Quartz put out an interesting piece today about Apple and the definition of consciousness. Thome W. Malone writes that Apple is technically a conscious organism based on certain criteria. At first I thought it was silly, but then I considered that since corporations have personhood, why not consciousness? Of course this applies to any corporation, not just Apple. And it seems to me that it wouldn’t be just any consciousness, but a hive mind. Android users scoff at the Apple hive mind, but it will assimilate you next and resistance is futile.
Awareness: The entity can react to changes in the world.
Self-awareness: The entity can react to—and can tell others about—changes in itself.
Goal-directed behavior: The entity can take intentional action to achieve goals.
Integrated information: The entity can combine many different kinds of information simultaneously.
Experience: The entity feels happiness, pain, hunger, or other subjective experiences.
Check It Out: Watch Out Borg: the Apple Hive Mind May Be Real
How stupid is this? Man, you guys get funny when you need copy. If Apple is or contains a “hive mind” there is no way you can spin this as a good thing. And, the funny part is you don’t even see it. Or, maybe you see it and don’t care that your hive is a little “slow” (in computing literally) as in no forward looking cutting edges that maybe an Alphabet or Tesla/Space X/TeslaPower or Amazon purvey… no car, no AI, no AR, no quantum dots… oh they do float funny things up once in a while – anybody remember eWorld? Apple Camera? Apple Quicktime200? The MessagePad2100?? So, you’ve been riding the iOS high life for years now – but it’s played out and ultimately Android kills Apple in mkt share but you want to talk hive, nice. Hive Mind: “a notional entity consisting of a large number of people who share their knowledge or opinions with one another, regarded as producing either uncritical conformity or collective intelligence. “