Most of us see technology as a positive influence in our lives. No one gets lost driving a car anymore. Emergencies are dealt with quickly and as efficiently as possible. Television sets and computer screens that are practically as big as the walls we mount them on. Shopping from the luxury of your crib. On the surface it all seems like heaven on earth and it might be for a while but with all its benefits technology has the potential of annihilating the human species and even perhaps all biological life on earth and given who will be in charge 10, 20 or more years into the future, we may very well be facing inevitable dire consequences.
Technology’s use is a tricky thing because we know it can go to far. We know it so well we make movies about that potential, like the classic Terminator film starring Arnold Schwarzenegger. The arch villain in that film is a technology called Skynet. Lately, many online users have started referring to internet giant Google as SkyNet as people see similarities between both sources of technology.
This question about the annihilation of the human race at the hands of technology has not gone unasked. We can already see the effects of technology on our psychological well being as we drool like Pavlov’s dog at every new technological breakthrough while banging away on our cell phones. We see it in the health of our nation’s children who aren’t told to go outside and play anymore because of pedophiles and instead they sit in a chair either watching television or playing video games as they struggle with being overweight. All this and studies have also determined that as a species we are getting dumber, not smarter which in my opinion is due to technology doing everything for us.
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One of the more rational theories being bandied around is that biological life could be destroyed by nanobots. This is a very real threat especially given the generation that will be coming up to bat next. Consider the following scenario.
We are now capable of making self-replicating nanobots which are tiny little robots that can be programmed to do many things in many different areas like medicine. Imagine tiny little machines that can travel through your bloodstream and repair your organs. That future is not that far away.
What if there was a massive oil spill in the Golf of Mexico. Not one tanker but for some reason several. There actually are a couple of refineries in the U.S. that are in the Golf. This is an ecological disaster of monstrous proportions. One option the government has to clean up the mess is to send in self-replicating nanobots to clean up the mess quickly and efficiently. Do you think that any in the Millennial generation would even hesitate to send in those nanobots? If they stay true to form and remember a lot of Woodstock wannabees currently roam the halls of our capital buildings still hanging on to 60’s beliefs, they wouldn’t even consider listening to any warning that might accompany this action.
Here’s the threat. Something goes wrong or gets altered in the programming of these tiny simple robots. They clean up the oil alright but they just keep on replicating making more and more tiny robots who were designed to destroy a biological fuel. It seems reasonable to believe that these nanobots would continue in their work and even if they only destroyed all the crude oil on the planet it would have devastating effects on the population. See all the plastics around where you are working right now? No more of that and no more of certain kinds of clothing or cells phones … the list is longer than Santa’s good/naughty list. And when this constantly growing mass of tiny robots finishes destroying all the fossil fuels they will all stop replicating and retire in the Bahamas right?
Make no mistake this is a very real possibility and a very real extinction level event. Does anyone reading this actually believe that this generation of soy boys and beta male women are going to have the wherewithal to say “no” to deploying the self-replicating nanobots or will climate change take front and center? I think we are all pretty confident about the answer to that one and this is just one of many scenarios that could unfold.
Technology is making us fat, stupid, and lazy while at the same time technology’s ability to think faster and for itself is increasing exponentially. Such growing power being controlled by a generation of ignorant and lazy ideologues is a recipe for Armageddon.
The opinions expressed in this commentary are solely those of the author and are not not necessarily either shared or endorsed by iPatriot.com.