cybernetic subjection, or how to lose the knowledge forever.

 I'm reading Privacy in the Age of Neuroscience by David Grant, which is a very heavy tome indeed, but super interesting - it did make me want to see more examples of contemporary  problems- one that I think is that most of the  route finding on cloud based map apps isn't (just) an algorithm (Dijkstra, for example) but is derived from surveillance of what routes drivers actually take. The problem with this is, that once all drivers have given up doing their own search for better routes, there's nothing left for the cloud-based map system to learn from. So once you've "stolen" all t he human Knowledge (as in london cabbies) and ingenuity (as in anyone), there's no-where left to go - and all that evolution that went into allowing human early hunter gatherers to find stuff (and find their way home) is lost. Brain plasticity means you simply won't have it any more in any form (biological or silicon). but the algorithm will not know this, as it is just a list  of stuff, not an actual strategy. Not even a pheremone hill climber the way many insects work.

It is essentially cognitive vandalism on a grand scale.