Return Of The Caveman. How Technology is Regressing Us
By: Robert Turner
Tags: Society, Culture, Technology, Lighterside, Psychology

Return Of The Caveman. How Technology is Regressing Us

Have you picked your tribe yet? The time is rapidly approaching where you will need one. It’s not safe to be alone out there

We started out on our long evolutionary journey from dimly lit caves occupied by small groups. Groups formed out of necessity. Even at our most primitive level, we grasped the concept of safety in numbers.

It wasn’t purely a safety issue. Larger groups produced better results when foraging or hunting. Better to share the spoils than have no spoils at Better to share and socialize than to dine alone. Many hands, light work. The list goes on but I am sure the point is conceded.

As we developed societally and our numbers increased, so to did the size and complexity of our groups. The strongest was chosen to lead these hierarchies and a gradual unwritten codex of group behavior that was beneficial to the group and its members emerged. Let’s call it the Caveman Codex for harmonious coexistence.

The fact that culturally and geographically divided groups managed to produce almost identical codices points to the validly of these basic principals which would over time form the basis for our first religions.

Religion is not, in my opinion, a spiritual gift to man, but rather man’s attempt to enforce the Caveman Codex, ensuring its unquestioned adherence, thereby ensuring the survival and advancement of the group. History tells us that when we choose to ignore the values enshrined in the Codex, the wheels come off.

Our groups have become legion

Time passed and we evolved in sporadic jumps, from one age to the next, sometimes enjoying enlightened periods and then regressing. Our last and current jump has been spectacular and as far as we know, unparalleled. We are now masters of almost everything we survey, able to bend and mold our environment to better suit humanity.

Our groups are now legion, the occupants numbering sometimes billions and are as varied as they are numerous. We group ourselves by ethnicity, geographically, linguistically, sexually, politically, and even globally.

It is an easy thing for someone to lose themselves in this vast sea of humanity and in response, over the last two centuries, we have a gradual shift to focusing on the individual. On their rights, dreams, and desires, often at the cost of the group. We have not as yet been able to fully quantify that cost, partly due to insufficient data and a lack of historical comparison.

What history does tell us is that the group is essential to our survival and our ability to move forward. Destabilize the group and you destabilize the individual. Lose sight of the Codex and you lose sight of the horizon.

So how does this all tie in with technology? I will attempt to explain this as best I can. I do not have the benefit of datasets, psychologists or social anthropologists to call on, but I do have the power of observation and interpretation. You are free to disagree with my interpretation of the facts, That is the beauty of open discourse.

In 1990, Tim Berners-Lee opened the floodgates

Modern man is raised on a narrative of striving to be the best we can as individuals. A balanced approach to this would be to consider both the interests of the individual and the collective, as they are interdependent. The bias in the late twentieth century has lent heavily towards the individual. Their rights have become paramount in modern culture, trumping all else, irrespective of the cost.

Our groups were still able to partially adapt to address this imbalance as it was limited to a small cross-section of the populace. Then in 1990, Tim Berners-Lee opened the floodgates with the creation of the World Wide Web and the internet as we know it today was unleashed.

In the space of thirty years, our global connectivity and ability to communicate across all spectrums exploded and has changed our world forever. The new digital messiahs were born, spreading their messages of the importance of individualism or self. Almost overnight the world decided that self was the path to fulfillment and that for various reasons the Codex had been misleading them.

They are in some ways correct, as the original Codex has been hijacked and distorted by power bases promoting specific group agendas. These agendas are for the benefit of the few and are propagated at the expense of the group. This is true of almost all modern codices, including religions, political and social codices. Far better then to pursue your own agenda, than to follow a corrupt hierarchy.

The problem with this approach is two-fold. The first is obvious. We need the group to survive. Going it alone is not an option. The second is less glaring, but more important. By abandoning what we correctly identify to be a corrupt hierarchy, we forfeit the ability to effect any change within that group or structure.

It’s analogous to abandoning a ship that’s leaking rather than attempting to repair the leak. If everyone jumps overboard, not only will the ship undoubtedly sink, it’s passengers, now drifting alone in the sea, are also doomed.

Our world is desperately in need of ship fixers, individuals who believe in the principals espoused by the original Codex. People whose individuality and purpose stem from their unshakeable belief in the group. People whose core values and self-belief are not determined by outside factors.

The divisiveness of the online world becomes more apparent by the day. It has spawned new tribalism amongst populations globally, in a digital re-enactment that is troublingly reminiscent of our Stone Age ancestor’s development.

We are aware of the polarizing effect of the internet. We are aware historically of the dangers of tribalism, the feuding and open warfare that arises as a result. Yet we stand by, day by day, watching this catastrophic disassembly of our hierarchies and offer the following excuse. The internet is not reflective of the real world and poses no danger.

We continue to espouse our own individual views whilst vilifying the only structure and Codex that has proved over and over how critical it is to our combined survival as a species. We are lighting our torches and heading off again in search of caves, spurred on by technology.

We need to turn those torches on our groups, expose them internally to the light, cleanse them and restore the Codex to its rightful place at the pinnacle of the hierarchy. Man has proved unable to occupy this position without yielding to the siren call of its power. Perhaps our only salvation lies in re-embracing the Caveman Codex, the greatest gift our ancestors bequeathed us.

The time may already have passed for addressing these issues. Many are now resigned to simply observing humanity become ever more ensnared in the perfect trap of technology. It is a cunning digital web of our own design. One whose very existence we now choose to ignore because it is convenient.

The digital world may not be the real world, but it’s evolution and our eventual submission will not be possible without our complicity. Left unchecked it will divide us and then consume us, individually. Only together can we rediscover our humanity, put aside our differences and embrace our rightful destiny.

There is a place in this future for technology, but it cannot come at the price of our humanity. We need to be the ones firmly in control. At the moment we’re losing this fight.