The Low-Tech Times

Lara Farrar wrote an interesting piece for CNN about a group of experts that will be discussing the possibility that hi-tech machines could put an end to the human race:

On the final day of the Global Catastrophic Risk Conference, experts will focus on what could be the unintended consequences of new technologies, such as superintelligent machines that, if ill-conceived, might cause the demise of Homo sapiens.

“Any entity which is radically smarter than human beings would also be very powerful,” said Dr. Nick Bostrom, director of Oxford’s Future of Humanity Institute, host of the symposium. “If we get something wrong, you could imagine the consequences would involve the extinction of the human species.”

It seems pretty far-fetched to me, but is interesting nevertheless. My hope is that low-tech life will prevail. I wonder what the staff at RobotInTheWoods.com think?

I very much enjoyed watching the first two Terminator movies, but have yet to see the third one. The movie series, starring Arnold Schwarzenegger depicts a future where humans fighting for survival against with deadly cyborgs. Links to the DVDs are below.

This entry was posted on Wednesday, July 16th, 2008 at 8:46 pm and is filed under RECOMMENDED, books, magazines, and movies. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.