Technecropolis Archaeology, Part II: The Denial of Consciousness

If a surveillance camera records a shooting star and stores it in a database, but nothing in the world observes the screen, did it happen?

If there’s nothing to sense, reflect, and engage with molecular arrangements in space-time, one can be sure: neither the star, nor the possibility of one, doesn’t exist.

i.

Following my previous article, which was, admittedly, a disorganized, exploratory attempt to describe and flesh out a larger idea that stalks me, and which upon discipline eludes me, and only typing and researching can help me shine a light on its shape — today, I woke up with a sense of clarity.

More than anything, I want to highlight the multiplicity of technology. Like anything else, it can heal or harm, depending on how humanity applies it. Technology is shaped by ethical choices. The consequences of those choices reverb throughout the cosmos.

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As humans, we exist in a constant state of flux: between past and future, oblivion, life, and death. We’ve been able to maintain a sense of history spanning centuries, while most individual humans remain aware of their inevitable demise, and we have the power to influence the future, if only marginally. We experience all of this while simultaneously conscious of the present, in which each moment always provides a choice — an inflection point — and the ability to augment the shape, direction, substance, and form of space.

We are not passive observers. We exist between worlds, our bodies are mediums between, almost crystalline and prismatic, and we can alter the world in ways both subtle and profound. We must face the magnificence of human life and not cower in the face of its brightness. Let us be neither proud nor ashamed, but gratefully honor the magnitude of our governance.