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by Pierre Baldi
MIT Press, Cambridge MA, U.S.A. 2001.
245 pp. illus. Trade U.S. $24.95
ISBN: 0-262-02502-7.

Reviewed by Curtis E.A. Karnow


Professor Baldi's motto might be, "it's just a matter of time." He reviews the state of the art in molecular biology, cloning, DNA-based experimentation, and a bit on the growth of computational power and the internet, concluding that these developments undermine our classic notions of self and humanity. The biotechnology snapshot is rich and authoritative. This is what Professor Baldi does, although given the remarkable speed of these developments, it must take courage to print a book on this-- the risk of being outdated is high. An enormous benefit here is its detailed review, with good notes and bibliography, of the status of stem cell research, genome sequencing, and related technologies.

The discussions of the internet and computers are far less authoritative, and not nearly enough for the purpose of the book. Baldi argues that Moore's law (computational power doubles every 18 months) means that any information-based construct can be achieved, at some point. He calculates the information content of 'external selves' (the information presented to the outside world), thinking to avoid problems of mapping internal states and qualia. (But a couple of chapters later he slips into calculating the 'self' as such.) This content is of course a finite number, "albeit very large". In some the book's looser moments, chapters soar from computers to the brain, and rapidly shift into forecasts of intelligence served up by technology. He concludes this with a 'strong impression' that future minds and intelligences will be created, sufficiently close to the human prototype, such that their very existence will challenge what it means to be human.

And what can happen, will; Professor Baldi is clear that technological developments are inherently unstoppable. He thus ends with a chapter on ethics, but, having listed the issues, moves on with a simple suggestion that we be practical and "empirical," and not fixate on immutable rules premised on what are, after all, rapidly evolving issues of what it means to be human. This may be circular reasoning: I can imagine immutable ethical principles which, obeyed, stop technological advances and so maintain a certain sense of humanity. As Baldi notes, the Catholic Church has taken the position in the past, and takes it now; and whatever position one has on its merits, the Church is not logically in error.

Baldi forecasts the downloading and duplication of brains, and (by unsung implication) selves, just as he has does with bodies. These developments undercut, he says, our working definitions of self, person, and identity. Aside from his grounding in biotechnology, a lot of this is speculation, and our first class science fiction authors do it better. I am especially wary of a long series of forecasts made first with computers and then with its assumed kindred, the human brain, and then its epiphenomenon, the self-- all based on a series of calculations of information bits, mapped against the curve generated by Moore's law, concluding with a "hey presto" predication of inevitable developments.

To be sure, most readers would agree with Baldi's premise that technology continuously shifts our sense of self and what it means to be human. But the premise, as stated, is almost trivial; tougher issues center on whether the sheer speed of change has a qualitative different effect on us; what the changes are; and critically whether technological changes have similar effects on the widely varied notions of 'self' and 'humanity' we deduce from various cultures and times. Stalin, my mother, and the Buddha would, I suppose, have very different constructs of what it means to be 'human,' and not each would care much about cloning or the internet. So it is that Baldi maps out a trip into the future, without addressing the starting point. So we cannot tell if he went anywhere, at all.

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