Recently, while on the climb-down from the acute effects of Ayahuasca, my friend and I were discussing whether technology could ever vanquish nature, specifically in the context of the besieged Amazon rainforest.
His position was that
a.) people have been encroaching on the rainforest for centuries and it’s still there, having only made tiny inroads into the vast landscape and
b.) even if the rainforest were ever fully destroyed by man (or AI birthed by man), it would eventually resurface in some other incarnation.
On the second count, I agree that the rainforest, if it were destroyed and all life within it extinguished, the same or something else like it would likely emerge at some point on a long enough timeline (even billions of years).
On the first count, though, what I don’t think he appreciates is the exponential rate of increase in technological capacity year over year, so that in the not-so-distant future it would be entirely plausible that nihilistic technocrats or AI could develop the means to wipe out all life on Earth in a single keystroke.
Another way of looking at it, of course, is that technological progress by man is a natural process itself, so the question “can technology vanquish nature?” doesn’t make sense.
So, to put it to you, Armageddon Prose audience: will technology ever defeat nature?
(“God” can serve as a proxy for “nature” and the question still applies.)
Ben Bartee, author of Broken English Teacher: Notes From Exile, is an independent Bangkok-based American journalist with opposable thumbs.
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