Technological alienation and how networked digitality constitutes a map for understanding the complexity of individual and collective consciousness

Summary

Fears that technology fosters alienation and may control humans through superintelligence are rooted in a reductionist view that equates human identity with intelligence. Consciousness, however, is broader than intelligence and functions as a networked, multidimensional phenomenon. This perspective counters alienation and suggests humans can be compatible with accelerated modern society if its logic is restructured around complex consciousness rather than mere intelligence. The argument uses networked digitality as a heuristic to understand consciousness's multidimensional nature and scope, extending even to a collective consciousness, and calls for rethinking socio-political institutions to avoid technological totalitarianism.

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Abstract

Abstract Technology is feared to foster alienation, and may even come to control us through superintelligence. Yet this fear is exacerbated by a reductionist assumption that humans are defined mentally by their intelligence. Human consciousness is broader than intelligence, but how does it actually function? This article will suggest that these two problems of technological alienation and consciousness can actually help inform each other. Going beyond the intelligence-focused computational theory of mind, it will argue that technology can help us conceptualize the networked multidimensionality of consciousness . This multidimensional consciousness counters assumptions of alienation and suggests human compatibility with a modern accelerated society, provided we restructure its logic based on our complex consciousness rather than on mere intelligence. The article makes this argument in three parts. First, it reviews the notion of alienation by focusing on Robert Hassan’s theorized transition from analog to digital, and problematizes existing assumptions about analog and how it is supposed to reflect a linear logic in humans. Second, it uses networked digitality as a heuristic guide to understanding the multidimensional nature, scope, and simultaneity of individual consciousness. Third, it suggests that networked digitality can even help us to transcend the individual to imagine a multisensory connected collective consciousness. The article ends with an outlook on how we can start to rethink our socio-political institutions in light of multidimensional consciousness so that they remain liberal democratic rather than being hijacked by technological totalitarianism.

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