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To any star trek buff, who has watched the movie “The First Contact” or the series “Star Trek Voyager” these are only too familiar words. Mention them and what comes to mind immediately are those cuboids, which house numerous half cybernetic drones. Tough looking drones who represent the integration of mind and machine and of mind and mind. Not invincible but nearly so.

The serial gives a very negative image of the Borg. It describes in detail how the Borg go about destroying various civilizations, assimilating them as it calls it and gives a rather graphic view of the assimilation process wherein the drones inject nano probes into the victims body. The victim then is transformed into a drone and the mind gets linked to the collective (Much like the vampire movies where once bitten the victim becomes a vampire). The newly created drone then awaits instructions and performs the tasks as per the wishes of the collective. A horrifying thought no doubt. The first impression that one gets is that this Borg is a species, which is the embodiment of evil itself. Careful thoughts reveal a few other things though.

Every society, culture or religion has always tried to represent evil by an icon. To the bible it is Satan, to the hindus it is the ravanas and the kamsas. The symbol of evil as everything else in this world is also time dependent. Thus during the 2nd world war, Hitler and his Nazis held this position. And in the future as Star Trek would have us believe it is the Borg. It is in the human nature to symbolize everything that is good and call it the handiwork of god and also to symbolize everything that is evil and call it by the above mentioned names. Needless to say many of the above mentioned are genuinely evil, but often our fear of the unknown itself leads to what we call as evil. Thus, anything which was unexplainable was ascribed to witchcraft or tantrism during the past. As far as the future is concerned already there are many who fear alien invasions, or robots taking over the world, or more seriously as Star Trek would put it a transformation of all cultures into a Borgian civilization. All these topics can be discussed at length, but among these I believe the Borgian case deserves a special attention, simply because it is completely different from the rest.

There are essentially two aspects to the concept of the Borg. The first one which is the more trivial one is that of the integration of mind, body and machine into one entity. While this sounds completely fictional, rest assured that it’s only a matter of time before such a thing actually takes place. In fact from a certain perspective its mild variant already exists. We do have people who rely on voice synthesizers for their speech, people who depend on hearing aids for listening, robotic arms to help the disabled all exist. The specific case of the renowned physicist Stephen Hawking certainly serves to illustrate this reality. Thus with the help of his speech synthesizer this great physicist is able to ‘share’ his thoughts with the outside world, further his electronic wheel chair is able to help him move around here and there. What’s more there are people out there whose lives depend upon ‘gadgets’ like pacemakers. Are’nt all these people Borgian in some sense? Also just because they rely on gadgets for their existence, has it made them any less human?

In a sense the integration of the body and the machine has already been achieved. Most important of all it has been beneficial to many. The more challenging problem from a technology point of view would be inter connect the mind with the machine. Suffice it to say that quite a deal of research is going on in these areas and limited success has been achieved. Again repulsive as the thought may be to some, such a technology can prove extremely beneficial and can enhance the quality of our lives, if used properly of course.

Then there is the second aspect to the concept of the Borg. It is this, which makes the Borg quite unique. The Borg are essentially ‘intelligent’ human like life forms assimilated into a collective. This collective however is unlike any other we know. It is an interlinking of billions of mind, with each mind capable of reading every other mind and thus incapable of hiding its own thoughts. A super massive network, which would put any network we know to shame. A perfect example of distributed computing, with all individual nodes processing the acquired data and making computations to achieve the goal of the collective – The quest for perfection. Not a bad aim in itself.

Every society, religion organization or community is a collective. Every collective has definite ideologies, which it tries to impose on its members and often even on those who are not a part of the collective. A few societies may brag about how they encourage their citizens to think freely and teach them to respect other people’s thoughts. Thus it would appear that such societies do not impose their ideologies on others. However if examined closely one would realize that even such an act is an imposition of an ideology namely that of respecting others thoughts! What’s more thoughts or actions, which are not in the interest of the collective as a whole are discouraged. There are written and unwritten codes of conduct. In essence there are protocols, which everyone is supposed to follow. Those who do not follow them are pronounced ‘guilty’ and are appropriately ‘punished’. The punishment usually leads to the guilty being banished or isolated from the collective. Thus a religion might excommunicate a devotee for making blasphemous remarks, the gen x might refuse to interact with someone within their age group for not having a ‘cool’ attitude as they perceive it, or more seriously the law and order machinery might decide to throw someone in the dungeons for breaking the rules of the land. May be the punishment is really necessary or may be it really isn’t but the point is that every collective imposes its ideologies and those who by their virtue of thoughts or actions oppose it are the criminals, in the eyes of the collective. The collective always decides what is ‘good’ and what is ‘bad’ and tries to influence everyone into the ‘good’ side. An individual’s individuality is in the process lost on some matters or issues at least. However it is not just the collective, as a whole, but even individuals who indulge in these actions. Everyone among us tries to not necessarily impose but at least influence the thoughts of others around us, for the ultimate goal we all have in mind- The quest for perfection (Though the definition of perfection may vary). In what way are we different from the Borg, then?

A collective is always stronger than the individual. Not only because in unity lies strength, but also because in variety lies strength. This can be easily seen in the case of us humans itself. Over the past century since more people from different races have started interacting, our species as a whole has grown extremely powerful and has come to dominate the earth completely. Thus the Borg who assimilate species from all corners of the galaxy are naturally expected to be the champions of the galaxy. Also unlike ours their society has no concept of hierarchy, though there is a queen Borg. This lack of hierarchy ensures that all are equal in the Borgian collective. There is a complete lack of competition. Some might argue that a competitive spirit is healthy. However logically speaking competition is one of the sickliest diseases prevailing in a society. Competition only leads to division of a society and certainly goes a long way in interrupting the flow of ideas among the members of a society. Worse still every individual wastes his or her resources in trying to beat others of his or her own kind. A complete waste of resources as far as the collective is concerned. Cooperation rather than competition should be the guidelines for any matured society. What could be better than billions of minds cooperating with each other? Perhaps this explains why the Borg, are such great achievers.

Finally for any species to survive that supreme ability is required- the ability to adapt. The best way to adapt is not by adjusting to the environment but by adjusting the environment to match your needs. Thus the government adapts itself to a financial crunch by raising taxes as opposed to cutting down its expenses, junk food companies create a taste for their otherwise distasteful food and third rate musicians ensure that everyone prefers to dance to their rhythms rather than listen to anything soft and melodious. Adjusting to the surroundings does not guarantee survival but adjusting the surroundings ensures that you not only survive but also win. Precisely why the Borg adopt this methodology.

Where does this leave us all? Would our technology take us close to the Borgian world? My own view is that it has nothing to do with technology at all. What we perceive as an individual consciousness might actually be a collection of myriads of them all working together and giving the impression that it is a single entity. In other words a question can be raised as to whether every single person or individual is actually a collection of consciousness knitted together to give the impression of a single consciousness or an individual rather than being a single consciousness as we have always imagined. Even if that is not the case, whether we realize it or not we might not be a Borg kind of a collective but everyone among us in our approach and thinking are just like the Borg. We all love to assimilate people and certainly do wish we could tell our ‘victims’ that resistance is futile.

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