Horizon - Human 2.0 (24/10/2006)

I tuned in late to this program and found it so ridiculous that I really had trouble watching it through.

When I joined, the program seemed to be just finishing ‘explaining’ Moore’s Law and impressing upon the viewer that this ‘law’ made it obvious that very soon in the future the average computer would be ‘more powerful than the human brain’.

What does this even mean? Will a computer in 2 years time be able to hold believable verbal conversations with me or is it suggesting that a computer of now is not quite powerful enough to find the first million primes faster than I can? Clearly the statement means nothing unless it is followed up by a discussion of how ‘power’ is defined in this context.

The program then proceeded to introduce us to a line up of supposed ‘scientists’ that where there to share their crackpot visions of the future. By crackpot, I mean absolutely on the very fringe of current scientific thought, my favourite example being Ray Kurzweil, a man who sells pills designed to extend ones life long enough so that future science can help you live forever (see this link for a good laugh).

Ray was there to tell us about a future where we were ‘upgraded’ to the point where we had superhuman powers, ranging from the obvious super-strength (from the implanted nano-wires) to the memory and vision enhancements provided by brain implants.

Keeping with the outlandish theme of technology gone crazy, Horizon decided to bring in another doubtful personality to tell us about how things might happen differently – we might all be wiped out by a marauding artificial intelligence at any moment, despite presenting zero evidence suggesting that current science can deliver anything like a genuinely independent A.I.

At no point did Horizon see fit to introduce a scientist that put forward the much more plausible claim that neither of the above scenarios might play out.

Fundamentally, there was little in the way of real science presented to the viewer and what science that did appear was distorted, unbalanced, massively over-dramatised and generally misinterpreted. If a viewer were to take the program seriously they would have no choice but to start saving for the implants or begin digging a nuclear bunker immediately. Somehow I don’t think many people did either, they simply left this miserable ‘science’ program with no better understanding of technological progress than they had before.

submitted by Dan Rogers