Was Nietzsche A TechnoOptimist?
If Friedrich Nietzsche were alive today, he would undoubtedly have millions of followers on social media. Among the greatest successes of the German philosopher and aphorist of the 19th century were phrases such as: "What does not kill me, makes me stronger." "Look at the rock for a long time, the rock is looking at you." and the classic "God is dead. God remains dead. And we killed him."
From Andrew Tate to the Decline of the Bronze Age, Nietzschean thought has even experienced a bit of a resurgence online thanks to the extreme progressive left. As the "Lord of the Red Earth" at the time, Nietzsche led a polemic against Christianity and the philosophy of asceticism and egalitarianism it inspired. Modern Nietzscheans argue that eugenics originates from Christian "slave morality", an inversion of classical aristocratic morality that defined the primacy of sacrifice, denigrated human perfection, and sought above all to protect the innocent.
Our modern Nietzscheans are certainly right, despite attacks on gifted programs and increasing tolerance for civil unrest in American cities. But according to its latest torchbearer, venture capitalist and early internet entrepreneur Marc Andreessen, Nietzsche can even help us understand the enduring response to new technology.
As Andresen explained in his recent Techno-Optimist Manifesto, “we are being lied to” about technology. We are told that this destroys jobs, damages the environment, and creates inequality. Instead, he wrote, “our civilization is built on technology,” because technology is “the glory of human ambition and achievement, the pinnacle of progress and the realization of our potential.”
Andreessen's penchant for aphorisms is well known. In 2011, he stated that "software is eating the world". During the pandemic, the rallying cry “It's Time to Build” has become a rallying cry for builders and technologists across the country. This is no different from his last manifesto. Written as a series of simple sentences and short positions, Andresen's advice aims to create a Nietzschean aesthetic rather than convince technology skeptics. On the one hand, there are technological “superhumans” who take risks for the sake of a richer, freer, richer future. On the other hand, there are enemies who hinder progress. growth bullies, AI pessimists, government officials and ESG consultants.
As a fan of Virginia Postrell's 1998 classic The Future and Its Enemies, I know many of these points, and most of them are true. However, aphorisms risk creating the illusion of depth and are not a substitute for reasoned argument. Unfortunately, this analytical weakness ties Andreessen's Manifesto into a knot of contradictions.
Consider Andresen's quote about the anti-humanist philosopher Nick Land. “When you combine technology and markets, you get what Nick Land calls a technocapitalist machine—an engine of continuous material creation, growth, and wealth,” writes Andreessen. “We believe,” he continued, “that the techno-capitalist machine is not anti-human, in fact it may be humanity's most important support. This is useful for us . The techno-capitalist machine is working for us . All cars. work for us .
However, whether he realized it or not (and I doubt it), this changed Land's philosophy. Indeed, the very term “techno-capitalist machine” implies the impotence and subordination of humanity to the forces of high-tech capitalism. As Andreessen puts it, our only goal is to ensure that “the upward spiral of technocapital continues forever,” according to Land, not for us humans, but for the machines themselves. We were just traveling; a simple downloader for digital posthumans that will surely replace us.
Land is the shadowy leader of the efficiency acceleration, or e/acc, internet subculture that seeks to accelerate the emergence of superintelligent artificial intelligence. The name is a play on efficient altruism, an influential movement of utilitarian ethicists whose proponents saw the creation of non-unitary superintelligence as an existential threat.
The country does not fully agree with their predictions. A philosophical pessimist and philanthropist, he views the end of human civilization with a kind of sociopathic indifference. Land even studied the Black Death, a plague that killed 25 million people, from the perspective of a mouse. When asked whether the human experience was important, Land said: "I don't see why it should be a particular priority."
Andresen disagrees with the moralists' skepticism. He wrote: “Intelligence makes everything better. “As a fundamental human right. we must expand it as much and as widely as possible. . . . Artificial intelligence is our alchemist, our philosopher's stone. we really make the sand think.” To some extent, this is true, but this does not allay concerns that sui generis artificial intelligence will completely surpass human capabilities, a development that many AI researchers now view as inevitable, and it is also unpleasant to reflect on the intellectual debt AI to his godfather. of the death cult. :
Andreessen's internal confusion culminated in the question of whether technological optimists were utopians. Although he saw technology as a "universal solution to the problem" that would allow us to colonize the stars, Andreessen firmly rejected utopian thinking. Instead, he wrote, “we espouse what Thomas Sowell called the limited view,” which sees compromise everywhere and progress as something that “happens only on the margins.”
That is what I mean. It also stands in stark contrast to Andreessen's never-ending view of technology as an inherently “liberating” force and an “upward spiral going on forever.” In contrast, Sowell's “limited view” has a very conservative understanding of human imperfection and thus the dualistic nature of technology.
Consider the problem of population growth. Andreessen writes that technological optimists estimate that "our planet's population has been greatly reduced" and that "the world's population could easily reach 50 billion people or more." Accept. However, birth rates in developed countries are declining not because of Malthusian population control, but because of the inherent forces of modernity itself. For example, the advent of oral contraceptives in the 20th century was undoubtedly “liberating” for women, who gained new autonomy over their biology. Although perhaps the first “transhumanist” technology, this disjunction of the relationship between sexuality and pregnancy has profound cultural and demographic implications that modern societies are still grappling with.
The result of this observation is to emphasize that we cannot rotate or reverse the present moment, but only ring the bell. Therefore, a truly conservative view of technology should be neither optimistic nor pessimistic, but rather an absolute realist, especially when the technology in question, such as artificial intelligence or biotechnology, directly impacts what it means to be human. :
Although many innovations seem inevitable in retrospect, the exact path of development and diffusion of new technologies cannot be determined in advance. We can use public policy and private initiative to shape technology in ways that enhance our humanity and allow us to thrive rather than resign ourselves to fate and a kind of posthuman oblivion.
Nietzsche, for his part, would almost certainly have rejected Andreessen's techno-optimism as another form of earthly Christianity, as if technologists were establishing a heavenly kingdom on Earth. It is true that the conformist and decadent “Last Man,” whom Nietzsche described as a passive mediocrity, and whom Andreessen himself declared to be his mortal enemy, was a consequence of the abundance of technology.
As Nietzsche said in The Will to Power , “Man, who believes that he chooses a drug, actually chooses a drug that accelerates exhaustion; Christianity is an example. . . “progress” is another.
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