Intro
With regard to themes and issues of fundamental importance – not only for those who study and do scientific research (in all the scientific-disciplinary fields involved) – about which there is much debate, wrongly presenting them as completely original and innovative, I share some parts extracted from a scientific article from 2021, published in early 2022. I could go back much further: these are theses, an approach, an epistemology, studies and research rooted in almost thirty years of multi/inter/transdisciplinary study and research.
Because, as I have always said, one cannot be an ‘expert on everything’. One always needs in-depth and rigorous study, experience, comparisons and projects with many colleagues from various disciplinary areas, and one must do a lot, a lot of research always ready to accept error and the ‘constitutive emergence’ (1995) of all that is Social and Vital.
[…]
“We continue to approach the complexity of life with a reductionist/deterministic mentality, we continue to make the “Great Mistake”(Dominici, 1995-1996, 2009, 2014) of believing that education today is a question of a purely technical or technological nature, merely a matter of teaching skills and know-how — and nothing more (which instead is the exact opposite of what we so desperately need); we continue to insist on separating, dividing, isolating what is, in reality, not only correlated and interdependent, but intrinsically and profoundly united, widening the fracture between what I have called “false dichotomies” (1995-1996), not only between nature and culture, culture and technology, between the natural and the artificial, but also between fields of knowledge such as the humanities and the hard sciences, between interdisciplinarity and specialization, even between creativity and rationality. Breaking down, isolating, simplifying (including what is impossible to simplify), these have always been our (simple) answers, our simple solutions to complex problems, our illusory “devices” of reassurance that everything is under control and that what we cannot control is simply a freak occurrence, an occasional black swan, a momentary breach in our perfect techniques for monitoring, determining, predicting – and for measuring, since all that is not measurable, of course, is of no use to anyone.
And indeed, with respect to a certain absence of thought and/or the incapacity to think, we have all but deemed “useless” theory itself. Certainly, when compared to practice and research, theory cuts a fairly futile figure, according to the current mindset: yet another example of the ever-present false dichotomies, that of theory vs. research and practice.
The present-day obsession with doing, designing, studying, and funding (!) only what is “useful”, the attempts to observe, describe, explain, recognize and control complexity, human life, spirit, and vitality by dividing, charting and cataloguing, forgetting that the “essential is invisible to the eye” (Saint-Exupery, 1943), the insistent search for control and certainty in order to cling onto an illusory sensation of familiarity and reassurance in the face of the radical unpredictability and variability inherent to life and reality, apart from impoverishing our minds and imagination, apart from weakening the bonds of belonging – bonds of solidarity, community and identity – end up bringing us back again and again to a sterile search for quantitative data, numbers, facts, figures, results, statistics and solutions, to all that can be measured, which is what I have in the past called the “tyranny of concreteness:” (2009-2019).
This tyranny of concreteness is, quite literally, a cognitive and cultural dictatorship, supported by a ubiquitous architecture of fields of knowledge and skills, which has come to dominate every aspect of contemporary social and cultural organization and life, establishing a totally inadequate “culture of evaluation” that is incapable of grasping the complex and qualitative (!) dimensions, the subtleties, the ambiguities, the contradictions, conflicts, ambivalence, coexistence, typical of the human, the social and the vital.
And how could it be otherwise? In the civilization of automation and concreteness, it is the “facts” which must prevail – or what we label as such – it is the data which, according to certain deceptive and misleading narratives, would seem to no longer need any intervention, epistemological or methodological, from human beings. All that is needed, apparently, is the software and, of course, the know-how for using it. And these same data, admittedly essential and fundamental, are often, however, presented (erroneously) as though they were “facts of life”, while, as used to be taught in our classical epistemology and research methodology courses, the data “can never speak for themselves”. Today, consequently, they reign unchallenged, considering that, according to the hegemonic paradigm, the only things that count are skills, digital skills….which are undoubtedly necessary, but as I never tire of saying, quite insufficient, especially as a method or approach for evaluating facts or data.
Compatible with the dictates of the tyranny of concreteness is the concept – I for one, at least, have the distinct impression, that a similar concept regarding “thinking” (but also thought, thoughts, and thought system(s)) is prevalent nowadays: thinking, as is known, requires a great deal of “time”, as well as a good capacity for abstraction (among many other capabilities), therefore it tends to slow us down. It follows that, in sacrificing a certain degree of speed, we become much less “efficient”, according to the tenets and well-established legends of organizational cultures.
Legends, which, despite the latest narratives, and albeit contrary to the majority of expert opinions, have never quite died out, quite the opposite! What else can be said, other than to point out once again, that these are, and have always been, educational and cultural issues?
To wrap up this theme, I would like to repeat these unforgettable words of Hannah Arendt: “If it should turn out to be true that knowledge (in the modern sense of know-how) and thought have parted company for good, then we would indeed become the helpless slaves, not so much of our machines as of our know-how, thoughtless creatures at the mercy of every gadget which is technically possible, no matter how murderous it is.” (Arendt, 1958: 3).
Man and Machine: Artificial Intelligence and algorithms
At this point I would like to reintroduce a theme mentioned in the initial pages of this article, namely, the advent of artificial intelligence and the ever more widespread use of algorithms in every sector of social life. Among the various fields of study, research and action, it has become of the utmost importance to reflect upon the relationship/interaction between man and machine (Mumford, 1934, 1967; Wiener, 1948, 1950; McLuhan, 1964; Foucault, 1988). The objective, in my opinion, should be to focus on a “complex synthesis” (1995-1996) capable of at last overcoming the devastating separation (false dichotomy) between culture and technology, with the prospect of “healing the fracture between the Human and the Technological”.
As I have said before, the growing capacity of our species to gradually take hold of the levers of its own evolution leaves us with the need to rethink the somewhat ambivalent interaction between technique/technology and human beings, along with the necessity to reformulate our thinking about what it means to be human. In particular, we are obliged to re-examine our (once again) ambiguous and complex interaction with intelligent(?) machines and robots, because the “complex synthesis” triggered by this interaction is one whose prospects, developments and implications we are as yet unable to evaluate.
My own reflections on this convergence run along two parallel lines: on the one hand, the possibility, or more likely, the probability that machines or robots will come to resemble human beings more and more closely does not worry me in the least; as a matter of fact I see this change in dynamics as a positive move which will facilitate the abovementioned synthesis and interaction.
I am, however, extremely concerned at the mere idea/aspiration/vision/narrative that humans might/should become more and more similar to machines, which could, arguably, add unlimited potential to our capacities/abilities but, inevitably, in aiming to eliminate error, in aiming to eliminate the possibility of making difficult (even the wrong) choices, and even more so, in aiming to eliminate the unpredictability of their own actions and decisions, would be tantamount to eliminating precisely what makes us “human beings”.
In the framework of certain recurring, dystopian Utopias, the idea of designing and realizing logical machines/ technological androids /intelligent machines (Turing, 1950, 1994), capable of imitating and behaving like human beings and/or subsequently, to create hypertechnological automated environments/ecosystems (even, “perfect societies”…perhaps we could define them as “algorithmic societies”), perfectly devised by perfect devices, incapable of making mistakes…is an age-old – ancient – idea/ambition/vision spanning many historical eras, which has touched and tainted all areas of human and social praxis; from myth to religion, from the sciences to the arts, from literature to technique/technology itself, permeating all forms of social and cultural production.
In the future, no doubt, we will be dealing more and more often with more or less intelligent (smart?) materials and machines – with ever more massive intensification and extension of the networks and levels of connection with the human race – and with new android/robots that, as anticipated, will become better and better at imitating us and replicating certain kinds of human behavior.
Running the enormously potentiated risk of being unable to evaluate in-depth the consequences of our choices, destined to reveal themselves in all their power, immense and irreversible.
But what are all these efforts aiming towards? In what direction are we heading? At times, my impression is that we are simply “playing things by ear”, in a condition of limited rationality (Simon), drifting through the great paradoxes of the hypertechnological and hyperconnected civilization, a civilization that feeds — and feeds upon — a multitude of risks and illusions.
In short, rather than healing the fracture between the natural and the artificial, should we choose instead to make a lopsided dash toward “transhumanism”, the outcome, I fear, might turn out to confirm the wisdom of the famous proverb: “fools rush in where angels fear to tread”. I must confess that I have always considered the term artificial “intelligence” to be a bit of an oxymoron, as I believe that intelligence is a connotative feature of living beings, involving an emergent property of the (complex) human mind that we call “thought”, while artificial intelligence may merely correspond to a greatly heightened capacity for calculation and problem-solving. I cannot deny, however, that we must be ready to cope with the epistemological fracture represented by the advent and exponential progress of AI systems, which may end up blurring or, in the near future, even completely doing away with the traditional distinction between complicated and complex systems. In this case, the non-linear and unpredictable dynamics that I believe will ensue, are those of a progressive transformation and evolution, again through non-linear differentiation, of all of these “complicated systems” into “complex systems”, with a resulting and somewhat paradoxical return to the centrality of error and unpredictability: the Human, in other words, will once more take his/her place at the very core of the world-system(s), with unprecedented novel powers and new responsibilities, never before seen in human history. It must be hoped that all of this can unfold in the framework of a renewed systemic relationship with the machines, with the “nature” of the natural and the artificial, with the world outside of us (inside and outside, another false dichotomy that, someday perhaps, we may succeed in pondering).
A World of Artificiality
Faced with this literal explosion of the artificial, in a world where technique is no longer subordinate to nature, in a world of artificiality, all that communication and the social production of knowledge can do, despite the importance, especially today, of their strategic functions, is to accompany it, render it visible and pull it into the public debate, where it takes form, to all effects, as “nature”, as a nature whose manageability presents considerable difficulties. In other words, within the hypercomplex society (2003), socially and culturally marked by fragile social bonds and by the hegemony of individualistic values, the dimensions of what is technically/technologically controlled has become hypertrophic with respect to what is controlled non-technologically, but – and this is the crucial point of the question – these processes and dynamics have not contributed to reactivate the fundamental social mechanisms of trust and cooperation, but have rendered the “life-worlds” much more uncertain, fragmented and precarious for the Subject.
Despite the hegemonic “narratives” which continue incessantly to be spun, what is in fact happening is that the advent of the hypertechnological civilization has expanded, as never before, the dimensions of dynamicity, variability, but also of precariousness, uncertainty, insecurity and vulnerability within – and without – the social systems, rendering the functions of social communication even more strategic in terms of an (unattainable, as should be clear by now) “reduction of complexity” (Luhmann), of the management of risk and uncertainty, and of mediation of conflict (Dominici, 1995-1996).
It would perhaps be useful to recall that we find ourselves at a crossing point, an insidious passage – in the midst of yet another, very inflated age of transition – a process which should deeply concern us, towards multidimensional, global modernity, marked by an even greater accumulation of anomalies and knowledge illusions (Kuhn, 1962; see also: Lakatos-Musgrave, 1970, Sloman-Fernbach, 2017), which have debilitated the certainties of our once-consolidated cognitive paradigms.
The hegemony of instrumental rationality and of the self-regulated market economy has allowed the logics of dominion to triumph and to spread to the totality of social life. This process has further weakened those bonds that transform individual choices into collective projects and actions. Regarding the theme of social cohabitation, what has been generated is a strongly individualized global society, which shifts the burden of greater responsibility onto the shoulders of each single social actor, called on to bear alone the weight of responsible freedom.
From this perspective, the development of forms of mediated communication (Thompson, 1995), for example the expansion of connection technology and of networked social systems (Toffler, 1980; Castells, 1996-1998, 2009; Himanen, 2001; Hess-Ostrom, 2007; Floridi, 2010; Byung-Chul, 2012, 2013; Rainie-Wellman, 2012), besides the opportunities created, may well contribute to further weaken and cool off the mechanisms of the production and intensification of social bonds (Coleman, 1990; Putnam, 2000) (or what is commonly termed production of social capital in scientific literature).
Moreover, the belief, fostered by technological solutionism and acritical neophilia, that technology (in particular, digital technology, the internet and other networks), can solve any problem, including a return to a more trusting rapport between politics and citizens, could well turn out to be yet another fatal error. Considering that political and social praxis, despite finding/having found new virtual arenas of construction and organization of consent and/or opinions, require a crucial passage from theoretical processing to practical, concrete action, which must impact the political deciders. And in order to do this, what is needed are informed and critically educated social actors in flesh and blood, active and aware within their networks of cooperation.
For some time, globalization has constituted the empirical condition of the modern world (Sassen, 1998), condition that is associated with the concept of complex connectivity, meaning a “densening network of interconnections and interdependencies that characterize modern life” (Tomlinson,1999:14). This is a process that can also be viewed as the triumph of an omni-comprehensive, totalizing ideology that absorbs, envelops, incorporates and molds all spheres of praxis and of real life. And any criticism of globalization (Gallino, 2000; Stiglitz, 2002) as producer of a ferociously disruptive individualism (Touraine, 2004), is in reality a criticism of the global capitalistic system, guilty of having broken the age-old alliance between capitalism and democracy (Dahl, 1998) and of having staked everything exclusively on a technological and economic development without considering the implications on single individuals and on social groups and citizenship (Marshall,1950; Rawls, 1971; Bellamy, 2008; Norris, 2011). The world economy (Wallenstein) is progressively de-potentiating the mechanisms and apparatus appertaining to democratic regimes, with profound repercussions, not only on the structures and hierarchies of the systems of global production, but also, and above all, on the entire architecture of rights and protection regarding people, citizens and workers. The undeniable outcome is the passage from a working society to a risk society (Beck, 1986, 1999, 2007), with the victorious establishment of a perpetual political economy of insecurity. This always brings to mind a formula I am fond of repeating: we are trying to manage a sharing economy without having the least idea of the true meaning of a sharing society.
Every process of technological innovation or change necessarily determines elements of stress and vulnerability in the system, but technological progress bereft of culture becomes a merely “would-be innovation”, creating less equality and fewer opportunities. It is only through long-term educational processes involving true interdisciplinary, multidisciplinary and transdisciplinary programs designed to stimulate critical thinking, to teach students to recognize complexity and to see objects as systems rather than vice versa, that we will be able to form hybrid figures (1995-1996), capable of uniting the false dichotomies that keep our narrow fields of discipline separate, so that innovation and inclusion can walk hand in hand to create a truly participative and democratic society.
Only by radically rethinking education, educational processes and our educational institutions, which entails first of all breaking the chains of tradition and upsetting the governance of our schools and universities — innovation means destabilizing (2005) — can we hope to overcome the “great mistake”, the false dichotomies and the cultural backwardness and tardiness which puts us in the position of forever chasing after the accelerations of technology. Thought and theory must no longer be considered “useless”, while error must be recognized for what it truly is: a source of knowledge and vitality. Above all, it is time we stopped teaching and training our students to be “mere executors of functions and rules.”(Dominici, 1995-1996, 2009-2021).
We are currently experiencing and attempting to inhabit an era marked by drastic changes and by processes of complex synthesis, whose epistemological and ethical implications have exposed us to completely novel trajectories and prospects. The last word, however, belongs to Mother Nature and to that vitality of spirit, that spiritual vitality that no technological device, no hyperconnected and hypercomplex ecosystem will ever be able to capture, cage or re/disconnect, least of all by means of the logics of control and/or reclusion.
The Digital Mockingbird
In the mid-19th century, Danish author Hans Christian Andersen wrote an admonitory fairy tale called “The Nightingale” (Andersen, 1843), about an emperor who substitutes the artificial song of a golden wind-up nightingale for the natural singing of a real bird he used to love, encouraged to do so by the words of the court music-master: “For you must perceive, my chief lord and emperor, that with a real nightingale we can never tell what is going to be sung, but with this bird everything is settled. It can be opened and explained, so that people may understand how…and why one note follows upon another”.
But at the end of the tale, only the song of the living bird will be able to succeed in restoring the health of the emperor, who has fallen deathly ill.
In speaking of humanity’s ongoing anthropological transformation, in speaking of the need for learning to inhabit complexity, in speaking of the advent of a “new” Nature, we must take care not stake everything on the digital simulation of human thought and sentiment, lest we be once again taken in by a mechanical bird, this time, more aptly, a (digital) mockingbird.
Research Article
“The Digital Mockingbird: Anthropological Transformation and the “New Nature”, in World Futures.The Journal of New Paradigm, Routhledge, Feb. 2022.
#research #transdisciplinarity #education #AI #FutureofEducation #ComplexSystems #EducationForAll #PeerReviewed
https://doi.org/10.1080/02604027.2022.2028539
Disclosure Statement
No potential competing interest was reported by the authors.
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