There's a very subtle through-line of the 1993 film, Jurassic Park, that sounds eerily relevant in our own technological state of the world, but it's something extremely easy to miss. Let's take a look at a few different scenes throughout the movie, because I think this lays out a pretty accurate history and potential future of technological development and integration with humanity.
The Computer Age
When Dr. Grant, one of the paleontologists, is first introduced to us, he stands up and gruffly mutters, "I hate computers." Dr. Sattler, another paleontologist, immediately quips that "the feeling's mutual," and then escorts him down the hill to take a look at a scrappy machine with a flickering monitor. It's the latest in dinosaur dig-site technology.
"Shoot the radar into the ground and the bone bounces the image back," the computer operator mumbles, explaining while concentrating on his controls and the fuzzy image appearing on the screen.
![[jurassic-park-radar-screen.png]]
"Few more years' development and we won't even have to dig anymore." He continues, typing away while the fossil image gets clearer after a few more passes of rendering.
"Where's the fun in that?" Dr. Grant scowls.
![[jurassic-park-looking-at-raptor-radar-rendering.png]]
Once they can see the dinosaur image, Dr. Sattler and Dr. Grant immediately jump in with their expertise, describing what they see, including guesses on measurements, species (velociraptor), and other features. The screen turns Poltergeist when Dr. Grant gets too close to touching the monitor, and Dr. Sattler explains in yet another quip:
"Dr. Grant's not machine compatible."
"They've got it out for me," Dr. Grant says quietly.
Now we obviously have some funny tension here between these experts and technology. Almost like the scene is pitting them together in a competition to see who is providing more value: the slow humans with expertise? Or the computer programs that are constantly evolving in ways that would essentially take away a huge part of the human paleontologists' work? Grant already is being portrayed as a bit of a curmudgeon in this scene, especially after his little lesson he gives to a kid that doesn't "respect" the velociraptor, calling it a giant turkey.
This is exactly what it probably felt like at the time (1990s) if you were a knowledge worker of some kind, grappling with the new machines that were quickly becoming a daily part of work. There were people who were excited about all of the new possibilities, maybe even making claims that made other people uncomfortable like the computer operator in this scene did with the claim that soon they won't have to dig anymore. There were also people who felt like computers got in the way of their work or were too volatile to rely on. We obviously know what happened since then, because we not only have computers at work, regardless of occupation, and even have computers we put in our pockets for use at all times of the day.
The excavation site scene is very much a grounded, historical take on the technological revolution. It's the implications of the next phase that start to get closer to home in our current situation.
A New World
Fast-forward to Jurassic Park, the incredible realization of technology and biology that pulled dinosaurs out of extinction and into our world. The crew have just seen their first dinosaurs down by the lake. They go into the main building with ultra-rich founder, Dr. Hammond. Walking up the stairs past a giant skeleton of tyrannosaurus rex, Hammond is excitedly babbling about the park and his work:
"...incorporating all the latest technologies in the world...we've made living biological attractions so astounding that they'll capture the imagination of the entire planet."
"So what are you thinking?" Dr. Sattler starts a side conversation.
"That we're out of a job," Dr. Grant replies with a nervous chuckle.
"Don't you mean, 'extinct'?" Dr. Malcolm jabs.
This is such a short moment, it was something I never noticed until after I started writing CYBORG_ and am on the lookout for weird commentary like this. The notion that paleontologists suddenly feel threatened—actually threatened—by technology for their field of work is striking. I see at least these two assumptions baked into Dr. Grant's statement and the context of what the scientists know at this point:
- They assume that because they've now seen real biological creatures that those creatures represent the actual dinosaurs from which they were made.
- They assume that their contributions and methods are no longer relevant because the creatures are alive.
Granted, they haven't gone on the science-explaining tour just yet at this point in the movie, so they don't know that technically, these dinosaurs are completely new creatures, not resurrected species. I would argue that because the DNA has to be modified by contemporary frog DNA in order to complete the discovered dinosaur DNA sequencing, that the dinosaurs would essentially be a new, created, dinosaur—similar enough, but certainly differing from their ancestors in unexpected ways. Even if this first assumption is true, then the optimist would say that paleontology has not lost any value at all. This actually creates the demand for more paleontology—expanding the field to consider both prehistoric discovery and contemporary biology based on the new living creatures.
In a way this mirrors our real-world knowledge worker situation just a few years ago. The introduction of LLMs to the public invited and required more expertise, because without it, there were gaps that couldn't be bridged. For example, building a custom website is quite hard—ChatGPT could do some of it, maybe even make a cool interface, but when it comes time to put it on a server or maintain it, the gaps become quite difficult to overcome if you have no idea why sharing localhost:8000 doesn't show your website to your friend. .
You could argue that it still didn't really invite more expertise, because companies have made layoffs, claiming AI can now replace those workers. Sometimes this has led to surges of re-hiring for those positions, sometimes not. The thing we can be sure of is that this AI-replacement story is causing volatility in the market. We can also be sure that while experts are less likely to be under threat, it's the entry-level, junior jobs that are getting hit hard right now.
Futures
We get two more moments that continue this question of work for our paleontologist heroes. The next scene is in a tree, where Dr. Grant and the two grandchildren of Dr. Hammond have spent the night.
"What are you and Ellie going to do now if you don't have to pick up dinosaur bones anymore?" Lexie, the oldest, asks.
"I don't know. I guess we'll just have to evolve, too," Dr. Grant answers.
Now, this is technically the last time we actually get a reference to job loss or job transformation. It sounds a lot like what the tech bros are saying: AI is here to stay, and you're going to have to level up—that's how it works. Evolve or die. However, I think it's interesting to add one more moment to complete the thought. At the very end, the kids, Dr. Grant, and Dr. Sattler have reunited. Narrowly escaping the pack of velociraptors, they run to Hammond and Malcom in a Jeep outside the park's visitor center.
"Hammond, after careful consideration, I've decided not to endorse your park," Grant says jumping into the passenger seat."
In miracle of miracles, the old man responds in agreement: "So have I."
I think it is both of these scenes that together help us handle the futures that are ahead of us right now in the world with increasingly better and more dangerous AI. Yes, we'll have to evolve—but that doesn't necessarily mean that we have to accept or adopt AI. It feels too much like accepting a marketing message if the only option is to push forward against all of our better judgment and against our own interests. There are many options available to us, although they may be shrinking.
One option that won't be advertised is Dr. Grant's final conclusion: pushing back against the narrative and not endorsing "the park." In our terms, that might be putting pressure on lawmakers to end the race to AGI/ASI. That might be raising awareness of the dangers that AI poses to everyone. That might be helping your kids avoid and/or navigate this new technology. We may not individually have the influence (or even the chance) to convince an ultra-rich oligarch to stop pursuing destructive and dangerous technology that they have funded, but there is still the possibility that we can collectively be convincing in other ways, especially through regulation.
Jurassic Park offered two predictions for the loss of paleontology as we know it today: first, the computer itself would force them to give up digging for dinosaur bones, and second, the incredible genetic technology of re-creating the dinosaurs themselves would put them to pasture. We don't actually get to see either of these predictions play out. That's because, in my view, it's up to us now to figure out how we want to steer the future. Jobs will be threatened, lives will be up-ended, but I hope we don't stop digging for dinosaur bones, because there is value in slow discovery, in the arts and practices we have participated in anciently, and in understanding our present by better understanding our context within a huge span of evolutionary time. When we lose sight of the past, our future becomes even more tenuous and more easily controlled by a powerful few, rather than a democratic many.