Asmiov's Gaia and the Brilliance of the Masses

I was recently re-reading Vernor Vinge's Fire Upon the Deep, and began thinking about the Tines in relation to Isaac Asimov's Gaia from Foundation's Edge. These sci-fi classics are far from the first to explore group mind theories, but are easily among the most popular and prominent.

For those unfamiliar with these novels, allow me to define:

Tines: Aliens which merge four to eight physical bodies into a hive mind called a pack. These dog-like creatures communicate via sound waves, and each pack represents a single consciousness. Greater or fewer Tines in a pack results in stupidity or insanity.

Gaia: Planet of 1 billion people all tied together into a telepathic group consciousness when it was founded; this consciousness was eventually extended to the non-human life, and later to the inorganic material of the planet. Outside of the group consciousness, each individual maintained a separate consciousness. (Thanks Wikipedia!)

Gaia and other group mind theories have grown almost as quickly as the Internet which spawns them. With the ubiquity of Bluetooth earpieces and wireless bandwidth, the dream of a technological Gaia inches closer to a reality.

Is this a good thing? Probably not. As technology brings more people together, the more humanity is lost. See the virtual personalities and stalkers of MySpace, Facebook, and Second Life. Simply examine the emails and IMs sent and received every day. Gruff, one-line fragments from which we tease some meaning and invent the rest.

Of course, the "Wisdom of the Crowds" collective thinks this is the greatest thing since sliced bread. Popularized by James Surowiecki and overtaken by the likes of Tim O'Reilly and Jimmy Wales, the concept is simple: a large group of nonspecialists is more intelligent than any expert. This is the thinking that founded Wikipedia and DARPA's controversial Policy Analysis Market.

While Surowiecki's original thesis put large boundaries around this "crowd wisdom," the meaning has now morphed into any crowd is wise. Forgotten are the original catechisms of "Diversity of Opinion" and "Independence." Of course the failure causes have been ignored: homogeneity, centralized management, information cascades, and emotional factors. With Surowiecki's constraints, how is it possible to form a wise crowd?

The technologists of today pushing for the Gaia of tomorrow are primarily devotees of this new so-called "crowd wisdom." Perhaps it's more appropriate to call it the "Brilliance of the Masses." This brilliance is on display for us daily: dumbed-down news, soccer hooliganism, politicians, etc.

If the thought of this future Gaia is not disturbing enough at this point, consider this is the most popular video of all time on YouTube:


UPDATE: Jaron Lanier has a nice thesis on the Wisdom of the Crowds at the Edge titled "Digital Maoism: The Hazards of the New Online Collectivism"