Human Beings as Machines

Trapped: What Happened to Our Dream of Freedom

Adam Curtis

BBC (2007)

Film Review

Part 2 The Lonely Robot

Part 2 takes a close look at the role American economist James Buchanan played in extending free market economic theory to human biology, politics and governments. The Impossibility Theorem is fundamental to Buchanan’s concept of “market democracy.” According to the Impossibility Theorem, collective will is impossible in a democracy because the desires of millions of individuals are too varied and complex. Buchanan maintained the only way to respond democratically to people’s wishes was to allow them to fully pursue their selfish self-interest in the marketplace.

Clinton Dismantles New Deal Welfare Programs

A direct result of Buchanan’s influence over Margaret Thatcher, John Major, Tony Blair, Ronald Reagan and Bill Clinton was massive cuts in taxes and social services, coupled with a repeal of corporate regulation. The most immediate result was a massive increase in inequality. Corporate elites became much, much richer – while nearly everyone else became much poorer. Ironically the gap between rich and poor would increase far more rapidly under liberal-leaning Blair and Clinton than under Thatcher and Reagan. Clinton will go down in history as the president who dismantled the welfare programs Roosevelt enacted under the New Deal.

Meanwhile overconfidence in computers and so called “behavioral economics” (free market theory) would result in government departments run by targets and incentive schemes. Sociopaths and economists quickly learned how to game the system by cheating on their targets.*

The Selfish Gene Hypothesis

Likewise biological scientists used free market and game theory to promote the Selfish Gene hypothesis. This theory conceptualized a simplistic view of human beings as machines that were controlled entirely by their genes. It held that genes, which were likened to on-board computers, compelled people to act selfishly to guarantee their genes’ survival.

This mechanistic view of human biology would lead to a profound change, led by psychiatrists and drug companies, in the way Brits and Americans viewed themselves. The new checklist diagnostic system the American Psychiatric Association (APA) launched in 1979 (see Part 1), coupled with the aggressive marketing of selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRIs) would lead people to view themselves as machines – machines that needed to be fixed if they experienced unpleasant emotional states, such as worrying, conflict, insecurity or anxiety.

People Pop Pills to Cope with Deteriorating Social Conditions

Because these checklists deliberately ignored life circumstances that might cause unpleasant feelings, common reactions to life stresses became medicalized. This, in turn, led to an expectation that people would take pills to adjust to steadily worsening social conditions.**

The theoretical basis of behavioral economics began to unravel in the 1990s. The Selfish Gene hypothesis was abandoned when new genetic research revealed that cell’s ability to choose, based on environmental conditions, which parts of the DNA molecule become operational.

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*More recent research shows that only two sectors of society are driven purely by self-interest: sociopaths and economists.

** For example, loss of good paying and secure jobs, loss of representation in a rigid and corrupt government and overall loss of control over our lives.

Free link to film: The Trap 2 The Lonely Robot [BBC]

Africa’s Hidden History

All Watched Over By Machines of Loving Grace*

Directed by Adam Curtis

BBC (2011)

Part 3

Film Review

The basic theme of the final video is this series is a bit unclear. Curtis seems to imply, based on flimsy and subjective evidence, that western liberals who provide humanitarian and developmental assistance to third world countries only make their living situation worse.

The main focus of Part 3 is the civil wars in Congo and Rwanda over valuable mineral resources coveted by multinational corporations. There’s a particular emphasis on coltan, a rare earth mineral essential in the manufacture of computers, play stations and smartphones.

The CIA Coup Against Lamumba

The film traces the history of the Congo back to 1960 when it first gained independence from Belgium. In 1961, after the Congo’s first president Patrice Lamumba allied himself with the USSR, the US and Belgium instigated a coup to remove him from power and had him murdered. Fearful that Congo’s rich mineral wealth would fall into Soviet hands, they replaced him with the brutal pro-western dictator Mobutu Sese Seko.

The Belgian Role in Rwanda Genocide

Curtis traces Rwandan history from their first episode of genocide, engineered by their Belgian rulers in 1959. Fearful that the Rwandans, like other colonized Africans, would demand independence, the Belgians deliberately instigated ethnic conflict by issuing mandatory race cards and promoting the myth that the Tutsis (which Belgium made colonial administrators) were a superior race that had migrated to Rwanda from ancient Egypt. Meanwhile Belgian aid workers encouraged oppressed Hutus (who comprised 85% of the population) to revolt. After three years of bloody civil war, Belgium granted Rwanda independence in 1962.

In 1994, the Hutus seized control of the Rwandan government and deliberately exterminated nearly a million Tsutsis. Hundreds of thousands of refugees fled across the border into Congo, where the UN and western aid agencies set up refugee camps. Curtis maintains it was a mistake to set up refugee camps because there were Hutu assassins hiding among the refugees. Armed conflict between Tsutsis and Hutus spread to rebel armies seeking to overthrow Mobutu. Hoping to win a piece of Congo’s mineral wealth, Zimbabwe, Angola, Chad, Namibia, Uganda and Libya all dispatched troops to support the rebels. Leaving more than five million dead, the civil war would continue until 2003.

I find it a bit puzzling that Curtis blames the UN and humanitarian organizations for fanning the flames of the Congo’s civil war. Surely most, if not all of the blame lies with the multinationals behind Mobotu’s dictatorship.

The Selfish Gene

Curtis interweaves his discussion of Congo and Rwandan history with relevant scientific research that endeavored to prove that humans are complex computer-like machines.

In 1967, population geneticist George Price allegedly proved that human beings were soft machines run by on board computers (i.e. DNA). A corollary of this hypothesis was that human beings commit murder and genocide because of a “selfish gene” which genetically programs us to hate a kill people who are genetically unrelated to us.

Price worked closely with evolutionary biologist Bill Hamilton who, based on his research, argued against providing medical treatment when people get sick because this causes genetically inferior people to survive and reproduce.

Dian Fossey’s Mountain Gorillas

A third narrative describes the work of primate ethnologist Dian Fossey who was studying Congo’s mountain gorillas during the decade-long civil war. My favorite scene depicts British naturalist David Attenborough stretched out on top of one of Fossey’s gorillas as they share a moment of relaxed contemplation.

*Title of 1967 monograph distributed free by California cybernetics enthusiast Richard Brautigan. Available for $400 from Abe Books