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The AfterEffects Consquences - So you ask what could happen if computers got as smart (or smarter) than man ?Its not as simple as the possiblity of computers taking over the world (like in the movies). There are so many more problems involved with the affereffects of such a break through in technology. Today, automation is the main theme for many factories and industrial production lines. Entire offices depend on computers to do their jobs, many businessmen depend on video conferencing to reach their biggest clients, teenagers log on to the internet as if it were a routine of life itself, high security buildings use computer systems to match finger prints before allowing access, banks keep entire customer records into huge databases, credit card companies depend totally on computers to function and power plants are monitor by control systems. Already, the entire of society depends on computers. Should all the computers in the world refuse to work, disaster would strike. Mankind may have to go back to a time before the digital age !! But at the same time, computerisation brought about many social problems. Automation of factories removed the need to hire works and many factory workers lost their jobs. Older staff in offices, once thought to be highly valued because of their experience are retrenched because they have no IT(information technology) skills and did not know how to use a computer. Computers which were susposed to make work easier instead generated more stress for workers because with the improved eqiupment, the management rises its expectations. Computers with human intelligence would generate even more problems. In all the industries, simple reasoning would cause almost all the workers to be fired. Why hire a human when you can just buy a robot that can do all the work at a faster pace, work through day or night, work on holidays and best of all, need no salary and will not complain ? With this simple reason, 80% of all the jobs can be taken over by robots. Infact, all of the jobs can be taken by computers. Then nobody has to work anymore. Well, it may sound nice and all. No work for the rest of our lives. But what would happen to society ? What would happen to our way of life without jobs. If nobody has to work for anything anymore, then wwhat would be the result ? The entire of society would break down with laziness, not to mention, becoming overdependant on these robotic brains. And if these computers were given too much authority and control over our way of life and are made to be incharge of our every need, then wouldn't we all be at their mercy ? What if they sudddenly turn against us ? And if these superior intelligence takes human form? Should we treat each of them like a human or like an object? Should we refer to these superior intelligences as "it" or as "him" ? Remember that these robots can be made to have emotions and feelings just like a human being. Remember the movie "bicentinal man" ? The movie deals with exactly the same problems that i am talking about. What exactly distingushes us as humans from robots if robots too have emotions, feelings and mortal thoughts ? It is not a question that i can answer. Maybe these thoughts are way too far ahead of time to be given any thought to right now. But when the time comes, in about one to three more decades later, all the answers will naturally be out.
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