Using Ghostin the Shellto Pose theQuestionWhat Doesit mean tobe human?40I’d like to pose a question, and I want you to really think long and hard aboutit: what is the most important philosophical question? I’m sure many of youwill think of the big three: where did we come from, why are we here, and isthere a hope for life after death? However, I am going to focus on the othermost popular question: what does it mean to be human? And MamoruOshii’s 1995 animated movie Ghost in the Shell provides the framework forinvestigating this question.Ghost in the Shell takes place in near future Japan, where the generalpopulace squanders around a grimey, impoverished city while the rich andpowerful govern in their ivory towers. Motoko Kusanagi, or more simply knownas the Major, is a cyborg police officer tasked with leading an anti-cyberterrorism unit in a futuristic Japanese city, where everyone is connected to amass electronic network (basically the Matrix). People can access this datafield through their artificial bodies, otherwise known as a ‘ghost.’ The Majorand her team are tasked with tracking down an elite hacker known as thePuppet Master, who has the ability to access the minds of other cyborgs, anduse them to do his bidding. His emergence, and the idea of entering anotherbody piques the Major’s interest, and gives the film its narrative drive. At theclimax of the movie, we learn that the film’s antagonist, the elusive PuppetMaster, isn’t an actual person, but a program.Masamune Shirow (the author of the Ghost in the Shell manga) has said thatthe title is an homage to Arthur Koestler’s Ghost in the Machine, from whichShirow drew inspiration from. One of the central concepts of Koestler’s bookabout philosophical psychology is that the human brain has retained and builtupon earlier, more primitive brain structures. The head portion of the “ghostin the machine” has — as a consequence of poor, inadequate connections— a rich potential for conflict. The primitive layers can, and may, together,overpower rational logic’s hold. This explains a person’s hate, anger, andemotional distress. This is what the Puppet Master has deemed the essenceof life. The Puppet Master downloads himself into body after body, longing tofeel a smidge of humanity, to feel those aforementioned feelings.The Major is entirely cybernetic, except for her brain. It is inferred that she wasin a near-fatal accident that killed her parents, and her body was destroyedbeyond repair, leaving only her brain, her soul, and her ghost intact, whichis then implemented into a new cybernetic body. This body is a shell thatis ultimately owned by the government, making her a slave to bureaucracy.Throughout the movie, The Major implies that she remembers little snippetsfrom her life before her ghost was transferred into the shell she currentlyoccupies. However, all her worries and nightmares begin to creep into herdaily life.So what does it actually mean to be human? To me, humanity isn’t just theability to observe the complexities of the world we live in, but the emotionalconnection and relationships we establish. Sure, many organisms on ourplanet find mates that they will spend the rest of their lives with, but onlyhumans can have complex relationships with varying emotions. That is whatbeing human is all about.In the world of Ghost in the Shell, society is ascribed to this philosophical andscientific movement known as transhumanism: a movement that essentiallyadvocates for the use of current and emerging technologies — such as artificialintelligence, cybernetic enhancements, and nanotechnology — to augmenthuman capabilities and improve the human condition. Through this, manypeople are able to backup their consciousness on a network to be importedinto another body after death, essentially allowing them to live forever. Theybelieve this to be the perfect world, and the ideal human life where one is ableto live on with your loved one forever, without ever having to say goodbye.But is this really an ideal life? Toward the beginning of the movie, the Majorand her team are following up on a lead regarding the Puppet Master aftera foreign diplomat that she was ordered to assassinate is “ghost hacked”(ghost hacking is when the perpetrator leaves no trace). They trace the phonesignal that the virus traveled through back to a low-level street thug, who hasunknowingly been convinced by the Puppet Master that what he is doing is toget back at his ex-wife. Upon capture, however, it is revealed to him that henever had a wife to begin with; he never met a girl, they never fell in love, theynever moved in together, and they never divorced.Ghost in the Shell isn’t a glimpse into a promising future: it is a warning. Inour ever evolving technological world, uploading our consciousnesses to theinternet is a very real possibility in our lifetimes, Where people have chosen toupload so much of their lives on social media, people have lost their sense ofconnection. If you can cheat death by being uploaded into another body, thenwhat’s the point of living at all? That is the point of being human: living anddying. Everyone is born with a life — it might not be as good as someone else’s,but it’s yours. You have the option to form the relationships you want, to makethe memories that you want to make, and to live your life how you want to live.And yeah, you’re going to die — everything does. So you have got to make themost of it — that is what being human is.by owen mayer
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