexiest and racist discourse on the technology. Some technologies segregated other genders, as noted in 1991 by Judy Wajcman. The very definition of technology has a male bias. The emphasis on techniques dominated by men drives a notion that turns to downplays the importance of women technologies such as childcare, cooking, and horticulture.
The primary risk involved in the possibility of turning the robotic differences into a stigma to form new racism forms based on the extent to which such differences can be compared to human culture and norm. Various importance frameworks, such as philosophy of sexual difference, postcolonial studies, disability studies, feminist epistemology, among others, should be considered in the development of robotics. The adoption of such considerations allows humans to generate a positive approach towards robots and to prevent them from turning the robot into their new symbolic. Others also will not fall into a dualistic paradigm that historically characterize western hegemonic accounts to oppositely articulate in the sense of male/ female, human/machine, white/black, etc.
CONCLUSION
The concept of postmodernism segregated into “post-human and post-woman” collates a crucial concern on the future of gender-related technologies in the current perception and future actualization. Most research findings show the application of artificial intelligence developments that are under male imagination and predominance. For example, cyborg intended to be neutral. Contrary, the result of the research showed that none of the respondents thought of feminine robots. On the other side, gender identity as a society seems to contradict the various legacies of biology. Even the consideration of the aspect of sex lacks the biological or physiological relevance for the robots. In the future, reaffirmation of gender hermeneutical role, such as in machine processes, information identification is necessary for the betterment of human interaction.
The relationships between humans and artificial intelligent robotics also require improvement. For instance, the ability of AI robotics to communicate human codes without being human and holding a mechanical body and biological brain (biological AI). To that context, cultural beliefs become central in the role of determining the human perception of advanced AI. The political, social, and economic pillars place stakes in the AI developments. With the progress, robot evolution would lead to the invention of peculiar and unique ways that are unpredictable. Going into the future, the integration of AI developments should consider the epistemological approach of the post-human to allow humans and robots to develop in their interconnected potentials.
WORKS CITED
Glascher, Jan, et al. “Distributed neural system for general intelligence revealed by lesion mapping.” Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences 107.10 (2010): 4705-4709.
Grewal, Dalvinder Singh. “A critical conceptual analysis of definitions of artificial intelligence as applied to computer engineering.” IOSR Journal of Computer Engineering 16.2 (2014): 09-13.
Marx, Leo. “The idea of “technology” and postmodern pessimism.” Technology, pessimism, and postmodernism. Springer, Dordrecht, 1994. 11-28.