“When someone is honestly 55% right, that’s very good, and there’s no use wrangling. And if someone is 60% right, it’s wonderful, it’s great luck, and let him thank God. But what’s to be said about 75%, right? Wise people say this is suspicious. Well, and what about 100% right? Whoever says he’s 100% right is a fanatic, a thug, and the worst kind of rascal.”
An old Jew from Galicia[1]
Never before in history has there been as much knowledge gathered as there is today. It’s also never been as available as it is right now. It is only normal that we are growing more agile and intent on utilising this data mine for a variety of tasks, fantasies, perversions, etc. We are building Noah’s ship and Pandora’s Box simultaneously. Depending on how it is viewed, used, structured, and distributed. The reproducibility era has arrived, as Walter Benjamin so eloquently phrased it. However, neither the mechanical nor the digital have taken control; rather, as is customary, there is a mesh of possibilities that offers a variety of fresh methods of creation.
The latest developments in AI and other fields are merely extensions of this curiosity; they provide yet another tool for gaining access to the treasure trove that is gradually growing into our collective awareness. Will it? No one knows, futurology is still far away. Nonetheless, this results in numerous behavioural changes, as well as changes in how people evaluate and construct objects or create art. Music is a good example of how sounds were once produced physically and required the creation of instruments in order to produce a specific desired sound, which took many years to achieve. Using electronics has made it much simpler to create and synthesise sounds, substituting some of the labour-intensive physical steps. This has opened up a vast array of new creative possibilities. The same thing is happening in movies, where CGI made it possible to make movies of a kind that had never been made before, and it continues growing. Humans are still present, but their physical needs are less important because of this new electronic layer.
In terms of art, we’re still not there, but there are indications. There is a growing emphasis on agglomeration and processes (as Arendt points out), and this is reflected in the kinds of work being produced. An example are AI drawing programmes, which one can consider updated versions of older computer programmes like Photoshop, Cad or tools such as digital cameras, digital printing, and so on. Are we better off now than before? It is different, there are positives and negatives, but overall, I would say these are all positives because they provide, as mentioned, a wide range of new opportunities to develop, build, and utilise both our own and the world’s potential. What one should not forget is that we are still human and thus still very much bound to the physical and probably so for the foreseeable future. One should not neglect one’s origin and proclivities, this is not the path to godliness, it is a path to improve our capabilities, but these are still very much rooted in honey bees, eating fish, fighting with fists and having uterine grown children.
All of these represent significant shifts in our societal structure and how we view the world. As a result, now more than ever, a critical approach is required, with critical thinking focused on ourselves, our surroundings, and the effect they have on us, as well as the impact we have on our environment. As we improved our living conditions and tool mastery, our population grew significantly, and our footprint grew wider and more impactful. We are living in a time when an unprecedented number of people are capable and able to view their surroundings with the necessary distance, owing to improved quality of life, in order to have a clearer idea of what we have been looking at all along.
At this critical technological and political moment, with democracies having lost ground in recent years, it is more urgent than ever to remember the past struggles to achieve democracy and the freedom we enjoy every day. Reflexivity is an ode to freedom and the critical thinking that maintains it.
Martim Brion, Munich, 2023
[1] Miłosz Czesław, The Captive Mind, Vintage, 1990
Martim Brion 