ReWriting the Human Story - Chapter 8

Singularity.FM

"The universe is made of stories, not atoms." Muriel Rukeyser *** About 13.5 billion years ago, matter, energy, time and space came into being in what is known as the Big Bang. The story of these fundamental features of our universe is called physics. About 300,000 years after their first appearance, matter and energy started to coalesce into complex structures, called atoms, which then combined into molecules. The story of atoms, molecules and their interactions is called chemistry. About 3.8 billion years ago, on a planet called Earth, certain molecules combined to form particularly large and intricate structures called organisms. The story of organisms is called biology. About 70,000 years ago, organisms belonging to the species Homo Sapiens started to form even more elaborate structures called cultures. The subsequent development of these human cultures is called history." [Yuval Harari, Sapiens p. 3] After Benjamin Franklin disarmed the Gods by inventing the lightning rod, science has been the means by which humanity has first dethroned and then replaced God altogether. Today, breakthroughs in big data, AI, synthetic biology, genetic engineering, and neuroscience are all pushing us closer to Godhood. Many scientists are confident that defeating aging, creating mind uploads, AI, GMO humans, and radically new engineered organisms are simply a question of “when”, not “if”. This is why Stewart Brand noted that we are already Gods so we might as well start behaving as such. And so we have. Humanity has never wielded more power for we live in the most scientifically advanced century in the history of our civilization. Paradoxically, it is also the most dangerous century not only for countless species going extinct but also for our own existence. But how can that be? Isn’t science good both for us and the world in general? Read the rest here: https://www.singularityweblog.com/science-story/