the silicon chasm: technological enhancements and politics

HUM 605 Research Paper -- Peter Moons

The Silicon Chasm:

Technological Enhancements and Politics

Peter Moons

Humans have wholly embraced the idea of self-improvement from the beginning

of the species. From using a crutch for balance, to building primitive ladders that

increase height, to the invention of eyeglasses, man’s tools aid in improving what he

was endowed with naturally. Now with the advent of the technological age, self-

improvement takes on a more intrusive, individualized, and expansive meaning,

however, the era of seamlessly melding man and machine is still fiction. What is known

is that humans’ interpersonal relationships will change once that melding occurs; one

such relationship is that of politics. If every human can communicate electronically with

all others, and governments and companies can monitor and communicate with people,

as well, the nature of political structures will change. Therefore, owing to technological

enhancement of humans, politics in democracies will change in the form of choices,

styles, and perhaps even its existence.

Artifacts Have Politics

Necessary in the discussion of technology and politics is an understanding of the

infusion of politics into man’s creations, which then become artifacts. Technologies can

be used for good purposes or evil intent, to improve people’s lives or as a tool of

oppression. By choosing an intent, people are either empowered or disenfranchised.


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One such example of the latter was Robert Moses’s bridge designs. Moses’s racial and

class politics negatively affected the social welfare of generations of underserved

populations in NYC by limiting their access to areas outside the city.1 Similarly, in

another example, union workers were manipulated to entice them to quit their jobs by

installing inferior equipment on a factory floor. The end that was achieved aided the

plant owner.2

So there is a formula at work here with regard to artifacts of politics: the right tool

or design applied against a vulnerable population leads to a specific outcome, which

may not be desirable for one party but aids the intent of another. In the human mind,

the subterfuge employed makes the process appear evil. However, arranging the

technology to produce an effect is valuable in political terms.3 The common feeling

among publics in many, if not perhaps most countries, is that governments and

companies are manipulating the population for their own gains. For example, bus stops

are removed to prevent loitering or voting machines and voting ballots are crafted to

falsely lead voters into making certain choices. Thus, politics are infused in many

artifacts.

With the examples above, a trend becomes evident: there is a connection

between authoritarianism and science & technology, when the latter is pursued by some

people with evil intent.4 Since a major aspect of technology is its ability to organize5 and

control, such as turning chaos into order or “subdue[ing] nature” as Engels’s wrote,6

many commentators on technology express concern. Their apprehension does not


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make them Luddites, per se. In fact, such fears about control by political artifacts are

justified, as the near daily litany of disclosures about the surveillance society -- not only

in the UK and the US but globally -- shows. The concept of authoritarianism and

technology, which Engels saw, does not result in a utopia but in, to use a cinematic

example, Metropolis. The result of technology is not always freedom but often

enslavement, owing to the will of those in positions of power and the power structures

that allow for their hegemonic designs to gain ground.

A great value from technology comes in its “specific ways of organizing power

and authority;”7 for example, when power -- be that natural or political -- is organized,

society becomes stratified and assumes a structure. Such configuration is conducive

for totalitarianism politically and for the existence of central planning economically. The

future could see further attempts at a reprise of central planning, owing to an

unstoppable faith by the technorati on organizational ‘Big Data,’ analytics, quantification

of the worker, and algorithms that crunch all those numbers in an attempt to balance

input and output. The horror, then, would be the conflation of political tyranny and

economic central planning facilitated by science, technology, and data analysis.

This assessment may sound hyperbolic, but the link between governments and

technology companies is unmistakable. At one time, a “techno-scientific-industrial-

military elite” ran some processes in the US, particularly in the then-new area of nuclear

physics.8 Of course, 70 years after the Manhattan Project, the elites’ power is much

more pervasive throughout society, and the linkage to governments even stronger.


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Government and corporate elites have evolved their collusion to include vast elements

of private industry since World War II. The new elites decide what consumers products

will be available for purchase, owing to steep initial entry costs for manufacturers of high

technology products.

The complicity shown here is also a form of political control: the small inventor is

kept out of the market due to governmental regulations and cannot achieve ‘scale’ in

manufacturing and distribution unless a large conglomerate provides support. As yet,

the new technology that goes into humans is uncontrolled by any governmental entity,

at least in the US: there are no regulations against Radio Frequency Identification Chips

being implanted in adults, for example. Currently, the industry of transhuman

enhancements has not expanded beyond the do-it-yourself genre. Once that passage

to the commercial occurs, governments and corporations will seek to gain both control

and profit, skillfully guiding the consumer public to make choices that serve the former

two at the expense of the latter.

Realistically, then, the idea that “technical objects” have “social meaning” and a

“cultural horizon”9 can affect both relationships and politics. In an example of engineers

and meaning, the engineering designs for a goal can appear as aggression against

man,10 such as the inferior manufacturing machines mentioned above. This is the

tyranny of technology aided by man against man in pursuit of a goal – be that for profit

or fame, but now more often for control. Martin Heidegger was famously concerned

with what was concealed within technology, and was only slowly revealed, if at all.


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Thus, there may be a need for a “human interpreter” to give “meaning” to technology,11

to find out its true purpose or alternative, even ulterior goals.

Others have warned about the deleterious effects of technology. In England

centuries ago, some naysayers of the Industrial Revolution were mocked with the label

“Luddite.” Now such people are criticized with the adjective “antitechnology” or

“antiprogress”12 making them appear as opponents of innovation. One could say this

labeling is an attempt by industry to encourage consumers to keep buying the next

shiny object on the shelf. In one fledging field, self-driving autos, a nexus of car

manufacturers, IT companies, and governments are setting the conditions for another

paradigm shift.

Those that say a world of connected, data-driven, self-driving autos will be

susceptible to computer hackers or massive government surveillance, choice limitation,

and behavior control, are labeled as neo-Luddites themselves. The reality is that there

will be a great political upheaval with networked ‘things,’ such as self-driving autos and

the so-called ‘internet of things.’ Just as networks control electrical grids, military

systems, as well as the rise of ‘social networks,’ networked humans are also susceptible

to manipulation. This vast connectivity can lead to both favorable relationships and

heightened control, the latter for commercial or political ends.


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Technology in General

Governments have always embraced technology and used that as method to

control humanity. One can see this trend even in the beginnings of civilization in

Mesopotamia where measurements were stamped on clay vessels annotating their

weight, to today: that which can be regulated is regulated. Heidegger’s essay, The

Question Concerning Technology, showed that technology possesses the ability to turn

humankind away from nature, which represents man in his most free and least

‘connected’ form, and permits the enslavement of man.

Here, Heidegger noted an interesting connection between three elements:

technology, nature, and man, with humanity maintaining primacy of them. Heidegger

acknowledges the power that man holds here for he says, "everything depends on our

manipulating technology in the proper manner as a means.”13 However, Heidegger

goes on to say that man’s hubris may actually blind him to the reality that he cannot

control technology. The current zeitgeist of science-fiction certainly points to

Heidegger’s prophecy: technology, like Zeus’s fire stolen by Prometheus, slips out of

the gods’ control causing unpredictable damage.

An introduction of a definition of transhumanism is required at this juncture.

Simply stated, transhumanism is "the power of technology to transform humanity."14

This change goes beyond eyeglasses, for the technology is intrusive and radically

changes man’s ability; change means enhancing existing capacities or creating


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capabilities that did not exist previously. Some people will embrace enhancement

technology, as the now definite distinction between “enhancements and treatments,”

disappears.15

Improvements in technology, just as changes or manipulation of the human body

that are deemed as acceptable, are “culturally located” in time and place.16 There is a

difference between curing problems and making lives better, certainly. Additionally, a

pertinent question regarding human enhancements is their location: “does it matter

whether enhancements are worn outside of bodies as opposed to being implanted?” 17

The answer, for functionality is no, but yes in terms of aesthetics. If the latter, the ability

to blend in with a population of non-enhanced humans increases. Also, if internal, a

deception of appearance would permit all beings to look alike, with no distinguishing

features,18 thereby decreasing the dichotomy of enhanced versus non-enhanced

beings.

However, what is available now and is acceptable and what will occur in the

unknown future of enhancements may be radically different; further, what is tolerable

now and what will be acceptable may look odd, even ghastly to those in the present.19

Bringing this back to politics, one can see how the politicians in the democracy in the

US of 1789 would see many similarities to that in the US today, though some of the

measures of control, the intrusiveness of regulation, and the power relationships

fostered by political campaign funding would seem abhorrent. With transhuman bodily

enhancements, the changes of the future may also appear undesirable. The


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acceptance of change can be called ‘accustomization’ -- our behavior adjusts, but

people still walk into the manmade inventions of windows and windmill blades. Perhaps

this is the melding of technology and Darwinism.

Heidegger once made the claim, “only another God can save us.”20 Of course,

another God may not necessarily be a god, gods, or God, or none of the above, but

perhaps man’s intervention in the midst of technological development. An ‘interpreter’

or an interlocutor between man and technology could aid in “salvaging aspects of the

enlightenment” that “radically transformed and integrated into a new understanding of

reality.”21 Heidegger explained that man does not know what the Entframing of a

technology covers; for this reason man must understand the potentiality of each new

technology.

The manner today in which “man exalts himself to the posture of lord of the

earth,” means he is just engaging in an “illusion.”22 In fact, man is further deluded

because he “can never encounter only himself,”23 likely because technology becomes

part of man’s environment, often in unforeseen ways. Naysayers to transhumanism and

its enhancements will take this warning to heart, for the effects on both man, society,

and the environment from activities like nanotechnology, bioengineering, and genetic

manipulation, despite the best efforts of ethicists, are still unpredictable.

One problem the world may see is that companies that provide enhancement

technologies become the focal point of transhumanists’ lives. People may be indebted


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to their ‘makers’ for life sustaining upgrades, which would be similar to having to

upgrade personal computers in order to make them compatible with the latest

technology and software. If a transhumanist does not decide to ‘upgrade’ herself, she

may have a shortened life expectancy, because not upgrading may be a violation of the

‘terms of service’ to which she initially agreed.

Historically, man thinks he owns the technology but he may even become a slave

to his new master, whom he had thought a liberator. This scenario is just as true of

governments as of companies: the rebels who liberated the country now take away

freedoms for their own ends. In the Prometheus myth, man benefited from having fire,

but then must keep the flame perpetually burning; that ‘burning’ may one day be some

aspect of life that man will have to surrender to a government or company.

Originally, man employed technology to change the world, to create order or

design from the chaos of nature, which he could not control; now humanity uses

technology for self-change.24 Logically, the next step is to change human relationships

through technology, which is already being done through social networks and even

focused on the individual, immediately, through hand-held devices connected to said

networks. Since humans naturally seem to favor grouping themselves, political

structures will be the next step that technology will change. However, even though the

manner and outcome of technologically driven changes in political power and political

structures remains unclear, some predictions are possible based on how people are

enhancing themselves and the social networks they form.


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Democracies: Change and Choices

Technology now brings people together but could very well soon divide them into

classes, at a minimum, or drive them apart and into conflict at the maximum.25

Technology, as we have learned elsewhere, creates communities that would not

otherwise exist, because of the ability to allow people to generate their own personas

and live vicariously through them; moreover, there is a “bias” towards technology that

supports people’s “social interests.”26 Of course, an interpretation of that technology

provides the “social” context.27 Who joins what community, historically, was determined

by such factors, as race, creed, tribe, economic status, education, etc. What may occur

in the future is that interest and finances will be the factor for joining an entity of some

dimensions, either political, social, or other.

The technology available and who can afford to pay the costs of entry will matter

much in the future. Because “innovative technics,” including expensive technology, are

often enjoyed by the few,28 the costs of entry will limit involvement initially. Of course,

as Moore’s Law describes, computing power will increase just as price will come down.

The result will be the diffusion of technology. However, owing to increasing costs,

knowledge of use, and societal barriers, a stratification in society between the ‘have

nots,’ the ‘haves,’ the ‘have more,’ and the ‘have firsts,’ when discussing technology or

merely the access to technological devices, will develop. However, has this

stratification only just developed or has this always been the case?


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The diffusion of tools, of printing presses, of arms, etc. also occurred after the

research and development, initial creation, and use-by-full-funded-elites phases. So

while the normal arc of technological introduction and spread means that few people

today are riding through cities on horses and buggies, the cost of riding in an

individually owned automobile are still out of reach for many. A look at how technology

can affect voters and voting, in lieu of human enhancement, is relevant.

There may come a time where there are tiers of voters: the humans,

transhumans, and posthumans, each with different voting rights owing to how vested

they are in the results of the political structure of their communities and countries.

People, meaning all three of the aforementioned categories, will see each other

differently. Democracy would be in jeopardy if those with technological enhancements

garnered some type of advantage over others owing to their technology. In fact,

political structures of the future could be based on who has what ‘upgrade’ because

those with certain technology may be able to provide immediate input to each other and

to their elected representatives in any assembly. This scenario is not far from what

exists today, as voters with web access can email their representatives while the few

without or those who are non-adopters of such technology, rely on phone calls to their

representatives’ offices.

Perhaps, just as identity politics plays a role today, humans, transhumans, and

posthumans will have their own, unique political interests, voting blocs, and candidates.


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An “otherness to the technology” could develop, just as HAL 9000 and the astronauts in

2001: A Space Odyssey, saw each other as separate entities.29 The psychological

concept of ‘social proof’ is valuable here: what guides people in choosing and acting

comes from others’ opinions of what is acceptable behavior. If one person modifies

themselves, and then another, and so on exponentially, enhancements will be seen as

socially acceptable.

This process can affect voting patterns; many people take queues on voting from

people they view as ‘thought leaders’ and this will occur with enhanced voters, too.

When voting blocs become defined by technology, patterns of voting and support for

issues will become increasingly complicated. Further, enhanced people could become

the majority in a population and vote in their own self-interests over the choices of other,

non-enhanced people. Power and rapid grouping of people with like interests are going

to be of high value in the democracy of the future.

Discussions about authoritarianism versus freedom vis-a-vis the techne of a

technology30 or implement is very beneficial in understanding the power and politics a

technology may have. Technology is of course the conduit to achieve Transhumanism

by changing humans' bodies, brains, and psychological mood.31 There is a risk here

that governments may alter or influence transhumans for their own benefit, especially

when concerned with political power. And electrical power is key: if all transhumans are

in need of electricity in order to function, then electricity will be the ultimate key to force

compliance.


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Certainly, there is only a small step between monitoring and control, especially

about choices, such as what to purchase, where to work, and for whom one wishes to

vote; with in-body surveillance, that step is even shorter. Similarly, individuals’ concerns

“over their personal information flows”32 are real, however, the tangible scare is when

governments and companies aggregate that data and harness the power of data in an

expansive scale.

As one example, ‘first adopters’ on the cutting edge of in-body enhancements

have begun implanting electronic devices under their skin for various purposes.

However, device implantation into animals themselves is not new as veterinarians have

put tracking or identification tags under the skin of pets for well over a decade. The

resistance about device implantation into humans is seemingly low, likely because

humans are so desensitized to technology with the profusion of heart pacers, pagers,

cell phones, and web-connected devices. Democracy will change once humans are

able to vote immediately on an issue and provide their input directly to their

representatives. At this point, democracy would appear as a giant game show of

collective opinions, immediately identifiable, by region, type of person, economic status,

and so on.


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Technology, Politics, and Defining a Citizen

This change in democracy, especially in voting, may come in the near future:

once software begins to fully design itself and develop ‘post-humans,’ this sense of

“otherness,” again, will create a chasm between humans who are not enabled and

those who are.33 The changes from technological advancement and enhancements will

be profound and thus a question arises: with burgeoning "power of technology to

transform humanity,"34 after enhancements, will man still be fully human? In the age of

transhumanism or posthumanism, will the enhanced beings still be citizens? Will these

enhanced beings. If some cannot vote while others can, some transhumans and

posthumans may claim discrimination by non-enhanced humans, and vice-versa.

There is an argument that says enhancements are “against human nature,”35

however, any enhancement, such as eyeglasses, individually improves lives. Currently,

no one complains that someone who wears glasses has an unfair advantage in life or

those who wear them should get extra voting power. What can happen in the near

future is discrimination against some or a sense of entitlement by others. For a pluralist

society, enhancement technology can create “huge gulfs between the enhanced and

the unenhanced [which] would represent an even greater threat”36 to democracy. The

drive for enhancements in all their forms may change “the very nature of politics,”37

particularly because the political system is not up to the task of lawmaking with the

future in mind. The US’s legislative bodies are focused on the present and not the

future.38 However, legislators do have a responsibility to the future especially if man


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can manipulate himself to have a prolonged, or even an eternal life.39

Once enhancements become routine, society will recognize that laws must

change, too. Thus, a very important question in the future, once enhancements

become commonplace, is this: how will the law define a voter? “Genetic manipulation,”

“asexual” reproduction, and even “human cloning” are issues that will matter in the

definition of citizenship and voter.40 As with most innovation, there is a recognition that

enhancement technologies are evolving and coming to market faster than laws are

created or changed to address new developments.41 A major concern for a country that

prides itself on the voice of the common man being heard through the ballot box is that

human “enhancement[s] could simply elevate the accepted competence threshold for

qualifying as a voter, establishing a new minimal baseline for competence.”42 If

enhancements are a requirement, and someone does not have the requisite type, they

may legally be excluded from the voting process.

One factor that will be increasing in importance as humans become enhanced

technologically is that of “legitimacy.” 43 When governments and companies can know

much more about an individual -- biologically, genetically, and even their thoughts -- a

person’s ability to keep secure in their person, as the US Constitution states, becomes

limited. Here, a government’s intrusiveness de-legitimizes its functionality. Therefore, a

major concern for those who are enhanced, perhaps more so than those who remain

natural, is the real possibility that governments or companies can monitor people and do


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so at an increasingly low cost. This monitoring process may affect the electoral process

as the anonymity of voting disappears.

Because of the “greatly reduced the costs for governments to amass detailed

profiles of citizens and residents,”44 the largest barrier to collection on people

disappears. The technological means for monitoring behavior, likewise, will become

increasingly easier, especially when devices are implantable within a person. This type

of surveillance is certainly more intrusive than the current paradigm of external

surveillance through cameras and sensors outside of the body. Finally, man must keep

in mind that enhancements, like surveillance, possess “a technology powerful enough to

reshape what we are [and] will have possibly malign consequences for liberal

democracy and the nature of politics itself.”45

Will Democracies Continue To Exist?

Noting the enhancements in the human body and mind, especially the impact

these changes will have on society, including politics, may lead to a world of

“Technoutopians.”46 Thus, one can contemplate a time and place when democracy

may become superfluous. There are downsides to a utopia, though. In particular,

because humans abhor blandness, the striving for uniqueness and competition may

have to be bioengineered out of humanity. Otherwise, there will be discontent, both

socially and politically, in such a utopian society.


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If a forced utopia is in place, then a “decreasing [of] the absoluteness of

individual rights”47 will also occur. Keeping the population down, as in any tyranny, will

require governmental control of one identity group over another.48 At least one

academic predicts the return of eugenics owing to “Genetic enhancement technology;”

this bodes ill for society and democracy owing to an increase in inequality as the

uneducated and poor will not access the new technology, just as the educated and rich

will achieve more.49 Of course, then, the latter are more likely to continue to vote in

their interests vice those of others.

There is, of course, a deep libertarian streak within the technological and

scientific communities. Many technology developers see themselves as going ‘beyond

politics’ in their planning for the future of society. In one example from the last century,

“[i]n place of authoritarianism and representative democracy,” a forward thinker in New

York in the 1970’s advocated “for world governance through direct electronic

democracy.”50 Thus, in this manner, democracy may exist but at hyper-speed and on a

world-wide scale. Assuming all beings, human, transhuman, posthuman, and anything

else with voting rights can vote, their voice would be heard and their vote counted,

instantaneously; the result would be a global democracy.

Conclusion

In several different scenarios, futurists advanced the idea that melding minds and

machines would create globally linked enterprise of humanity, thus “leading to the


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emergence of collective intelligence.”51 These ideas were proposed as “Global Brain,”

the “noosphere,” and the well-known “Singularity.” 52 The end result of these utopian

arrangements is the connectivity of humanity, with the implication being an end to war,

famine, greed, etc. Presumably, physical conflict between nations and political strife

within countries would also disappear, once we can read each other’s minds.

Enhancements, in all their myriad forms, are likely the first step in this scheme.

Ultimately, national governments and voting within them could also fade away, as

their functions would be subsumed into a global government of interconnected humans.

In fact, the word ‘government’ implies such a structure would be necessary, when this

type of political body may be superfluous, as well. An apropos final thought on how

technological enhancements of humans will affect politics is this: any technology that is

capable of dramatically changing humanity also has the power to alter how humanity

governs itself.


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Bibliography Cockfield, Arthur. “Surveillance As Law,”Griffith Law Review, 2011, Vol. 20, Issue 4. Cole-Turner, Ronald. "Introduction: The Transhumanist Challenge," Transhumanism and Transcendence: Christian Hope in an Age of Technological Enhancement. Washington, D.C.: Georgetown Press, 2011. Fukuyama, Francis. Our Posthuman Future: Consequences Of The Biotechnology Revolution. New York: Farrar, Straus And Giroux, 2002. Gregory, Eric. “What Do We Want from the Just War Tradition? New Challenges of Surveillance and the Security State.” Studies in Christian Ethics, 2014. Heidegger, Martin. The Question Concerning Technology. New York: Harper & Row, 1977. Hughes, James J. “The Politics of Transhumanism and the Techno-Millennial Imagination, 1626-2030.” Zygon: Journal of Religion & Science. Dec2012, Vol. 47 Issue 4. Kaplan, David, ed. Readings in the Philosophy of Technology. Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield, 2009. Lett, Dan, Sean Hier, and Kevin Walby, “Policy Legitimacy, Rhetorical Politics, and the Evaluation of City- Street Video Surveillance Monitoring Programs in Canada,” Canadian Review of Sociology, Nov. 2012, Vol. 49 Issue 4. Lin, Patrick, and Fritz Allhoff, “Against Unrestricted Human Enhancement.” Journal of Evolution & Technology. May 2008, Vol. 18 Issue 1. Shapiro, Michael H. “Does Technological Enhancement of Human Traits Threaten Human Equality and Democracy?” San Diego Law Review. Summer 2002, Vol. 39 Issue 3 1 Langdon Winner, “Do Artifacts Have Politics?,” Readings in the Philosophy of Technology, ed. David Kaplan, (Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield, 2009), 253. 2 Ibid. 3 Ibid., 253-254. 4 Ibid., 257. 5 Ibid., 259. 6 Ibid., 257. 7 Ibid., 259. 8 Ibid., 258. 9 Andrew Feenberg, “Democratic Rationalization: Technology, Power, and Freedom,” Readings in the Philosophy of Technology, ed. David Kaplan, (Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield, 2009), 144. 10 Ibid., 144-145. 11 Ibid., 144. 12 Winner, 255. 13 Martin Heidegger, The Question Concerning Technology, (New York: Harper & Row, 1977), 5. 14 Ronald Cole-Turner, "Introduction: The Transhumanist Challenge," Transhumanism and Transcendence: Christian Hope in an Age of Technological Enhancement, (Washington, D.C.: Georgetown Press, 2011), 4.


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15 Carl Elliott, What’s Wrong with Enhancement Technology?, Readings in the Philosophy of Technology, ed. David Kaplan, (Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield, 2009), 435. 16 Ibid., 436. 17 Patrick Lin and Fritz Allhoff, “Against Unrestricted Human Enhancement,” Journal of Evolution & Technology, May 2008, Vol. 18 Issue 1, 5. 18 Ibid., 2. The authors describe a scenario where no one knows who is and who is not enhanced: “As artificial intelligence advances, nano-sized computers might be imbedded into our bodies in order to help process more information faster, even to the point where man and machine become indistinguishable.” 19 Elliott, 436. 20 Hubert Dreyfus, “Heidegger on Gaining a Free Relation to Technology,” Readings in the Philosophy of Technology, ed. David Kaplan, (Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield, 2009), 32 21 Ibid., 31. 22 Heidegger, QCT, 27. 23 Ibid. 24 Cole-Turner, 7. 25 Feenberg, 141. 26 Ibid. 27 Ibid. 28 Robert McGinn, “Technology, Demography, & the Anachronism of Traditional Rights,” Readings in the Philosophy of Technology, ed. David Kaplan, (Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield, 2009), 189. 29 Don Ihde, “A Phenomenology of Technics,” Readings in the Philosophy of Technology, ed. David Kaplan, (Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield, 2009), 93. 30 Clark Summer, Virtual Presentation slideshow, HUM 605, commenting on Winner’s essay. 31 Cole-Turner, 7-8. 32 Arthur Cockfield, “Surveillance As Law,”Griffith Law Review, 2011, Vol. 20, Issue 4, 796-7. 33 Ihde, 93. 34 Cole-Turner, 4. 35 Julian Savulescu, “Genetic Interventions and the Ethics of Enhancement of Human Beings,” Readings in the Philosophy of Technology, ed. David Kaplan, (Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield, 2009), 428. 36 Michael H. Shapiro, “Does Technological Enhancement of Human Traits Threaten Human Equality and Democracy?,” San Diego Law Review, Summer 2002, Vol. 39 Issue 3, 824. 37 Hans Jonas, “Technology and Responsibility,” Readings in the Philosophy of Technology, ed. David Kaplan, (Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield, 2009), 178. 38 Ibid., 183. Sometimes, they are not even up to focusing on the present, such is the nature of deliberative democracy. 39 Ibid., 181. 40 Shapiro, 837-838. 41 Jay Stanley and Barry Steinhardt, “Bigger Monster, Weaker Chains,” Readings in the Philosophy of Technology, ed. David Kaplan, (Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield, 2009), 306. 42 Shapiro, 830. 43 Dan Lett, Sean Hier, and Kevin Walby, “Policy Legitimacy, Rhetorical Politics, and the Evaluation of City-Street Video Surveillance Monitoring Programs in Canada,” Canadian Review of Sociology, Nov. 2012, Vol. 49 Issue 4, 331. Regarding legitimacy, the authors note: “Policy legitimacy also entails procedural legitimacy: the ways in which policy advocates persuade stakeholders and members of local communities that formal standards of policy making have been addressed.” 44 Arthur Cockfield, “Surveillance As Law,” Griffith Law Review, 2011, Vol. 20, Issue 4, 795. 45 Francis Fukuyama, Our Posthuman Future: Consequences Of The Biotechnology Revolution, New York: Farrar, Straus And Giroux, 2002, 7. 46 James J. Hughes, “The Politics of Transhumanism and the Techno-Millennial Imagination, 1626-2030,” Zygon: Journal of Religion & Science. Dec2012, Vol. 47 Issue 4, 772. The “Technoutopians” are those who believe in the power of technology and human enhancement to create a better world, if not a utopia.46 47 Robert E. McGinn, “Technology, Demography, and the Anachronism of Traditional Rights,” Readings in the Philosophy of Technology, ed. David Kaplan, (Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield, 2009), 193.


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48 Eric Gregory, “What Do We Want from the Just War Tradition? New Challenges of Surveillance and the Security State,” Studies in Christian Ethics, 2014, 53. The author writes that “a lust for security and secrecy has become the lust that dominates America and its idolatrous politics of dominating others.”48 Domination of others is the natural end-state of a tyrannous government. 49 Fukuyama, 159. 50 Hughes, 762. 51 Ibid., 765. 52 Ibid., 764-5.

the silicon chasm: technological enhancements and politics

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