Alas, in America, serious science and fine art must pay
homage to entertainment.
Imperial orders organize surrounding bread and circus.
Harari ain’t bread, so he must be circus.
Harari, author of “21 Lessons for the 21st
Century,” sees a near future of two classes: elite and useless.
We are so quick to adopt the convenient path before the
moral one. We don’t protest or be dubbed a luddite, the phrase, “Your options
have changed.” Instead, we regard it as being material to accommodating to the
tech-facilitated world.
By this standard, those who go and stay off line accept a
lesser life.
Harari rejects this precept. Why? Because he predicts
artificial intelligence will disrupt to the point of dissolution of what it
means to be human.
Does Silicon Valley clap its ears, or challenge this
doomsday message?
No, Silicon Valley invites Harari to speak to its workers.
Why? Surely in order to develop a vaccine to inoculate the
virus.
Smart people in power seek a way – above all else – to stay
in power.
How best not to neutralize the threat that Harari’s ideas
pose but to co-opt them.
Inside, he is pitched to workers as one of them, something to
be hacked and, then, exploited.
Even when he preaches the terrible destruction that thrives
in the core of the social media tech virus that is bigger than all us.
Next: Running for Your Life: Simply “Reporter”
