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PR TrendsNew Technologies

The Human API — Enter the Cybernetic Renaissance

We need to augment up if we want to keep up.

Jerry Silfwer
by Jerry Silfwer

Cover photo: @jerrysilfwer

Reading time: 6 min.

Are we en route to a human API?

Are you using your smart­phone every wak­ing hour?
Yeah, me too.

But no, this isn’t going to be one of those texts where someone com­plains about how we’re becom­ing slaves to IT. Instead, I sug­gest explor­ing a future mer­ger between bio­logy and technology.

Are we en route to becom­ing part human, part robot?
Or are we already there?

Here we go:

Quicklinks 

All Technologies are Human Extensions

Marshall McLuhan - The Medium is the Message
Marshall McLuhan (1911 — 1980).

Marshall McLuhan: “The Medium is the Message”

“The medi­um is the mes­sage” is a phrase coined by the Canadian philo­soph­er Marshall McLuhan in the first chapter of his not­able book “Understanding Media: The Extensions of Man.”

Despite being one of the most influ­en­tial thinkers in media the­ory, McLuhan’s ideas are often widely mis­un­der­stood. “The medi­um is the mes­sage” is no exception.

“The medi­um is the mes­sage” does­n’t imply that con­tent or sub­stance lacks import­ance, only that the medi­um in which mes­sages are sent will sig­ni­fic­antly impact humanity.

  • McLuhan pro­posed that intro­du­cing a new medi­um will impact human­ity sig­ni­fic­antly more than any­thing sub­sequently trans­mit­ted through that medium.

McLuhan views medi­ums as exten­sions of human physiology. Our abil­ity to build houses extends our human skin, as it pro­tects against the ele­ments. This added lay­er of pro­tec­tion and phys­ic­al safety frees up men­tal band­width for human interaction.

So, a house is a medi­um in McLuhan’s inter­pret­a­tion. All human tech­no­lo­gies, down to the camp­fire, are con­sidered mediums.

“McLuhan’s insight was that a medi­um affects the soci­ety in which it plays a role not by the con­tent delivered over the medi­um, but by the char­ac­ter­ist­ics of the medi­um itself. […] McLuhan poin­ted to the light bulb as a clear demon­stra­tion of this concept. A light bulb does not have con­tent in the way that a news­pa­per has art­icles or a tele­vi­sion has pro­grams, yet it is a medi­um that has a social effect; that is, a light bulb enables people to cre­ate spaces dur­ing night­time that would oth­er­wise be envel­oped by dark­ness.”
Source: Wikipedia 1Marshall McLuhan. (2023, May 15). In Wikipedia. https://​en​.wiki​pe​dia​.org/​w​i​k​i​/​M​a​r​s​h​a​l​l​_​M​c​L​u​han

According to McLuhan, our abil­ity to cre­ate exten­sions of human­ity expo­nen­tially impacts our com­mu­nic­a­tion more than any mes­sage con­veyed as a result:

  • A light­bulb is a medi­um (an exten­sion of the human eye).
  • A house is a medi­um (an exten­sion of the human skin).
  • The tele­phone is a medi­um (an exten­sion of human vocal cords).

And so on.

Why is McLuhan’s ana­lys­is neces­sary? “The medi­um is the mes­sage” is a stark remind­er that a medi­um’s format (and its lim­it­a­tions) will massively impact human soci­ety — and the mes­sages them­selves, too.

We often default to seek­ing mean­ing in mes­sages but for­get to con­sider the medi­um’s inher­ent media logic.

Learn more: Media Logic is Dead, Long Live Media Logic

💡 Subscribe and get a free ebook on how to get bet­ter PR ideas.

From Biological Darkness to Augmented Ascension

A medi­um is that in which a phys­ic­al trans­fer of inform­a­tion takes place. If our smart­phones are exten­sions of our voices, ears, social graphs, memor­ies, and the fab­ric of our logic­al think­ing, then aren’t we, accord­ing to McLuhan’s light bulb ana­logy, in the pro­cess of step­ping out of cyber­net­ic darkness?

We have a long his­tory of appro­pri­at­ing tech­no­logy to free up men­tal bandwidth.

  • Campfire or the clothes on your back could be seen as exten­sions of your bio­lo­gic­al heat­ing system.
  • A build­ing can be seen as an exten­sion of your skin, your body’s largest organ, pro­tect­ing you from the real­it­ies of your environment. 
  • Your to-do app could be seen as an exten­sion of your memory, reliev­ing you of (per­haps unne­ces­sary?) cog­nit­ive loads.

Adding sup­port­ive sys­tems to see in the dark, stay­ing warm and sheltered, and sort­ing and struc­tur­ing thoughts and ideas allow us to com­mu­nic­ate and devel­op increas­ingly com­plex and abstract con­cepts. Information tech­no­logy allows us to cre­ate lay­ers upon lay­ers of human civilisation. 

But recent tech­no­lo­gic­al advance­ments, start­ing per­haps with the smart­phone, must be regarded as unpre­ced­en­ted even by his­tor­ic­al standards.

I’m talk­ing about transhumanism.

Transhumanism: A Posthuman Approach

What is transhuman­ism? A couple of years ago, in 2009, I advised the Pirate Party, which earned two seats in the European Parliament. Within this by-nature tech­no­crat­ic move­ment, transhuman­ism was often dis­cussed and debated.

“Transhumanism advoc­ates for the advance­ment of sci­ence and tech­no­logy to over­come human lim­it­a­tions and pro­motes the devel­op­ment of new bio­tech­no­lo­gies to enhance human poten­tial.”
Source: Dictionary of Global Bioethics 2Have, H., & Neves, M. (2021). Transhumanism (See Enhancement; Transplantation; Genetic Engineering). Dictionary of Global Bioethics. https://​doi​.org/​1​0​.​1​0​0​7​/​978 – 3‑030 – 54161-3_499

“Transhumanism, abbre­vi­ated as H+ or h+, is an inter­na­tion­al intel­lec­tu­al and cul­tur­al move­ment that affirms the pos­sib­il­ity and desirab­il­ity of fun­da­ment­ally trans­form­ing the human con­di­tion by devel­op­ing and mak­ing widely avail­able tech­no­lo­gies to elim­in­ate age­ing and to greatly enhance human intel­lec­tu­al, phys­ic­al, and psy­cho­lo­gic­al capa­cit­ies. […] Transhumanist thinkers study the poten­tial bene­fits and dangers of emer­ging tech­no­lo­gies that could over­come fun­da­ment­al human lim­it­a­tions, as well as study the eth­ic­al mat­ters involved in devel­op­ing and using such tech­no­lo­gies. They pre­dict that human beings may even­tu­ally be able to trans­form them­selves into beings with such greatly expan­ded abil­it­ies as to mer­it the label ‘posthu­man’.”
Source: Wikipedia 3Transhumanism. (2023, October 29). In Wikipedia. https://​en​.wiki​pe​dia​.org/​w​i​k​i​/​T​r​a​n​s​h​u​m​a​n​ism

A transhuman world is almost incom­pre­hens­ible. It seems to sit above fun­da­ment­al con­cep­tions of “good” or “bad” — it seems inevitable.

A Global Village of Shared Experiences

I would argue that devel­op­ment is intrins­ic­ally inev­it­able — and that tech­no­logy allow­ing more inform­a­tion to flow is neces­sary. And no short­age of trends sug­gests we might be on the cusp of a transhuman­ist­ic future.

  • The inter­net (allow­ing humans to con­nect regard­less of geo­graph­ic­al constraints)
  • Cloud com­put­ing (shar­ing inform­a­tion access and com­pu­ta­tion­al power)
  • Augmented- and vir­tu­al real­it­ies (digit­al spa­tial spaces)
  • Internet of Things (where everything is interconnected)
  • Internet of brains (brain-to-brain or brain-to-tech interfacing)
  • Quantified self (to track and ana­lyse one­self passively) 
  • Data min­ing (on a glob­al scale with massive data sets)
  • Neural net­works (with layered com­pu­ta­tion­al models) 
  • Artificial intel­li­gence (includ­ing the poten­tial of a singularity)
  • Quantum suprem­acy (where qubits allow for more pro­found calculations)

What does it mean to extend the human exper­i­ence with tech­no­logy — or is it the oth­er way around? Are we advan­cing tech­no­logy with human experiences?

“We Are the Robots”

Popular cul­ture has been play­ing around with mer­ging human­ity with machines for cen­tur­ies. Science fic­tion does tend to become a real­ity; we might already be well under­way to becom­ing cyborgs:

“A cyborg is a cyber­net­ic organ­ism (i.e. an organ­ism that is a self-reg­u­lat­ing integ­ra­tion of arti­fi­cial and nat­ur­al sys­tems). The term was coined in 1960 when Manfred Clynes and Nathan Kline used it in an art­icle about the advant­ages of self-reg­u­lat­ing human-machine sys­tems in out­er space.”
Source: Bionity​.com 4Cyborg. (2023). Bionity​.com. https://​www​.bion​ity​.com/​e​n​/​e​n​c​y​c​l​o​p​e​d​i​a​/​C​y​b​o​r​g​.​h​tml

So, how close are we? I use Evernote as an extern­al memory bank, an arti­fi­cial exten­sion of my brain made up of soft­ware and hard­ware work­ing in sync with the liv­ing organ­ism that is me. Does this make me a … cyborg? 

We Are the Human API 

Would it be pos­sible to cre­ate a biological/​electrical interface? 

“An applic­a­tion pro­gram­ming inter­face (API) is a pro­tocol inten­ded to be used as an inter­face by soft­ware com­pon­ents to com­mu­nic­ate with each oth­er. An API may include spe­cific­a­tions for routines, data struc­tures, object classes, and vari­ables.”
Source: Wikipedia 5API. (2023, November 23). In Wikipedia. https://​en​.wiki​pe​dia​.org/​w​i​k​i​/​API

Will we ever be truly able to integ­rate dir­ectly with inform­a­tion technology?

Even pub­lic rela­tions thought lead­er Brian Solis dis­cusses “the human API,” mak­ing the concept his primary focus for his key­note present­a­tion at the world’s most pres­ti­gi­ous new media event, Le Web in Paris.

“What if the medi­um wasn’t just the device, the medi­um was us? At the cen­ter of the IoT and Big Data are the very people who fuel the con­stant exchange of inform­a­tion. At the same time, it cre­ates a human net­work, where we become nodes and the inform­a­tion that ties togeth­er people and devices feed new exper­i­ences and changes our beha­viour over time.”
— Brian Solis

The Cybernetic Renaissance

“Transhumanism, a mod­ern form of Enlightenment techno-uto­pi­an­ism, has evolved into diverse sub­sects, with poten­tial for viol­ent con­front­a­tion as tech­no­lo­gic­al innov­a­tion and human enhance­ment threaten the future of human­ity.”
Source: Zygon 6Hughes, J. (2012). THE POLITICS OF TRANSHUMANISM AND THE TECHNO-MILLENNIAL IMAGINATION, 1626 – 2030. Zygon, 47, 757 – 776. https://​doi​.org/​1​0​.​1​1​1​1​/​J​.​1​467 – 9744.2012.01289.X

I would argue that we’re in the midst of a cyber­net­ic renais­sance. As the media curse of the Bell curve and the his­tor­ic­ally recur­ring tech­lash dic­tates, we tend to focus on the adverse side effects, such as tech­no­logy-induced stress, atten­tion defi­cits, brain tumours, and big data-related integ­rity issues. 

Loud voices are demand­ing everything from legis­lat­ive coun­ter­meas­ures to pro­hib­it­ing the use of inform­a­tion tech­no­logy in schools. We’re col­lect­ively afraid of what our transhuman future will bring. We shud­der at the thought of hav­ing humans and machines merge into one.

The effects of devel­op­ing human APIs are poten­tially massive. Like so many his­tor­ic­al trans­itions before, we could be stand­ing with both feet in the middle of a reform­a­tion that far over­shad­ows the digit­al inform­a­tion revolu­tion. Still, shar­ing exper­i­ences and becom­ing more inter­con­nec­ted with everything else might just as well be seen as a nat­ur­al step­ping stone in human evol­u­tion. Some will choose to fear a medi­ev­al cyborg dysto­pia, but I firmly believe that human­ity is enter­ing a cyber­net­ic renaissance.

Keep your smart­phone, not as its slave, but as a part of what you can be.

Please sup­port my blog by shar­ing it with oth­er PR- and com­mu­nic­a­tion pro­fes­sion­als. For ques­tions or PR sup­port, con­tact me via jerry@​spinfactory.​com.

PR Resource: The Digital Transformation

The Digital Transformation of PR

The biggest chal­lenge in mod­ern pub­lic rela­tions is the con­stantly chan­ging media land­scape. With the pro­lif­er­a­tion of social media, the rise of fake news, and the decline of tra­di­tion­al journ­al­ism, it can be dif­fi­cult for organ­isa­tions to con­trol the spread of inform­a­tion and pro­tect their reputations. 

When Brian Solis and Deirdre Breakenridge pub­lished Putting the Public Back in Public Relations: How Social Media Is Reinventing the Aging Business of PR in 2009, it pro­posed how PR should embrace the digit­al-first media land­scape and elev­ate our pro­fes­sion to new heights. 7Solis, B. & D. Breakenridge (2009, February 1). Putting the Public Back in Public Relations: How Social Media Is Reinventing the Aging Business of PR. Amazon​.com: Books. … Continue read­ing

Public rela­tions pro­fes­sion­als must be stra­tegic and pro­act­ive in their approach and must be able to adapt to new tech­no­lo­gies and plat­forms to com­mu­nic­ate with their pub­lics effectively. 

“The authors argue that earli­er paradigms are mostly inad­equate in address­ing the needs of a 21st Century in which com­mu­nic­a­tion tech­no­logy is cre­at­ing rap­id glob­al­iz­a­tion while it is dan­ger­ously exacer­bat­ing the ten­sions of mul­ti­cul­tur­al­ism. Through a crit­ic­al dis­cus­sion of pri­or assump­tions and paradigms in pub­lic rela­tions schol­ar­ship, the authors under­line the need for pub­lic rela­tions to revital­ize and bring its body of know­ledge into the 21st Century. The authors pos­it and dis­cuss how the com­munity-build­ing the­ory ori­gin­ally espoused by Kruckeberg and Starck (1988) and mod­i­fied in sub­sequent schol­ar­ship can provide a viable depar­ture point toward devel­op­ing new approaches to research about and prac­tice of pub­lic rela­tions that can take into account the dynam­ic envir­on­ment wrought by changes in com­mu­nic­a­tion tech­no­logy.”
Source: Public Relations Review 8Valentini, C., Kruckeberg, D., & Starck, K. (2012). Public rela­tions and com­munity: A per­sist­ent cov­en­ant. Public Relations Review, 38(5), 873 – 879. https://​doi​.org/​1​0​.​1​0​1​6​/​j​.​p​u​b​r​e​v​.​2​0​1​2​.​0​6​.​001

The biggest chal­lenge in PR is ensur­ing that our pro­fes­sion keeps up with new com­mu­nic­a­tion tech­no­logy and stays valu­able and rel­ev­ant as a busi­ness function.

Learn more: PR Must Adapt (Or Die)

💡 Subscribe and get a free ebook on how to get bet­ter PR ideas.

PR Resource: How AI Will Impact PR

Artificial Intelligence and Public Relations - The Future Office - Doctor Spin - The PR Blog
Every path is going to lead you some­where. (Photo: @jerrysilfwer)

The AI Revolution: Transforming Public Relations

There are sev­er­al ways in which arti­fi­cial intel­li­gence (AI) is likely to impact the pub­lic rela­tions (PR) industry. Some poten­tial examples include:

  • More high-level tasks, less low-level. The use of AI-powered tools to auto­mate tasks such as media mon­it­or­ing, con­tent cre­ation, and social media man­age­ment. This could free up PR pro­fes­sion­als to focus on their work’s more stra­tegic and cre­at­ive aspects.
  • Improved ana­lys­is and bet­ter strategies. The devel­op­ment of AI-powered sys­tems that can ana­lyse large amounts of data to identi­fy trends and insights that can inform PR strategy and decision-making.
  • Using PR pro­fes­sion­als as AI train­ers. Using AI-powered chat­bots and vir­tu­al assist­ants to handle cus­tom­er inquir­ies and provide inform­a­tion to the pub­lic allows PR pro­fes­sion­als to scale PR training.
  • Better pub­li­city through inter­con­nectiv­ity. The cre­ation of AI-powered plat­forms and net­works that can facil­it­ate con­nec­tions and col­lab­or­a­tions between PR pro­fes­sion­als, journ­al­ists, pub­lics, influ­en­cers, and oth­er crit­ic­al stake­hold­ers in the industry.
  • Earlier detec­tions of poten­tial PR issues. AI-powered tools can help PR pro­fes­sion­als identi­fy and mit­ig­ate poten­tial crisis situ­ations by ana­lys­ing data and provid­ing early warn­ing sig­nals of poten­tial problems.
  • Increased edit­or­i­al out­put. In organ­isa­tions where the com­mu­nic­a­tions depart­ment is driv­ing the con­tent strategy, PR pro­fes­sion­als will have plenty of tools for increas­ing both the qual­ity and the quant­ity of the out­put. 9Silfwer, J. (2023, March 20). AI & PR: Beware the Artificial Content Explosion. Doctor Spin | The PR Blog. https://​doc​tor​spin​.net/​a​r​t​i​f​i​c​i​a​l​-​c​o​n​t​e​n​t​-​e​x​p​l​o​s​i​on/

Overall, the impact of AI on the PR industry is likely to be sig­ni­fic­ant, with the poten­tial to revolu­tion­ise many aspects of how PR pro­fes­sion­als work and inter­act with their audi­ences.

Read also: PR Beyond AI: A New Profession Emerging From the Rubble

💡 Subscribe and get a free ebook on how to get bet­ter PR ideas.

ANNOTATIONS
ANNOTATIONS
1 Marshall McLuhan. (2023, May 15). In Wikipedia. https://​en​.wiki​pe​dia​.org/​w​i​k​i​/​M​a​r​s​h​a​l​l​_​M​c​L​u​han
2 Have, H., & Neves, M. (2021). Transhumanism (See Enhancement; Transplantation; Genetic Engineering). Dictionary of Global Bioethics. https://​doi​.org/​1​0​.​1​0​0​7​/​978 – 3‑030 – 54161-3_499
3 Transhumanism. (2023, October 29). In Wikipedia. https://​en​.wiki​pe​dia​.org/​w​i​k​i​/​T​r​a​n​s​h​u​m​a​n​ism
4 Cyborg. (2023). Bionity​.com. https://​www​.bion​ity​.com/​e​n​/​e​n​c​y​c​l​o​p​e​d​i​a​/​C​y​b​o​r​g​.​h​tml
5 API. (2023, November 23). In Wikipedia. https://​en​.wiki​pe​dia​.org/​w​i​k​i​/​API
6 Hughes, J. (2012). THE POLITICS OF TRANSHUMANISM AND THE TECHNO-MILLENNIAL IMAGINATION, 1626 – 2030. Zygon, 47, 757 – 776. https://​doi​.org/​1​0​.​1​1​1​1​/​J​.​1​467 – 9744.2012.01289.X
7 Solis, B. & D. Breakenridge (2009, February 1). Putting the Public Back in Public Relations: How Social Media Is Reinventing the Aging Business of PR. Amazon​.com: Books. https://​www​.amazon​.com/​d​p​/​0​1​3​7​1​5​0​6​9​5​?​t​a​g​=​p​r​2​0​0​f​-​2​0​&​c​a​m​p​=​1​4​5​7​3​&​c​r​e​a​t​i​v​e​=​3​2​7​6​4​1​&​l​i​n​k​C​o​d​e​=​a​s​1​&​c​r​e​a​t​i​v​e​A​S​I​N​=​0​1​3​7​1​5​0​6​9​5​&​a​d​i​d​=​0​2​J​7​6​Y​W​6​R​9​G​X​V​R​C​C​J​J​M0&
8 Valentini, C., Kruckeberg, D., & Starck, K. (2012). Public rela­tions and com­munity: A per­sist­ent cov­en­ant. Public Relations Review, 38(5), 873 – 879. https://​doi​.org/​1​0​.​1​0​1​6​/​j​.​p​u​b​r​e​v​.​2​0​1​2​.​0​6​.​001
9 Silfwer, J. (2023, March 20). AI & PR: Beware the Artificial Content Explosion. Doctor Spin | The PR Blog. https://​doc​tor​spin​.net/​a​r​t​i​f​i​c​i​a​l​-​c​o​n​t​e​n​t​-​e​x​p​l​o​s​i​on/
Jerry Silfwer
Jerry Silfwerhttps://doctorspin.net/
Jerry Silfwer, alias Doctor Spin, is an awarded senior adviser specialising in public relations and digital strategy. Currently CEO at KIX Index and Spin Factory. Before that, he worked at Kaufmann, Whispr Group, Springtime PR, and Spotlight PR. Based in Stockholm, Sweden.

The Cover Photo

The cover photo has nothing to do with public relations, of course. I share for no other reason that I happen to enjoy photography. Call it an “ornamental distraction”—and a subtle reminder to appreciate nature.

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