ULTIMATE COMPUTING - Quantum Consciousness Studies

Origin and Evolution of Life 57
centriole centers (MTOCs) with chromosomes in middle. 6) Centriole anchored
microtubules separating a pair of duplicate chromosomes. By Paul Jablonka.
3.4 Biotech Evolution—The Next Symbiosis
There are several indications that the evolution of technology will force
another nonlinear acceleration in biological evolution which has dealt with crises
such as toxic oxygen two billion years ago, utilized new energy sources, inhabited
new environments, developed new forms, and spawned technologies which
themselves have evolved. Many observers have been alarmed by technological
evolution. Nineteenth century scientist/satirist Samuel Butler (Margulis and
Sagan, 1986) considered the possibility of machines suppressing humans and
assuming supremacy of earth:
man will become to the machine what the horse and the dog are to
man-he may continue to exist, even improve, and will probar bly be
better off in a state of domestication under the beneficent rule of the
machines than he is in his present wild state. After all we treat our
horses, dogs, cattle, and sheep on the whole with great kindness. We
give whatever experience teaches us to be best for them. In like
manner it is reasonable to suppose that machines will treat us kindly
for their existence is as dependent upon ours as ours is upon lower
animals.
Of course we eat some animals, and experiment upon others. It seems every
new technology is a double-edged sword with capacity for good or evil—the
basic “Frankenstein” scenario. But reliance on new technology is probably
necessary and inevitable for adaptation and survival in an ever crowding and
progressively toxic world. Margulis and Sagan (1986) cite general systems
theorist John Platt who is a student of evolutionary acceleration and believes that
life on earth may be nearing an enormously important turning point. The global
computing and communication that has emerged following World War Two has
become, according to Platt: “a collective social nervous system for managing
millions of our problems, and its importance for the long range future may be as
great as that of the first learning nervous system.”
New technologies may help biology to deal directly with current and future
crises. In their book, Microcosmos: 4 Billion Years of Evolution from our
Microbial Ancestors, Margulis and Sagan (1986) describe some surprising
possibilities. They feel that current man is little more than communities of
bacteria, modular manifestations of the nucleated cell, and that new “artificial”
life forms will emerge from symbiotic fusion of biology and technology. They see
this happening along three lines: genetic biotechnology, computer robotics, and
biochips:
... one day soon entire suits of genes, proteins and hormones may be
dovetailed in the laboratory to create new species of microbes. As
we gain a greater understanding of embryology and immunology we
will surely clone cells into progressively larger and more complex
organisms sure to intervene in our own evolution.
As computer robotics evolve smallward to become nanotechnology,
collective interactions with genetic biotechnology and natural biochips could
precipitate the next evolutionary phase transition: mind/tech symbiosis.
Margulis and Sagan (1986):