Define inevitable.
Do you mean that no matter what we try to do, individually or collectively, that Neuropath and Crash Space will happen?
I don't think so.
But, if you mean simply that if the science and technology as well as current trends continue unchecked and unhindered, those are potential realities? I absolutely think so.
Agreed, particularly the last bit.
At this stage, I personally view most of Bakker's fiction as warnings of the negative (usually disastrous) consequences of the Information Age/Anthropocene or Transhumanist/Dataist movement - whatever we call "this era happening right now" - rather than declarations of the inevitable. In other words, he writes cautionary tales regarding these topics and issues.
Quoting directly from Wikipedia because I'm lazy:
Like horror fiction, generally the cautionary tale exhibits an ambivalent attitude towards social taboos. The narrator of a cautionary tale is momentarily excused from the ordinary demands of etiquette that discourages the use of gruesome or disgusting imagery because the tale serves to reinforce some other social taboo.
Cautionary tales are also frequently utilised to spread awareness of moral issues, and for this reason are often told to children to make them conform to rules that either protect them or are for their own safety.
Obviously Bakker is writing such tales for adults more than children, and the theme of "unknown unknowns" that runs through his work makes such categorization a bit more nuanced. But, I think one can approach his stories the way one might approach, say,
1984 by George Orwell. It's meant to be taken quite seriously, but not to the degree that we literally prepare for an actual political-entity-organization-thing called Big Brother, just something (or things) similar to it.
Thus, we today should be prepared, to the extent of our ability, for people/beings/entities
like a Neuropath, or a Kellhus, and be aware of the potential disasters from technologies
like those seen in Crash Space.
As for my own personal view on where reality will take us, for whatever that's worth, I generally fall somewhere in the middle. I don't really think our entire society as we know it will rapidly collapse in an apocalyptic fashion within the next, whatever, 20 years (I admit it feels weird saying this in a post-Trump Administration America, but my larger-scale view of things has not really changed that dramatically). Instead I lean more toward it being a perceptually gradual shift for most of the world, albeit one that is lightning fast by historical standards.
That being said, if I were to bet a million dollars,
I'd suggest that by the end of the 21st century a significant portion of the world's population will look back at humanity as we are now and realize they are no longer the same animal -- and unfortunately I don't see that process being a perfectly smooth progression for people in general. Persecution and bigotry are not so easily solved, especially the latter. It seems very likely that under such circumstances, a considerable chunk of the population will be "left behind", for lack of a less loaded phrase, and I would imagine that group will include those both willingly and unwillingly, depending on the context. And that may well be for the better. Who can say?
That is, after-all, what makes this point in history uniquely challenging.
No one knows how information technologies will alter our society even five years from now. We can make educated guesses, and probably get a decent idea, at least for now. But make no mistake, once/if we find ourselves co-existing with entities possessing an intelligence even moderately superior to our own, all bets are off. It is, quite literally, impossible to comprehend the nature of such things
*I only omit TSA from the rest of RSB's oeuvre because it's just so damn huge and covers so many topics and issues, many of which are older than God. Which is not to discredit the more speculative elements; I actually think one of the bigger "under-sung" achievements of the series is, IMO, the virtually unparalleled depiction of what a greater-than-human-intellect such as a Dunyain might
actually be like. The series basically ruined superhuman intelligences in other fiction for me, at least any that try to "get inside the head" of such a thing.
ETA: Actually, I'll amend that last statement -- Peter Watts deserves a mention for his portrayal of creatures smarter (by large or small margin) than humans. His approach is different and he certainly hasn't been spending 30 years writing a character like Kellhus, but he's definitely circling around a similar array of ideas, and he does it with more finesse than basically any other non-RSB author I've personally read.
