What does it mean to be human? This question that most of us struggle with at one time or another has undergone radical revision in each of the last two centuries because of modern science. Darwinian evolution revolutionized our conceptions of ourselves in the 19th century, and molecular biology has produced an equally important revision during the last half of the 20th century. As we enter the 21st century, I believe that we are in the process of another radical revision as a result of recent work in robotics and artificial life.
The Darwinian revolution changed the view of humans in relation to other species. No longer is it reasonable to view ourselves as the products of a special creation “in a 24-hour day.” Rather, the current human species is a transitory state in an ongoing process of natural selection dating back several billions of years and continuing into the future. Darwinism is fully accepted by the scientific community. Nonetheless, we often feel that humans are in some way different from other animals. This difference must be quantitative, of course, but is often regarded as so great as to be effectively qualitative. Postulated differences that make humans different from other animals include assertions that humans are biologically distinct; only humans have consciousness; only humans have language; and only humans have special rights.
Over the past few years, however, scientists have chipped away at our belief that humans possess special properties. UCLA’s Jared Diamond, a professor of geography and physiology, has discussed how humans are genetically and behaviorally so close to our primate relatives that we are properly regarded as The Third Chimpanzee, the title of his remarkable recent book. Similarly, the notion that humans alone exhibit consciousness is being challenged by experiments and observations that show other species are capable of learning and foresight.
Further revision in our understanding of ourselves has come from molecular biology, which considers each organism to be a huge chemical reaction, encapsulated within whatever bounds that organism. This reductionist view of humans is universally accepted among biologists.
Another view is emerging that, I think, will lead to yet another radically different notion of ourselves and our place in nature. It argues that living systems are best regarded essentially as processes, much like computer processes. Our society and our ecosystem are collections of concomitantly executing programs that take in material, process it and spit it out. Eventually, each process, like computer processes in general, are doomed to end, but may well “fork out” new processes as “offspring.” For example, each of us consists of almost entirely different molecules than we did when we were first born; we look different, think differently and in almost all ways are different. Yet we regard ourselves as the same individual because we are the same process, extended in time.
One consequence of this view is that other forms of life are entirely possible — not only extraterrestrial life but also artificial life, which consist of processes that have the essential properties we attribute to living ones: metabolism, movement, reproduction, etc. Robots and computer viruses are only two possible examples. Computer viruses are complex and can move around, metabolize, self-organize and, in some instances, recombine with one another as in sexual reproduction. Life, then, is not about material continuity, but rather about self-organizing processes that take in, organize and may produce other processes. This functional approach is increasingly being accepted, and I believe most people will eventually come to accept it at some level.
Will society come to embrace the idea that we are not special but merely another species in an evolutionary process — or a mere chemical reaction or process? I am not sure we are capable of doing so. For example, I can accept at one level that my daughter is “just another” chemical reaction, but on another level I cannot help but regard her as a very special human, with lots of spirit and special consciousness. Some have suggested that Eastern thinking comes to grips with these splits better than does our Western one. I am not certain of that, but I am certain that it is difficult to accept at an internal level some of the ideas that our rational science demands. This necessarily leads to conflicts within us that may well be ineluctable and a source of real insecurity.
That science fiction movies sometimes raise these issues but ultimately come to reassure us of our inherent human superiority illustrates the problem. In Star Trek, Captain Kirk’s humanness proves superior to Spock’s reasoning; in Star Wars, “trust the Force” suggests that there is a power greater than ourselves. Other movies such as Terminator; I, Robot; Blade Runner; and the very poignant A.I. exploit our insecurities about inherent humanness, but also reaffirm that humans are unique. Such conflict would have no appeal if we were really comfortable with our specialness.
The changes in our understanding about the meaning of life and humanness will necessarily lead to changes in the rights and responsibilities that we feel toward one another. It becomes especially important that we have guidance and forums for discussion like the UCLA Center for Society and Genetics. It is important that we not automatically assume that these newer positions offer only bleak, existentialist views. Darwin famously concludes his Origin of Species with his belief that “There is grandeur in this [new] view of life … and that, whilst this planet has gone on cycling according to the fixed laws of gravity, from so simple a beginning endless forms most beautiful and most wonderful have been, and are being, evolved.” One must agree with him. I would argue, further, that viewing life and humanness from the newer perspectives is no less wonderful or beautiful, perhaps more so, as we try to imagine one chemical or abstract process reading this essay or contemplating the consequences it portends.
