Year Million (2017)

Recently, I stumbled across a new cable television series that started showing up on the National Geographic cable channel called Year Million (2017).   The documentary-style show is the type of series that makes an immediate impression on the viewer.  The series takes a speculative look at how human beings and human society will evolve (devolve?) in the next several hundred years (the term “Year Million” not specifically referring to a million years from today; it’s more of a catchy way of saying “the future.”) This is the kind of program that sticks with you long after a viewing, that makes you think, question your reality, and alternately, can invigorate/frighten you to your core, in its display of the future worlds depicted.

Here's a description of the show, via Google:

"Given how rapidly technology and intelligence have advanced humankind in the past 10 years, one can't help but wonder how different the world may be in another 10 years. National Geographic, however, is thinking big. The six-part docudrama "Year Million" paints a visual story of what it will be like to be a human 1 million years into the future. Narrated by Laurence Fishburne, the series features top futurists, scientists, scholars and notable science-fiction writers guiding viewers through the latest advances in technology, ideas and innovations and to an existence where we're living beyond our bodies, beyond our planet and beyond our solar system. Illustrative, imaginative storytelling describes humanity's fate through the lens of a typical futuristic American family, which includes an android daughter."

I've seen three episodes of the series thus far.  Here's the titles, with a brief description of each episode, via the series website:

Episode 1-Homo Sapien 2.0-A look at advances in neuroscience and engineering in regard to artificial intelligence. Advances in neuroscience and engineering are bringing us closer toward a reality first described in great science fiction, one in which artificial intelligence will become indistinguishable from – or perhaps even surpass – human intelligence. This could lead to a future in which AI beings become our essential collaborators or a threat to human value and life. What are the major milestones that are leading us towards this singularity, and how will that affect the evolution of the human species?

Episode 2-Never Say Die-How the futuristic idea of living forever will change what it's like to be human.  In the future, will we move beyond treating individual diseases and, instead, treat the aging process itself? How would a dramatically protracted life change not only the fabric of society, but what it means to be a human being?

Episode 3-Dude, Where's My Body?-With human activity transferring to virtual spaces, will reality suffer the consequences.  Advances in graphics and computing power have given rise to a renaissance in virtual technologies from world-building platforms like Second Life to manufacturers of VR headsets like Oculus Rift. We’re seeing more and more of human activity transfer to virtual spaces, offering people profound experiences via online personas and even transforming the way the real-world functions. Will we reach a tipping point where reality becomes a pale shadow of the rich, imaginative, virtual worlds we’ve created for ourselves? What will that mean for our perception of humanity? What do we risk losing?

My biggest issue with this series?  The impact of theology on human future society is completely ignored, a rather unfortunate misstep of this series.  Additionally, in the episodes I have watched, the disciplines of philosophy and psychology, and their impact on future human societies are to a large (but not total) extent, ignored.  Theoretical physicists are interviewed, yes, which is a welcome and necessary component of the program.  One theoretical physicist does reference such diverse thinkers as Albert Einstein and Sigmund Freud.  But no philosophers are interviewed in the series? No theologians?

There’s no discussion by the existing on-camera commentators on what impact religious faith will have on these future biological, electronic, et al advances of humanity, which I find curious, to say the least.  Yes, I am only three episodes into the series, but I find the omission of non-secular P.O.V. thus far contributes to an incomplete feeling whilst watching the show. 

For example, in the first episode, Homo Sapien 2.0, we are told that in the future, electronic automation will eliminate most jobs, even those occupations considered “safe,” like those in the medical or legal field.   The patriarch of a future family (that is followed throughout the series) is shown at one point to lose his job as an architect to computers/automation/robots that can do the job quicker, cheaper, and more effectively.  What are human beings, such as this individual, going to do when they no longer have a job to go to every day?

I believe that in the absence of employment, a large majority of unemployed individuals will turn towards psychology, philosophy, and yes, religion, to make sense of their lives following the massive loss of occupations.  Machines potentially can replace psychologists and philosophers, but they can never replace, say, Catholic priests, who are required to be human to fulfill their duties.  So, at least some jobs in the clergy sector will be irreplaceable. 

Yes, I am well aware of the argument that a system of guaranteed basic income might be a solution to widespread unemployment caused by job loss as a result of omnipresent automation in future human society.  In that case, humans will have ample opportunity to pursue leisurely activities, as they won’t need to earn money for a living.  This, of course, is assuming that some sort of basic income can be affordably provided to the citizens of a nation, or that the philosophical nature of a particular nation will allow for that guaranteed basic income in the first place.  I’m entirely not convinced a developed country like the U.S. would (or should) plan on a future guaranteed basic income to short-circuit mass poverty (or could even afford such a system in the future, were it to become an economic neccesity.)

As far as what the series Year Million gets right?  Well, there are a number of touches I really like. 

It was a really inspired choice to choose actor Laurence Fishburne to narrate this series.  Fishburne is synonymous in many a mind as the character of“Morpheous”in the set-in-the-future Cyberpunk Matrix movie series of the late 20^th-early 21rst century; his voice lends an air of authenticity to the proceedings.

I also like the choice the series producers made in following a futuristic family that we gradually get to know and love as the series progresses.  We feel a kinship with the family, even as we feel separated from them by multiple decades (and even centuries.)  By the third episode we are fully emotionally invested in the fate of this little group of related individuals.

Bottom line, I am very curious to see how this series plays out.  Truth be told, if some of the predictions of the future of humanity thus far illustrated come to pass as depicted in this series, the seeming-utopia presented seems to me (as a man of faith) to be more of a dystopia, and one that I am not all-too-interested in seeing come to fruition.