The use of the phrase "claim the right to be unhappy" here is most indicative of the type of culture that the film created. Emotions are no longer inherent or natural, they are something you must claim or fight for. To have "the right" to something inherently means that it is not simply given. It makes the issue one of possession rather than oppression. It's not that the new society is oppressing the emotions, but rather that they are no longer claiming/possessing them.

This analogy stood out to me as a very effective means to explain what the author is trying to get at. The idea that regardless of how bad something is, if everyone has it and I don't, the question isn't if I should have it, it's why don't I. It's used fairly effectively here to get the point across, specifically with the idea of food, which is so necessary to us. We could even go further to draw the connection between food and technology as now completely essential to our lives that who cares if it's contaminated or dangerous, we still need it.

It's interesting the use of the word "soul" here as a means to define the unquantifiable part of what makes us human taken from the article mentioned previously. Much of the author's argument has thus far been biotech based and "soul" is at first what the author describes as the chemicals that makes us feel, whereas "soul" is traditionally used as the essence of who we are while our body is just a vessel for that "soul" to live through.

The Monolith's act as stages throughout the movie of human development/evolution. And every monolith up until this point has seemed to be the human as a creator of technology and being able to use it, but it's at this point that the monolith represents a transition into a type of 'superhuman' as shown in the rebirth scene. No longer are humans evolving by creating something, but by improving themselves. This seems especially poignant when HAL's disconnection is considered as well. David had to 'unplug' HAL in order to get to this next step. He had to, in essence, kill the very thing that had led humans to this point of evolution.

It's interesting that the author chooses to emphasize the distinction between extropy as an opposition to entropy, but instead as a metaphor. However, would extropy not be the opposite of entropy metaphorically as well? Scientific definition aside, entropy is defined as the universe's tendency towards chaos in all manners of the word meaning constant expansion and disorder. Extropy is the universe's tendency towards the idea of a 'singularity' (discussed in "The Technological Singularity") so essentially the exact opposite? The universe's tendency to follow "intelligence, functional order", etc. toward a single point of "posthuman" where we've gone beyond human capability?

The author points out that human competition, which thus far has driven the exponential development/advancement of technology, would drive developers towards the "unfettered versions." While I agree that it would likely be the case, I think it's possible that the author is underestimating how much of ourselves would likely end up in the superhuman. Aspects of humanity that were likely never intended to be in the superhuman, but will end up there inherently due to who is programming it.

It seems that the author is establishing a relationship between modern physics and technology as a circular relationship in that modern physics would not be possible if technology did not allow us to study it nor would technology advance should modern physics not be studied. So, essentially, modern technology is a method to reveal modern physics to us? Therefore, modern technology is also a revealing just as modern physics is a revealing, but that they mutually allow each other to do so?