Selah
We have agreed as a civil society that might is not right. What we have not given much attention to as a technological society is that ability is not inevitability.
If it can be made should it be made?
First things first, I think this is a poorly framed question. Poorly framed because it ignores how inventions come to be.
There are three angles to inventions: (1) Necessity is said to be the mother of invention. This is true on one hand for many inventions. But the other angles to this are that (2) necessity is the mother of adoption, and (3) adoption is sometimes the mother of necessity.
No statement depicts the latter angle better than Lucius Annaeus Seneca’s quote:
“Until we have begun to go without them, we fail to realize how unnecessary many things are. We've been using them not because we needed them but because we had them.”
In other words, we only begin to see some things as life-changing because we have started to use them. We then reach the point where we cannot do without them. On that note, here is what we should be minimizing: the “we cannot do without it” effect.
The last angle – adoption as the mother of necessity – is true mostly of passion projects. Passion projects are not born out of an immediate need but rather out of the passion and imagination of the creator. Examples include Leonardo DaVinci’s flying machine (it did not actually fly), the Wright brothers’ airplane, and the iPhone by Steve Jobs.
Many of our present “inevitable” technologies which were once luxury are now mainstream and successful simply because the mass adopted them; eventually. It is only progressively that they morph from being luxurious items to things that we cannot imagine how our lives will be without them. But on the flip side, there are many fancy devices–probably thought by the creator to be a necessity—lying in their graves right now because very few people adopted them; so few that they did not survive.
So, if it can be made, should it be made? Everyone would answer yes. Why should we limit anyone’s ability to make something; to make the impossible possible? But let me make this clear: I asked this question not to stop us from doing what we can, but instead to inspire caution in the things we are certain that we can do. It is a question that is meant to inspire contemplation, not to stop your action abruptly unless your contemplation demands it.
We have agreed as a civil society that might is not right. What we have not given much attention to as a technological society is that ability is not inevitability. We understand and fiercely demand that the strong and mighty rein in their strength and avoid trampling on the weak just because they can. But we have not considered that brilliance in a lab coat is not the determinant of humanity’s future.
For instance, should we make artificial wombs? I personally think that we should. However, I don’t think we should be happy about it. But then what do I mean by “happy?”
By happy, I mean to delight in devices that nudge us to forget that technology is made for man and not man for technology. In other words, that creators should not be the means by which technology enslaves man. Or in my preferred McLuhanic terms: the chicken should not be the egg’s idea for getting more eggs. How does this happen? By conflating extreme needs with regular needs.
In what Nassim Taleb will call the technoautistic, there is the ever-present danger of creating devices that although promising to liberate man, eventually does the precise job of imprisoning him. Even worse, it is bad to think of technology as the ultimate, as the inevitable, and as the perfect existence that requires no opposition.
About artificial wombs. They will be priceless for extreme cases — where they are absolutely needed to save the life of mother and child. For this, I approve. But knowing humans, we will not stop there. We will not limit, especially if it is made abundant, the use of artificial wombs to extreme cases. I am certain that people will demand its everyday use, at any slight inconvenience or none at all, praising its liberating effects on women from their Biological prison. However, what will not present itself to us at the beginning stage of the adoption of this technology is the prison it will impose. And blind as we are, we will wallow in this prison when it eventually presents itself and we will rationalise it.
We all probably agree that a nuclear bomb should only be used in cases where we have no other choice but use it. But I don’t think we will take this “except absolutely necessary” attitude with artificial wombs. How do I know? Well, it is already happening with abortion; abortion for just about any reason; just because we can.
Everyone agrees that the Internet is great. The internet is a fusion of knowledge and electric power. And the internet as an extension of ourselves, (adopting McLuhan where electricity is an extension of the nerves and sharing knowledge an extension of intimate communication), has captured us with an inane scale of anxiety. Nevertheless, we have not chosen to go without it. We have instead begun to teach ourselves to cope and liberate some parts of our lives, not all, from its shackles.
Now, imagine such an interface like an artificial womb that does not just extend Biology but rather interferes with it; what effect can predict that it will bring? Whatever you can think of, it will be so much worse. I assure you.
In the end, the question, “if it can be made, should it be made?” Is not a question that is begging for a technical answer. It is a question that is begging you profusely in all your technological joy to contemplate the matter. Selah.