Life Begins…deals with an interesting concept, and fart jokes.
What happens when people wake up in a world without mortality? The number two fear of the world, number one being public speaking, got cured by technology. It's not that far fetched; each passing day brings new cures and treatments. Perhaps in several years, the doctors will win, and nothing would be terminal anymore. Needless to say, this would cause a massive restructuring of our society. For one thing, insurance companies would go bankrupt.
The technological singularity is an idea expressed by countless futurists over the past twenty years. Essentially, man made a tool so great that the tool is more complex than the man. In a nutshell, the technological singularity means that technology has fundamentally altered human existence in ways beyond our imagination. But just for imagination’s sake, try this one on for size. One day you return home to your living quarters, which can reshape itself depending on what you need, or want. A nano-manufacturer will make you anything you could possibly want to eat, wear, or play with. Nano-technology will turn heads and solve many problems over the next 20-45 years, so long as we don’t blow ourselves up first.
Anyways, back to you returning home. Your secretary/answering-bot is a Turing-machine of yourself. A Turing-machine is a computer. This program can fool your own mother into thinking that it is you. This program tells you of your obligations and options, what missed calls you have, emails that are waiting, any news relevant to you. If you are a student, your Turing-self would get started on the homework. However, your real self may want to indulge in some full immersion virtual recreation, or just do nothing. Which ever self is the real self is entirely up to you to decide. Really?
The whole world would change. That’s what happened in Life Begins…, the world changed forever and won’t ever be the same again. It’s kind of like that nursery rhyme of Humpty Dumpty. The world changes everyday. Some change we cry about, while others we cheer on. The change brought on by the technological singularity really doesn’t care if we cry or cheer for it. It won’t be a subtle change. Such a drastic shake up may cause the generation caught in it to feel more separated from and less identifiable with any previous generation, ever. There is a very good chance our own children will think we were barbarians, what, with our organic frailness and pollution problems. The vast summation of history shows humanity as a tenacious thing that often results to violence in pursuit of its survival, which may be unfortunate if a younger generation feels that it is fundamentally different than the preceding generation.
Enjoy Life Begins… it’s only supposed to be entertainment. Entertainment can provoke questions. Such questions found in Life Begins… are beginning to come at the world now. How humanity answers them will show its true worth. Or we could take the easy way out and just invade preemptively. Vote in 2008.
