automaton:
a) A mechanism that is self-operating.
b) An individual who acts in a mechanical fashion.
When viewed with a calculating eye, life on our dear planet can appear quite mechanical. Living creatures are, in the scientific sense, defined by their ability to react to the world around them. Plants react to the sun, leaning into its rays; invertebrates composed of only the most mundane structures still hunt, kill and eat (though I would point out that the absence of a brain still does not make the second action all that remarkable); even humans respond to our biological routines more often than our much-lauded minds. I firmly believe that we are more than automatons. The question in my mind is to what degree that is true.
There are many levels and degrees to consciousness. If you have trouble coneiving of that, just think of what you feel like in the morning, just after you wake up, whe your body is in second gear, your mind’s still in neutral, and the most complex sentence you are capable of begins and ends with “guh.” Think about those convivial nights when, after a bit of a drink, or two, or three, standing up is only partially a vertical action. For that matter consider sex. There are times when we function on autopilot, and it’s probably a good thing. If we were entirely conscious through every action and moment in our lives, we’d be burned out before passing through puberty.
Autopilot is a damned fine thing, but in what measure? I look around today and I see so many people flipping burgers, picking up drycleaning, making coffee; people with their iPods on, their eyes cast down, their minds turned off; people on autopilot through everything. They are on the bus, in Starbucks, on the street, in their cars, at their desks. From the slack face of the movie-goer to the rage-contorted visage of a fundamentalist politician, automatic response is leaving the realm of the occasional and entering the omnipresent. I understand it well: taking leave of your senses is entirely seductive.
History is littered with examples of group-think overcoming basic common sense and human decency, usually to the detriment of some ethnic, religious, or sexual minority. There is a fairly well-known and well-documented desire in the human animal to pursue belonging and to abandon personal ethics and morality to achieve closer ties to the group. The Matrix had it right when Lawrence Fishbourne said that some of us will fight to stay in, even if we know what we’re participating in is false. Living in what is ostensibly an enlightened age, this is troubling.
We are automata. Whether we intend to be or not, we are increasingly dependent upon the constant input of data to determine what we think, say and do. We quote pop-culture, reference movies, deliver one-liners as if they were gospel from on high; crank that volume high enough, get drunk enough, consume and hear and yell and see enough and you won’t hear that little voice inside that says “But wait, this isn’t you...”
This is the point where I look in a mirror and see that I’ve morphed into that old guy on the porch of his house, shaking his head ruefully at the kids on their skateboards and muttering something about how “times just isn’t what they used to be.” Yes, I’m beginning to sound a bit alarmist, but I’m aware that this is not a new problem. Human beings are one very short, slippery step removed from creatures that are free from the blessing/curse of conscious thought, and the maintenance of that minuscule separation has been a recurrent theme of our history. Regardless, there is an element of fear concurrent to the realization that we are, at our core, very fancy machines.
