Customer Reviews

Digital Spirit: Minding the future

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It's changed the way I view the past, present, and future. The author's broad experience and intense knowledge of science and technology provides the reader with a new way to view the world. The author provides astonishing parallels between historic events and the way they will shape the future. The technological perspective provides a glimpse into the future of mankind that I have never imagined. However, the author's unique perspectives and vivid descriptions made it easy to imagine the future. The new view of the future developed from reading this book will change and impact business and political decisions made by the reader.

This fascinating book has some of the best imaginative descriptions of daily business life in the 21st Century, a very interesting discussion of the history of Western science and a stimulating thesis on the impact of the Internet and digital technology generally on the future shape of human consciousness. But these various elements are woven together throughout its 400+ pages. Essentially, there are at least five distinct books here:

* The theoretical and metaphysical discussion -- the relationship between mind, spirit and digital technology, which is now being and will be transformed by technological advancements.

* A series of scenario-style depictions of various aspect of future life, including space travel. The Future Business Day in Chapter Nine is especially good, and engagingly believable.

* A history of human life and life generally on this planet, with a later focus on Western European scientific thought.

* The dialogic discussion between the author and his two internal left and right brain dynamics - which I assume are archetypical and thus similar to the internal dialogues of other thinking beings.

* A personal history of the author or narrator, who was raised and educated in Europe but now lives in Montana.

However, the effort of plowing through this rather complex structure has its rewards. In fact, the book can be read in sections, as many discussions are rather self-contained. For example, Chapter 11: Minding the Future is very strong. While not every reader who is interested in the evolution of consciousness will be interested in the history of physics or mathematics or vice versa. In other words, not everybody's left and right brains are as well balanced as the narrator's seems to be - with these two 'fictional' characters arguing among themselves as peers.

All in all, it is a charming book. The banter between the two sides of the author's consciousness is quite amusing, and the tone and intelligence of the writing invites serious consideration of the author's main thesis on the evolution of consciousness and digital technology. He also makes judicious and often persuasive use of a wide range of quotes, including those of Ray Kurzweil (especially from an interview the author conducted in March of 2002). In fact, the critical assessment of Kurzwiel's work in terms of the author's own thinking is worth the effort of plowing through the rest (a hint: try the aforementioned Chapter 11). More information about the book and its ideas can be found at www.digeality.com.

This book takes you on a journey from the Big Bang to the digitally expanded human mind ahead of us. The tour guides Einstein, Darwin and a range of modern philosophers take you to where we are today. Gravity, black holes, entropy and the unexplained lack of mass in the universe are just some of the aspects of the expanding physical world. The emergence of life, DNA, the genes and nature's way of expanding life are shown to provide the basis for the importance of mankind. After the dominance of the physical reality, the author here shows how the memes accelerate the dominance of the mental reality, like the physical reality, expanding for ever. Next you'll see that this mental reality must provoke a digital reality as the means to further progress and expand.
The book provides many instruments for analyzing the world in which we take part. It provides a valuable introduction to modern philosophy. With so many hooks to science and life it must to many of us provide themes for, with confidence and respect, working on our future.
When IT is important to you and its current technological achievements are not enough for you then definitely read this book. Observe, dream, doubt and think with the author. Enjoy the view on digeality.