Buddhists often talk about something that sounds counter-intuitive but is actually most profound: “The mind is a prison”. According to this concept, all of us can become consumed by our own thoughts to the point where we become hijacked, ceasing to pay attention to real events and stimuli from our physical environment. We begin to … Continue reading The Dream That Humanity Is Unable To Wake Up From
Necrocapitalism hides its agenda behind the most colourful, mesmerizing shopfront, an endless theme park of consumerism our physical senses have zero chance of resisting: they succumb to the lights, the smells, the sounds and promises. Consumption becomes the intravenous narcotic numbing the pain of living in a sick society: the rent we struggle to pay, … Continue reading The Consumatronic Theme Park
We have every reason to wish to dismantle an economic system which has become an existential threat to both humans and the planet. Any economic system which sees nature and human rights as threats to its bottom line is ultimately a threat to nature, humans and itself. Necrocapitalism has no loyalties, alliances, feelings or even … Continue reading A Human Imposter
Had we been too quick to roll out the red carpet for technology? Had we passively accepted all the conveniences for the price of saying goodbye, forever, to essential parts of our biological being? Like a patient waking up in an operating theatre wondering whether all their parts are still in place, humanity found itself … Continue reading Welcome to Your Prosthetic Life
Along with relinquishing much of our freedom to technology, we have exchanged true happiness with counterfeit versions which only make sense in a machine world: we quantify happiness based on the number of consumer goods we buy and on GDP rather than on meaningful existence, exactly because we emulate machines: focusing only on the numbers … Continue reading Happiness In the Machine Age: An Exclusively Human Problem
We are being told by CEOs, self-proclaimed futurists, visionaries, technology gurus and Silicon Valley geeks with millions of followers and thousands of books sold, that AI will bring about a never-before-seen abundance, after a “short rough patch” of adjustment. I’ve watched a number of talks, interviews and discussions online with these experts over the years, … Continue reading AI Won’t Destroy the World. Humans Using AI Will.
When I was a kid, my parents bought me an illustrated guide to Greek wildflowers. Along with extensive botanical descriptions, there were images of flowers in their natural settings taken by wildflower enthusiasts over the years. Below each blowout image there was the usual information: where the plant may be found, what time of the … Continue reading The Global Voodoo Doll
The Thing is getting much more than us out of this human / machine partnership deal. It is getting the most precious commodity: data. It is beginning to own us, and our only planet. We have relinquished control over who buys our data, how much they pay for it, and what they do with it. … Continue reading Dawn of the Algorithmocracy
George Tsakraklides 