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Benign Artifacts
A human artifact is defined as any product of human endeavor. A natural artifact is that produced by the body naturally (urine, feces, phlegm, etc.). An artificial artifact, on the other hand, is produced via human mental creativity. A nuclear power plant is an artificial human artifact, as is a bicycle. Once an artifact is designed, it can be proliferated in physical reality if the materials and phenomena exist to make it. For example, dilithium crystals which power the U.S.S. Enterprise on "Star Trek" apparently do not exist.
Artifacts can be categorized into two types: benign and malignant. A benign artifact does not degrade its environment; a malignant artifact does. Common sense dictates that we humans should avoid degrading the environment which supports our life. Therefore, we should strive to design and proliferate only benign artifacts.
Artifact ecology is the study of the relationship between an artifact and its environment. One of its aims is to determine whether an artifact is benign or malignant. Once this has been decided, society can choose to allow or disallow the artifact's proliferation.
Present-day human culture uses zillions of artifacts of different species, it seems. Systems of artifacts function to provide us with vital needs such as food, water, and shelter. If we find that our necessary artifact systems are malignant, do we continue to use them or redesign them to be benign? How far do we want to let the Earth's biosphere degrade from its pristine, natural state?
As I see it, the challenge for today's engineers is to produce an ecologically benign human culture for future generations to use.
Steven D. Axelson graduated from the University with a bachelor's degree in computer science and a master's degree in electrical engineering. He is researching artifact ecology.
