Ivar thinks:
"Beyond that point where technology becomes integral to species survival, what selection pressure is there to increase brains? If anything, we sophonts already have more than's good for us." (p.200)
In The Time Machine, technology remakes the natural environment on Earth so that human intelligence atrophies.
It is possible that we are the only, or the first, intelligent species in this galaxy or even in the reachable part of the universe. Imagine that technological civilization does not destroy itself soon but resolves its internal conflicts and endures indefinitely. How much scientific knowledge and how much technological control of the environment will eventuate on such a timescale? It should be possible to enhance not only intelligence but also every other aspect of perception and consciousness for every member of a multi-planetary population. We might now be the Elder Race in its infancy.
No comments:
Post a Comment