Precetti del Tecnofilo

1. There is no single factor in human life more important than technology and yet most users have little or no idea of how most technologies work or even that their own bodies are sophisticated collections of technological systems.

2. If it were not for technology, the word, "progress," would have no meaning other than the mere continuance of some process or the description of its degree of completion. Progress, in the sense of something improving over time, would be without examples or illustrations of any kind. Social progress (movement toward a more fair and equitable society), for example, has been found to be elusive, temporary, and very reversible. Only technological progress seems to keep marching on while getting more powerful all the time. If it were not for technology, human culture would probably never change at all. Human culture is all about technology.

3. We are living in a time of unprecedented rapidity of technical development and we do not know where it is taking us. Socially our species operates on very primitive assumptions about how to live and survive while technologically our species is acquiring powers the average person can’t begin to imagine. This is a prescription for disaster. We’re installing the latest operating systems on our computers but we don’t make upgrades to our "Brain Operating System" (BOS) which is still using versions, in most cases, which are thousands of years old.

4. There is no LIVING organism in the Universe which is not an example of technology or an example of a technologically-organized system intelligently optimizing some form of survival strategy incorporated into the design and performance of its attendant biophysical mechanisms. The physical vehicles of all life-forms are comprised of interdependent systems of highly sophisticated technologies. It seems probable that the Universe as a whole is a living entity and, therefore, it too would have to be technologically organized. In that case, everything contained within what we perceive as the Universe would also be part, in some way, of the overall grand technical design.

5. Technology is all about functions and not what things are made of. Anything which DOES something, performs some function, is technology. Technology always involves the means to accomplishing ends. Since the primary characteristic of any technology is what it does rather than what it is, in a material sense, in studying technology we look at functions and how well these functions are performed. Performance is the big issue in technology. New technologies which perform their functions with greater power, speed or efficiency will tend to obsolesce earlier technologies which don’t perform as well. This is as true in Nature, looking at the technologies (physical bodies) of living organisms, as it is with humanly-produced technical products, devices, gadgets, software, etc. Technology is all about power, the ability to do things.

6. There are two parallel paths in the development or evolution of technology: hardware and software. The usage of technology usually involves both aspects, some form of hardware and the knowledge or skill of how to implement it. If a person has never seen a shovel or a screw driver, he wouldn’t know what they are for or how to use them. The objects themselves are forms of hardware; the knowledge and skill required in their use are the software element. Software involves language and programming. Hardware involves physical implements, gadgets and devices. Another name for technology is media.

7. Marshall McLuhan said that technology is the extension of Man. By this he meant that for every technology that is invented, there is a corresponding internal technology (performing similar functions) within the physical bodies of people. In this sense, clothing is the man-made extension of the skin's role in keeping us warm inside.

The wheel is a fundamental technology useful in transporting things over long distances. It is the extension of the functioning of human feet involved in running or walking. The wheel does not look anything like a human foot nor is it made of similar materials, but that’s not important in comparing how these two means of transportation function. The wheel, in its various forms and usages, is clearly a more powerful and efficient means of transport than the foot. The wheel is more limited than the foot in one sense, however, in that its higher efficiency is dependent on another medium, that of road or highway.

The total number of "extensions of man" is as great as the number of technological inventions (most of which are combinations of many kinds of technologies) man has so far produced – and far too numerous to give examples of each.

8. In addition to the two paths of technology, those of software and hardware, several general levels of technical complexity may also be discerned. The simplest level and the one whose operation is most focused on the material/physical plane is that of the mechanical technologies. As extensions of the human body, they perform functions similar to those performed by the bones, muscles and joints. These include the mechanical devices of levers and fulcrums, wheels and gears, coupled with chemical and mechanical energy sources such as steam or gasoline for locomotion.

The next level is the electrical or electrochemical. Electrical activity in the human body is most evident in the operation of the locomotor and sensory systems wired to and from the brain via nerve pathways. The human nervous system is extended in the electrical power network of our planet and in the many kinds of electrical technologies which have been developed. The highest degree of electrical activity in the body occurs in the brain. The global analog of that in externalized man-made technology would logically be communications networks like those of the Internet which connect computers world-wide.

We should probably define a yet-higher (and therefore least physical/material) level which will be termed the noetic (mental) or perhaps spiritual level. This corresponds to the intangible and less understood realm of will or perhaps of a kind of psychic force. There are already some kinds of brain-wave-actuated devices developed by the military but the extensions from this level of man include even stranger phenomena and devices.

9. Arthur C. Clarke’s Law of Technology: "Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magick." Dr. Clarke uses the antique spelling of magick to suggest that he means the real thing here and not parlor magic or sleight of hand. "...Sufficiently advanced..." is obviously relative to particular observers and their level of technological familiarity.

10. Robert Anton Wilson’s Corollary to Arthur C. Clarke’s Law of Technology: "Any sufficiently advanced parapsychology is even more indistinguishable from magick." Wilson has taken it all the way. Parapsychological phenomena are mind-mediated and include telepathy, clairvoyance, psychokinesis, levitation, materialization/dematerialization, precognition/prophesy, dowsing, etc. Such phenomena, when sufficiently advanced, are the very definition of magic if they can be shown to be valid, real phenomena.

This is at the cutting edge of what is scientifically acceptable today and, unfortunately, is the subject of government secrecy because of obvious military possibilities. However, unless you are someone who feels threatened by this new and hopelessly weird world-view in which such phenomena may occur and which seems to be tied in with discoveries in quantum physics and consciousness research, and have, therefore, had your head buried in the ground for the last twenty years, it is apparent by now, even without government stamps of approval, that much (if not all) of what was once called the occult and mysticism is now known through exhaustive scientific research to be real and factual and has been renamed the "paranormal" and the "parapsychological."

11. Terry Alden’s Law of Physical/Spiritual Mirroring: "For every parapsychological phenomenon that exists there is a corresponding physical phenomenon and vice versa." For example, tv and radio in the physical world would seem to be similar to telepathy/ESP in the psychic world. Gravity is a physical force which would seem to have its antidote in psychically-produced levitation. Electromagnetism produces invisible forces which can either attract or repel and the psychic talent known as psychokinesis or PK looks like the mirroring of EM forces. The hunch is that this kind of pairing can be carried out across the board for all types of phenomena.

For example, the information storage capacity of DNA in the biophysical world could be mirrored on the non-tangible astral plane (psychic/spiritual not-space-time world) as "soul memory" or the "Akashic Records," borrowing the Hindu religious term.

12. The Great Brain-Hemisphere Consciousness-Mode Dominance Shift:

Particularly evident in the "new consciousness" of those born after 1945, the first generation of which being known as the "Baby Boomers" and their children and grandchildren who are today’s youngsters and young adults, is the shift in brain hemispheric dominance from the left to the right side. The idea was developed by Marshall McLuhan in his "Understanding Media: The Extensions of Man" and states that the wide-spread advent of electrical technologies, particularly a.c. current, radio, telephone and television, is causing a shift from the traditional Western cultural scientific/rational left hemisphere dominance to the religious-tribal-mystical-holistic-irrational right hemisphere. What has been thought of in the past as civilized values, including literacy in the highly phonetic Western languages, is diminishing rapidly and a new electric tribal culture is springing up.

What had made Western culture so scientifically oriented in the first place, according to McLuhan, was phonetic literacy – the change from pictogram writing to sound-fragment-based alphabetic writing. Now, McLuhan suggested, all that is being reversed. Because electric technologies operate at the speed of light, it’s as though everything comes in all at once from everywhere. These effects are a lot like the way the right side of the brain likes to work. Right hemisphere dominance gives that sense of oneness and wholeness with the entirety of Creation which is closely related to many mystical and religious experiences. It is also a type of perception which sees the world in a simultaneous and non-separative way.

Signs of this consciousness mode shift in the young to 50’s population of today are (adapted from McLuhan):

a. More fads and trends, fewer lasting values, short attention span.

b. Tribal dance rhythms, music and rituals; drug culture/altered states of consciousness.

c. Less emphasis on literacy and civilized values, immunity from written propaganda.

d. Revival of mysticism, occultism, religion, and the ‘pseudo-sciences’, astrology, etc.

e. Belief in spirit world and magical powers, miracles, and the like.

f. Ecology movement; need to see the whole, holistic perception.

g. Alternative life-styles, alternative medicine, etc.

h. Mohawk and ‘punk’ hairstyles, body piercing, body painting/tattooing.

i. Gangs, out of wedlock births, worship of icons/rock-star idolatry, etc.

j. Inability to define and set long term goals and carry them out.

k. Humor in the form of one-liners, shock value humor.