Atlantic Magazine published an article about AI’s perspective on the shape and function of society: it will perform in the manner of a panopticon.

The panopticon is a design of institutional building with an inbuilt system of control, originated by the English philosopher and social theorist Jeremy Bentham in the 18th century. The concept is to allow all prisoners of an institution to be observed by a single corrections officer, without the inmates knowing whether or not they are being watched.

Mariner did not realize how frequently this term is being used today until after the Atlantic article. Despite being originated as a philosophical metaphor, it is as popular as Schrodinger’s cat and Pavlov’s dog. It also is more interpretive as a description of the future than mariner’s two movies of similar prediction, 1984 and Matrix.

The single corrections officer can be interpreted as a bucketful of AI corporations in operations today. Just to mention a few – Nvidia, Microsoft, Amazon, Meta, Google, Adobe . . .  Already in active use are most search engines, Alexa, Facebook, etc.

All the futurists like Jeremy Bentham, the movies, the active user applications and social media gossip predict a social panopticon where all there is left for a human to do is sit in a room and conjure reality through their smartphone.

Enjoy looking at wilderness sites on your smartphone? Did it occur to you it would be a genuine experience if you actually went to one instead?

Armageddon proceeds.

Ancient Mariner