Newcastle — The battle of man vs. machine has been going on for centuries, but it’s only in the last few decades that it has really heated up.  Man’s losing.  The age when the robot does virtually everything is in the foreseeable future.  The star ship is just over the horizon.  While it’s true that the machine is only as good as its program, the program can always be upgraded.  The stupid oaf remains a stupid oaf.

People speak of “artificial intelligence” for the computer, but it’s a misnomer.  I question whether there’s such a thing as intelligence in human activity.  Evidence points to the contrary; we’re blundering, unpredictable, and ignorant.  And because of these human characteristics the “artificial intelligence” of the carefully contrived computer model frequently fails to make correct predictions.  Look at economics, for example.  The experts are wrong more than half the time.  Has a computer helped you to make your fortune in the stock market?  No, because the activity of the market is illogical or perchance manipulated.

Some automation has redeaming features.  I like the idea that a robot performs many medical operations.  A robot is much less likely than a tired surgeon to remove my spleen thinking it’s my prostate.  Though, come to think of it, I’d rather not be in such a situation.

“The only thing we know is that we do not know.”  This maxim urges us to probe and create, at the cost, unfortunately, of ever-increasing confusion.  I don’t want 300 channels on my television.  How about one program that I enjoy instead?  Through our communications innovation we are now sinking in a quicksand of information.  Everything happens too fast, and everything is trivialized.  It appears there is no room for sombre probity, only the abomination of Facebook or Twitter.

In winning the battle, the machine has eliminated employment, enhanced obesity, and brought about a feeling of helplessness; a race of can’t-do humanoids.  There is little to give one a feeling of accomplishment.  Even in war the human is of little consequence, except perhaps for making bad choices and uninformed decisions.

“Whence cometh so suddenly my dreary pessimism?”  Well, it’s not sudden but usually quasi dormant.  It was triggered in me this week listening to National Public Radio’s All Things Considered. The subject was driverless auto technology.  Is this something we’re developing simply because we can?  Who would want such a thing?  It might make sense for the geriatric driver whose mobility, reflexes, and judgment are shot; make the road safer for the rest of us; but what of that Rite of Passage, maturity and the first car proudly earned after instruction in Driver’s Ed?  Another rewarding accomplishment taken away.  Do you want to send your kid to preschool in the driverless car, or would you prefer to share the experience?  What about NASCAR, the number one spectator sport; does anyone want to watch driverless cars that never crash?  A Stanford lawyer involved with the legal ramifications of the driverless car offers that he likes the idea of sleeping on the way to work.  Swell.

We already have some driverless features such as automatic parallel parking introduced by Toyota in 2003.  Google has managed to develop a car that can drive itself (watchable on the ubiquitous YouTube), but full implementation and availability are not anticipated for another decade.  Personally I don’t think it will ever happen.  Somewhere, somehow, the robot car has got to interact with the human, and that is where the system breaks down. We have an infinite, ingenious capacity to screw up.  I’m optimistic about this.

Cheer up!  We’re not going to lose the battle against the machines, even if it only devolves into a matter of litigation.  That is where we are likely headed.  All human endeavor will be directed to regulation, enforcement, compensation etc.   A nation of lawyers; wouldn’t surprise me none.  Such a happy thought.