the Hive Mind

Wikipedia is a fascinating phenomenon that seems to polarise people: either they love it or they hate it. Robert McHenry, former editor-in-chief of Encyclopedia Britannica, famously likened Wikipedia to a public restroom – a vistor never knows who has been there before him. 

 

A more considered essay – Digital Maoism – has now been penned by Jaron Lanier, and is well worth reading. In it, he considers the hazards of the collective mind at work. There’s also a follow-up to his article in the form of a collection of responses from what could be termed the chiperati – the shakers and movers in the cybernetic world. That follow-up is also worth reading.

 

The most arresting response to my mind comes from George Dyson, who quite rightly points out that the individual mind of Jaron Lanier is itself the production of a hive collective of processes within his brain. "All intelligence is collective. But, as Lanier points out, that does not mean that all collectives are intellingent".