Technology, data and algorithm: Religion of future?

In his influential essay “Religion as a Cultural System” Clifford Geertz tries to define religion through a cultural lens so that it can be studies from a different perspective. Geertz says that religion is a symbolic system where believers interpret the world they live in and live their lives through these symbols. In “Religion as a Cultural System”, Clifford Geertz defines religion as 1) a system of symbols which acts to 2) establish powerful, pervasive, and long-lasting moods and motivations in men by 3) formulating conceptions of a general order of existence and 4) clothing these conceptions with such an aura of factuality that 5) the moods and motivations seem uniquely realistic.

The core take-way from this definition is that religion is a set of inter-related symbols (these are more of ‘sacred’ symbols) that people use to create an ethos with a world view – something that appeals to a wide audience; these symbols are used by people to communicate and develop their attitudes towards life. In a way, Geertz’ definition of religion tries to draw a boundary around what is religious and what is not. When one thinks of modern things that are actually non-religious but that often takes the shape of a religion and fits into a religious definition, one can say that things like science, technology, data, capitalism/ consumerism comes to the mind. Here are the reasons why say technology/data would fit into the definition of religion proposed by Geertz.

Similar to a religion, technology and data (many aspects of it) are like symbols; they are the bearer of meaning. These symbols evoke deep moral and aesthetic sentiments among people. For example, people today have to share things online, they want to see how many people liked their posts, and they are always trying to ensure that they have a nice image in the online world as well, etc. When humans are confused, suffer or have moral dilemmas, they look to religion to provide them with more meaning; in the modern world, humans try to do the same with technology and data as they reach out to technology to get answers to most of their questions. People seem to believe everything that they see online or find online or in the social media (making the religious conceptions of reality seem true by presenting them artistically in an appealing and persuasive way). In a religion, the religionist feels that their feelings and action commitments seem to come from God; while this may not be true yet of technology and data, advancement in artificial intelligence and machine learning might make this aspect also true someday.

Over the last few decades, there have been a tremendous spread of internet and the Cyberspace today is crucial to the existence of human beings as humans are heavily dependent on the Internet to communicate, to do business, and also to share several aspects of their personal lives with others. Technology has made ways into all the aspects of our society and they are trying to make sense of all the data that is provided to these technologies by humans and their environment. Emerging technologies such as Artificial intelligence, machine learning and biotechnology have the potential to overhaul our societies and economies, and it might happen sooner than later.

In his book Homo Deus (The Data Religion): A Brief History of Tomorrow (2016), Yuval Noah Harari says that the universe consists of data flows, that all political or social structures are like data processing systems, and the human species itself can be seen as a single data processing system, with individual humans serving as its chips. The idea of a Dataist is that all organisms are like algorithms, and life itself is data processing.

Here are some more observations made by Harari related to Dataism. Harari says that Dataism isn’t only about making idle prophecies, it actually has several practical commandments.

A dataist tries to maximize dataflow by connecting to more and more media, and producing and consuming more information. This is quite true of the modern world where people are constantly producing and sharing information online.

Harari says that Dataism is also missionary in nature; It tries to link everything to the system. And in this case, it is not just about humans; it means everything – cars on the streets, our homes, trees in the jungle – almost everything today is on the Internet-of-things (IoT), which is indeed quite true. So basically, almost everything around us is connected to technology, and is feeding data to it, and that data can reveal interesting information and patterns about those things.

Dataists also believe that all good and useful things depend on the freedom of information. They feel that useful information should be free for everyone to access and not cost money to access. Harari gives the example of 26-year old American hacker Aaron Swartz who was against JSTOR for charging a small fee to access their academic materials. Swartz, who believed in freedom of expression, hacked into JSTOR materials wit the intention of releasing it on the internet for free. Swartz was arrested and on realizing that he would be convicted, he committed suicide. Harari says that while a Traditional religion assures you that your actions are part of some bigger cosmic plan and God watches you and cares for you, data religion also does a similar thing. Data religion says that every word and action of a person is part of some bigger dataflow and that the algorithms are constantly watching a person and they care for everything that person does and feels.

In “God Is the Machine”, Kevin Kelly says that our universe can be thought of as a huge computer carrying billions of computations. If one were to combine the teachings of quantum physics with the latest theories in computer science, it is easy for a person to believe that computation is almost a theological process. He says that everything in the universe can be seen in terms of 1 and 0, basically digital data. If one were to strip away all externalities and material add-ons, what remains in the Universe is the purest state of existence, which means something exists or something doesn’t. And this is true of all things around us. In the Old Testament, when Moses asks the Creator, “Who are you?” the being says, in effect, “Am.” So ‘One’ exists and it is the simplest statement possible. All creations, everything around us, can be thought of as a yes/no or a 1/0 decision (exists or not). These new digital atoms are the basis not only of matter, but also of energy, and life. Kelly talks about various possibilities linking computation and things within and around humans. Kelly talks about possibilities such as “computation can describe all things”, “all things can compute”, and a comparatively new view that “all computation is one”. Kelly provides several examples in support of these possibilities being true and says that our Universe can really be thought of as a huge computer.

To summarize, today almost every aspect of human life is linked to technology, and there is a huge amount of data being captured almost every second. Humans have not only become dependent on technology they now absolutely require it for their survival. For quite some time now, technophiles who have been promoting the internet as a means to achieve transcendence. With computation happening on a large scale all around, the Universe can be thought of as a huge computer; and with emerging technologies becoming smarter and having a mind of its own, the Universe can almost be compared as God, and things like technology, data and algorithms can be thought of as religion. Algorithms today are a lot more powerful and are in a position to predict things like whom a person could marry, what career to pursue, and so on. Interestingly, no one knows for sure where these great algorithms come from; for example, even those who work for Google search algorithm are only aware of certain aspects of the algorithm and not the entire thing. With technologies like machine learning and artificial neural networks, more and more algorithms are evolving independently and improving themselves and learning from their mistakes, and these technologies are only going to get better and touch more aspects of human lives and the society.

So, what is the likelihood that Dataism would eventually take over the world, considering that it may have some flaws? Harari puts it across nicely saying that even if Dataism is wrong and organisms are not just algorithms, Dataism will most likely take over the world, even with its flaws, similar to how religions have spread over the world over the centuries.

Academic Questions

“A religion is a system of symbols which acts to establish powerful. pervasive and long-lasting moods and motivations in men by formulating conceptions of a general order of existence and clothing these conceptions with such an aura of factuality that the moods and motivations seem uniquely realistic.” – Clifford Geertz, Religion as a Cultural System. Using Geertz definition of religion, discuss whether our reliance on technology, data and algorithm is becoming a religion of the future. Your answer must make extensive reference to (and cite) the key readings for the unit.

References

Cliffird Geertz, “Religion as a Cultural System” from Interpretations of Cultures (New York: Fontana Press, 1993). pp. 87-125.

Yuval Noah Harari, “The Data Religion” in Homo Deus: A Brief History of Tomorrow (London: Vintage Press. 2015). pp. 428-462.

Kevin Kelly. “God is the Machine.” Wired Magazine (June 2002) https://www.wired.com/2002/12/holytech

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