5. We Control Technology,
Technology does not Control Us
• We don’t feel that we will, or are even more
inclined to do something, just because we can.
• We feel in control. We make the decisions, not
the tools, technology, or situation around us.
• Commonly Believed Corrolary: Technology is
not good or bad. It is us who decide whether to
use technology in a good or bad way.
6. The Neutrality of Technology
• “Guns don’t kill people, people kill people”
7. However …
• “Why do people climb mountains? Because
they are there”
– H. Korman
• "Power tends to corrupt, and absolute power
corrupts absolutely. Great men are almost
always bad man.“
– Lord Acton, British Historian
8. From: “Drone Strikes Reveal A
Lost Moral Compass”
• Last year at this time, in preparation for the harvest
feast, the children joined their grandmother […] in
the field to pick okra. Though often aware of the
intimidating drone of these robotic machines
overhead, the family, secure in its own sense of
innocence, was unprepared for the hellfire that
descended on them unexpectedly when a drone fired
missile struck them followed swiftly by a second.
When the dust and the cries for help subsided, eight
relatives, including the children, were found to be
wounded and their grandmother […] dead, her body
burned and torn beyond recognition.
9. From: “Drone Strikes Reveal A
Lost Moral Compass” (Cont’d)
• There is, I fear, an explanation. A compass has
gone askew, the moral compass that when
pointing true tells us when our worship of war
as a substitute for wise foreign policy and its
lethal ever-expanding soulless technology is
leading us into a legal, moral, spiritual abyss.
10. From: “Drone Strikes Reveal A
Lost Moral Compass” (Cont’d)
• [J]ust as those poorly plotted maneuvers over our
children's heads remind us that we are at war, the
senseless murder of a grandmother […] should
remind us that […] the horrors we model, condone
and justify today are shaping a dystopian future […]
where the commitments to human rights and law are
quaint, outmoded notions that can be shredded and
burned beyond recognition because ... well, because
we can.
– Albany Times Union, November 16, 2013
12. The Plan
• I will use cognitive science to make an
argument that tools, technology, and the nature
of our environment can have an impact on our
inclinations to do or not do something.
13. Traditional, Naïve, View of Cognition
CognitionSense Act
Environment
Agent (Brain)
Cognition = f(brain)
Perception and Action are ‘mere’ input to and
output from thinking, reasoning, problem solving,
and decision-making
15. The World as External Memory
• Situated Cognition people say that the brain often
uses the environment as a kind of ‘external memory’.
Examples:
– Taking apart your computer: how do you lay down the
pieces to get it back together?
– Notes you write to yourself
– Planners, calendars, cellphones, laptops
16. Copying Blocks Experiment
Original Copy
Bins
Task:
Subjects have to make a
copy of the configuration of
blocks on the left by
‘grabbing’ individual blocks
from the bins at the bottom
and placing them on the right.
Result: after grabbing block
from bin, eyes would move to
original to check position
20. Biological Being
• We often think the boundary between ‘me’ and
‘my environment’ is my skin:
– Me: heart, lungs, legs, bones, brain, etc.
– Not Me: clothes, wallet, laptop, glasses, etc.
• This distinction makes sense if I talk about
genetics, diseases, growth, etc.: biology!
21. Physical Being
• As a physical being I have:
– Mass
– Shape
– Color
• These properties allow us to explain and
predict things such as:
– How much weight I add to an airplane
– How people can recognize me from other people
• But note: things like clothes, glasses, wallet,
are part of me. This is my physical being.
22. Cognitive Being
• As a cognitive being, I:
– See things
– Remember things
– Solve problems
– Make decisions
– Etc
• According to situated cognition, I may need to refer
to things that are outside of my biological (or
physical) being in order to explain those capacities.
24. Using Tools to create a new
Cognitive System?
Cognitive
System A
World
Cognitive
System A
Tool
World
Cognitive System B
25. Our Best Tool:
Language
• Literacy
• Numeracy
• Science
• Math
• Logic
• Language allows us to pass knowledge and
skills along to others, through all of space and
time. It is a huge part of culture.
26. Evolution
Darwin Wallace
‘Discovered’ the theory of evolution independently. Coincidence? Did one look over
the shoulder of the other? No. Many of the ingredients and basic ideas for evolution
were already in place. Darwin and Wallace were both able to put the final pieces in
and complete the puzzle. In fact, the history of science and inventions is full of
such ‘multiple discovery’: it shows that ideas don’t originate from a ‘naked’ brain, let
alone ‘pop’ up in a brain, but instead gradually evolve in the public domain.
31. Exploration and Exploitation
• As a controller, the brain has to figure out how what it controls
is able to interact with the world.
• That is, before it can ‘exploit’ its powers, it first needs to
‘explore’ its powers.
• Thus, it has to figure out the action potentials of what it
controls, as well as those of its environment. As such, the brain
will figure out and classify things as:
– walkable
– reachable
– graspable
– movable
– hammerable …?
33. Copying Blocks Experiment II
Original Copy
Bins
Same task as before.
However, original is hidden by
square, and you have to click on
it to reveal the original. Moreover,
it takes a certain amount of time
for original to appear.
Result: the more time it took for
original to appear, the more
subjects started to rely on internal
memory (brain).
34. The Google Effect
• The Google effect is that people forget those things
that they can ‘Google’.
• Some people lament this, saying that people have
become ‘lazy’ or ‘stupid’, not unlike how the
calculator has made people worse at basic arithmetic.
• But in reality, this was in fact a very smart move of
the brain. Incorporating the internet as external
memory is not ‘lazy’, but efficient. And while brain
alone = less smart, brain + internet = smarter!
• Most importantly, the brain naturally integrates its
environment if it makes sense: we don’t control this!
35. How our Brain Integrates
Technology: Perception
(Click on pic for vid)
36. How our Brain Integrates
Technology: Action
(click on pic for vid)
37. Monday, November 25
4-6pm
EMPAC Theater
Dr. Jonathan Wolpaw
“Adaptive Neurotechnologies:
Principles & Promise”
Live Demonstration of
Brain-Computer Interface!
38. Conclusion
• Technology very much has the potential to
change us as cognitive beings, affecting our
capacities for perception, action, problem
solving, reasoning, etc. i.e. all of cognition.
• As such, they are anything but neutral, and
we’ll have to be cautious in how we proceed
with the development of these technologies.
40. Back to Drones:
Confessions of a Drone Warrior
Drone operator Brandon Bryant
Was part of drone missions that
killed 1626 people
Suffers from PTSD
November 2013 Issue of GQ
41. PTSD for Drone Operators?
“There was no significant difference in the rates of
MH diagnoses, including post-traumatic stress
disorder, depressive disorders, and anxiety
disorders between RPA and MA pilots.”
- Pentagon Study
42. Why do Drone Operators get
PTSD?
• To some extent, their brain says: “I’m there”
• Old theory: PTSD is caused by fear
• Do drone operators fear for their lives the way
soldiers do that are actually in the battle zone
feel fear? Does the virtual presence become
that real? Unlikely.
• So, new theory: PTSD is caused by moral
anguish of killing people
43. Solution to PTSD?!?
• [R]esearchers have proposed creating a
Siri-like user interface, a virtual copilot that
anthropomorphizes the drone and lets
crews shunt off the blame for whatever
happens. “Siri, have those people killed.”
44. Just Because We Will, Should We?
• Variants:
• Just because we do, should we?
45. Technology will Change and
Destroy Humanity!
• If technology becomes more and more
integrated with our brains and with our being,
basically making us into a race of cyborgs,
then that means the end of humankind!
• So no, even if we will, that doesn’t mean we
should.
46. Problems
• Ought-From-Is or Naturalistic Fallacy: Just
because humans are a certain way, doesn’t
mean that we should be or stay that way.
47. Technology is Simply
Speeding Up Evolution!
• If technology is really going to change
humanity and make us into a race of cyborgs,
well, that’s just the next step of evolution:
Homo Sapiens 2.0!
• So yes, we will, and we should!
48. Problems
• Naturalistic Fallacy again: just because evolution
happens doesn’t mean it is good.
• Only shows 1 line of evolution … but evolution is a
tree!
• Suggest evolution = progress. In particular: ‘smarter’
is better … but ‘tree’ of evolution suggests quite a
different picture. Also, ‘progress’ is only increased
‘fitness’ to local environment … this is far cry from
‘fitness’ in any kind of absolute sense, let alone that
this would be ‘better’ in any kind of moral sense.