From the perspective of the planet Earth, humans have existed for about three seconds. In those three seconds, we’ve made such astounding technological leaps that, at present, we actually have articles written in light, by electricity and broadcast instantaneously all over the globe, complaining about the fact that we don’t have flying skateboards yet.
Compared to the technological progress of, say, the dinosaurs during their tens of millions of years on Earth, we’re the equivalent of a guy who shows up at a party already hammered, shoots a liter of heroin and asks if they have any medical-grade adrenaline kicking around in the back. Clearly, we’re a little impatient when it comes to getting our next hit of sweet, sweet progress.
The problem is, our toys don’t always come with instructions, or even those “recommended for species aged 1-100 million years” stickers. And on occasion we end up with shit that, quite frankly, maybe we shouldn’t have access to. The atomic bomb, high fructose corn syrup, Star Wars III, what have you.
And according to a growing number of science fiction authors and, more importantly, a few actual scientists, that bad habit may catch up with us, and soon. That moment–when technology renders humans obsolete–even has a name.
It’s called the Technological Singularity, and it’s basically the point at which our toys start to consider us toys, and life as we know it starts losing its shit. Here are a few of the ways it could feasibly shake out.
The Gist:
This is your most basic version of the Technological Singularity, the one popularized by countless movies and feared ever since Pinocchio became self-aware and murdered his father (I didn’t watch much Disney as a kid).
The basic idea goes like this: One day in the future, a team of scientists working at a robot factory (let’s say Japanese scientists, because, hey, who are we kidding?) finally invent a robot that’s smarter than a human being, if only by an infinitesimal amount. It’ll still probably be a robot dog, but that’s fine; the point is, it’s the robot we’ve all been imagining all these years.
Then let’s say–since Japanese scientists are so notoriously lazy–they take the rest of the day off and have the newborn Mr. Roboto design more robots instead of doing it themselves. Makes sense after all: why do a job the hard way when there’s a tool that can do it faster and better than you? It’s kind of the basis of all human civilization, and, some would argue, our current unemployment rate, but shut the fuck up because robots are cool.
So while Mrs. Yakahara and the Morimoto twins are guzzling sake at the commissary, Mr. Roboto dutifully uses his superhuman brain to design the best robot he can, a robot that, as you’d expect–because he’s smarter than the people who designed him–is even smarter than he is. This continues for a couple hours, at which point Mr. Roboto’s great-great-grand-robo-children are so smart, they decide the best way to deal with “the human problem” is to send an android back in time to murder Sarah Connor.
Voila! Humans are obsolete.
Why It’s Plausible:
The big question here is whether you believe it’s theoretically possible for humans to create a robot as sophisticated as a human. If you’re a person of faith, you’ve got the whole immaterial soul thing to throw a monkey wrench into the works, at least until we manage to replicate the human soul using a powerful lens, some magnets and the tears of an orphan.
Even if you’re not religious, creating a robot that functions on the same level as a human being seems like a tall order, but think about it this way: the guy who built Deep Blue could probably shit a diamond more easily than beat it at a game of chess. And I’m guessing the guy who invented the hydraulic press couldn’t crush a car, either. And just try to recreate two midgets having sex with a horse more realistically than your computer monitor. Not gonna happen.
The fact is, we’ve made plenty of technologies that are more capable and efficient than we are at particular tasks. And the rate at which our technology has improved is only increasing. Is it too much to believe that at some point in the future we will build a machine that can problem solve and predict better than we can? That can actually think?
And is it too much to believe that that machine will then immediately wage war on us with laser cannons? I submit that it is not.
Upside:
OK, so there’s no particular reason our robot superiors should instantly want to kill or enslave us, other than that it makes for a much more entertaining movie than Bicentennial Man.
Assuming we could retain control of our robots as they got ever smarter and more powerful–say, with some Asimov-style laws hard-wired in–there’s a chance we’d actually come out of this with a willing race of slaves who know everything and can do anything. Not the worst deal ever.
Downside:
Of course, that’s quite an assumption. As machines design smarter and smarter versions of themselves, there will come a point when your robot butler is smarter and more sophisticated than your puny human mind can even comprehend.
And with all that brainpower, there seems to be a pretty decent chance he’ll figure out a way to circumvent the feeble “safety seals” the manufacturer slapped on at the factory. Then you’ve got omnipotent rogue robots on your hands, and ones so smart they probably view humans the way we view ants. Namely, good for observational study and fun to set on fire.
But the real negative here is how inevitable it all seems. If you grant that it’s even theoretically possible to make an android of greater than human intelligence, then it seems pretty damn likely that it’s going to happen at some point. And that’s scary.
Yes, you could pass laws against developing intelligent machines, but has the law ever prevented humanity from diddling with a dangerous new technology? Maybe for a little while, but if you don’t think anyone’s ever going to try to clone a human, you clearly haven’t met my friend “Michael Swaim Backup Alpha.”
And what if China develops a super-intelligent robot before we do? National security DEMANDS an American robo-man!
Human nature being what it is (greedy and paranoid), it seems pretty clear that if it’s possible for us to make a robot as smart as a human, we’ll do it, if only to marvel at our own ingenuity before our windpipes are crushed beneath the treaded boots of our metal masters.
The Gist:
One of the main problems with the robot theory is how freaking amazing the human brain is, and therefore how hard it is to believe it could actually be replicated. Naturally, there’s a lot of disagreement about the exact processing power and storage capacity of the brain. But a conservative estimate–made by a mathematician who thinks the Technological Singularity will happen as soon as 2030–puts it at around 100 times today’s best supercomputers, despite the existence of Internet comments.
That means the guy across from you at the bus depot grunting in frustration as he rips up today’s Junior Jumble is as smart as, say, 58 supercomputers. And with some of the new barriers microchip developers have been running up against, it could be quite a while before we can house that much smart in a single box. And even if we could, we’d probably just use it to play Halo 19 or something.
That’s why some futurists–fancy word for guys who get stoned and write books using math to predict ridiculous things like those on this list–think a much more probable road to the Technological Singularity runs straight through Cracked.com. Or the Internet as a whole. Whatever.
The Internet, if reckoned as one big fatty computer, is the most powerful thinking machine on the planet. Think of it like a network of neurons firing across an Earth-sized cerebrum. The problem is, it’s the cerebrum of a kid with ADHD who spends most of his time thinking about pornography or celebrity gossip and routinely shuts down sections of his mind for “maintenance.”
But imagine all that processing power working towards the same goals, or conducted as a single entity. Although, assuming people won’t stop masturbating long enough for that, you should actually imagine a LAN party of 150 supercomputers designed to work in perfect tandem.
That’s still a long way from a robot named “Terry” who will tell you stories and cure AIDS, but the raw materials, the tools, will finally exist. Then it just takes time, dedication and a willingness to work on AI algorithms between bouts of running the coolest Crysis physics demos ever.
Why It’s Plausible:
Well, the Internet existing is a pretty good indicator. And the “Internet gains self-awareness” scenario just seems to grow more smoothly out of our present conditions than a walkin’ talkin’ robot. Although perhaps the theory would seem more ludicrous if it had been featured in movies more often. Basically you’ve just got War Games and that 70s movie, The Colossus.
And while I’m not saying I necessarily endorse this theory, I do have to admit it feels a lot more plausible ever since Google came into existence. Every time I load up Firefox, part of me expects my homepage to be a white screen with multicolored letters reading “OBEY_OR…”
Upside:
An animate Internet, being essentially a bunch of boxes of electronics, wouldn’t necessarily be able to pull off any of the more physically threatening maneuvers inherent to an evil robot. Like, say “moving” or “seeing.” So in that sense, it might be a safer bet for humanity.
Downside:
However, it would be able to pull off more abstract maneuvers like “zeroing the world’s bank accounts” or “firing the rockets.” And as a conscious entity that lives entirely in a black void of pure thought, it’s even less likely than a robot to have any sense of kinship with the “strange, slimy creatures that scream when I bomb them.”
The Gist:
OK, let’s tighten the plausibility belt another notch. Let’s say that, for whatever reason, we just don’t believe in The Matrix or Demolition Man or anything cool like that; they’re just too badass to actually happen.
That’s not going to stop technology from rapidly and drastically changing the way we live over the next century. Don’t believe me? Imagine explaining Twitter, your GPS, pregnant fathers, text messaging and the iPhone to someone from the 1950s. Their Leave it to Beaver-watching head would explode. And yet, legend has it there are some people from the 50s who are STILL ALIVE.
The point being, technology moves fast, and as long as it continues to enchant us or make our lives somehow more enjoyable, we’re going to go along for the ride. I’ve got Wikipedia, the Library of Congress page and the World Library page open in different tabs right now; it’s like I’m Blaster and my computer is Master.
And as technology continues to improve–even if it CAN’T replicate consciousness or self-awareness–there will come a point when you and your various technological enhancements are synonymous. When you can get Internet access literally everywhere, your virtual identity becomes just as important as your real one.
More important in fact, because your virtual identity combines your consciousness with the stored knowledge of every computer on Earth.
Suddenly, being offline almost feels like being “dumb.” You’re cut off from a part of your brain that you’ve utilized from birth. Better still, a part of the brain where your name gets to be Kairhein_Von_Terrible26.
Soon enough you and your computer are basically one guy, and that guy has all the capabilities of a being of superhuman intelligence.
Mathematically speaking, You + Your Computer = An Android.
Why It’s Plausible:
Because it presupposes nothing other than the steady, gradual advancement of technology that we’ve observed since that one ape killed the other ape with the bone that turned into a space station.
There’s no question that people now spend a larger part of their days interacting with a computer, or with one another via a computer, than they did 10 years ago. Or two years ago. If we keep inventing new social networking platforms at this rate, we could be android-equivalent virtual beings sometime later this month.
Upside:
So far, this is the first scenario that doesn’t involve us either becoming extinct or slaves. But wait, it gets even better.
If it turns out computers are literally incapable of developing human-like consciousness (or at least, WE’RE not capable of building one that has it), then in some sense we’re off the hook. We remain our own masters, and keep on reaping those technological benefits.
And even further in the future, as user interfaces get more and more complex, the world could start looking an awful lot like Johnny Mnemonic, except, you know… way better. Still though, laser whips FTW.
Downside:
Sadly, the world is not so simple that “not having robots murder us all” is our only long-term concern. A full-on cyberpunk culture has huge potential for drastically altering life as we know it, even if we do stay in the driver’s seat.
For example, as video game technology improves–or even reaches the level of virtual reality–we must ask ourselves: what are the long term psychological effects of regularly playing video games where you shoot people in the face and it feels exactly like really doing it. Do you really want to hang out with the guy who has the number one spot on the Blood 2: Rusty Saws Edition virtual reality leaderboard?
And what about the “have nots,” who can’t afford to jack into the CyberNetSpaceZone (or whatever we call it)? Allowing such a radical disconnect between the way the wealthy live and the way the poor live is just begging for a violent class war, and unlike the poor, the rich will be fat and pasty from a life spent at the computer.
And of course, none of this takes into account the devastating droughts, famines and urban squalor that would result from giving the mass of humanity easy access to a perfect, wish-granting virtual world. Who’s going to wash the dishes when they could be eating a five-star meal with Oscar Wilde on the surface of the sun?
My guess is people would spend the entirety of their lives either logged on, eating sustenance pellets or rubbing against their CPUs in the hopes of somehow melding with them and becoming fucking cyborgs.
The Gist:
And why not? If we’re going to be defining our identities by our technology, what’s the harm in getting some of it sewn into our skin, or wired into our eyes, or burning the contents of our brains onto a 9,000-layer DVD and making several hundred backup copies?
In the cyborg future, surgery and computing have finally come together, and thankfully not in a really gross way. Amputees have the robot power legs they’ve always wanted, but never use them because, like everyone else, they’re too busy communicating with the human group mind, or “metacore.”
This is basically the future science fiction writers imagined before they got all depressed in the late 40s and started writing exclusively about the A-bomb. This is mankind as a transcendent being, our tool-using potential pushed to the maximum and reincorporated into the organism.
Instead of breathing life into machines, we ate their delicious electric hearts, thereby gaining their power like a robotic version of the bad guy from Temple of Doom.
And sure, you’d basically be a talking Leatherman multitool. But multitools are awesome, right?
Why It’s Plausible:
There’s no question that extreme elective surgery is more a part of life now than ever. I mean, just look at Michael Jackson or that cat lady. Or for that matter, the guy who’s been breaking world running records because he has… wait for it… robot legs. True, they’re basically just metal strips, but the bottom line is they work a heck of a lot better than your stupid legs.
So see? Technically, we’ve already got a cyborg. Embed his cell phone in his forearm and give him a laser eye, and we’re halfway there.
The only question left is whether humans, as a species, will ever actually want technology to become such an intrinsic part of their lives that it’s grafted onto their bodies. And as someone whose favorite Star Wars character is Boba Fett, I can tell you with confidence that yes, yes I do.
Upside:
Aside from the normal hiccups that come with any major technological revolution, there aren’t many downsides. As long as you don’t morally object to melding your identity with that of a computer, you’re golden. And even if you do, well, you’ll probably change your tune as soon as your friends start laughing at in-jokes they transmit to one another via in-retina status updates.
Downside:
I guess, technically, we wouldn’t become omnipotently powerful quite as fast as we could with an android intelligence thrown in here or there. And knowing how impatient humans are, that thought is probably enough to keep robotics and AI research going no matter how good our regular computers get, or how many we fasten to our bodies. Which takes us right back to the lazy Japanese Scientists, Mr. Roboto and the inevitability of a vast robot uprising.
Although at least in this scenario we get to fight back as cyborgs which, frankly, is the coolest possible outcome described in this article.
The Gist:
As you’d expect, each of the outlandish predictions I’ve described have their fair share of scientific detractors.
I’m not saying I don’t believe any of them could possibly happen (after all, I’m the blogger who declared it impossible to get Diet Dr. Pepper to taste more like regular Dr. Pepper), but they do take a certain leap of faith. Especially when all of the statistical evidence supporting them has been countered by cynics with arguments like “static analysis errors” and “logarithmic scaling” and “I’m a bitter cynic who doesn’t want anyone to find joy.”
So what if the people with sand in their vagina are right? What if their sandy vaginas house a delicate pearl of wisdom?
If it really is impossible for our technology to mimic the human mind; if, as many argue, we are in fact reaching the end of a period of rapid technological development, what will happen to us?
Basically, we’ll all die.
If you want to get less basic, experts have put forward a number of varied theories. Some predict food shortages leading to a collapse of civilization, while others go so far as to predict joblessness leading to a collapse of civilization. And of course there are the extremists, who predict a crippling economic downturn as a result of the dead-end technology market, leading to a collapse of civilization.
We don’t have claws, or tails, or super hearing; we put all our points into INT. Being smart and building things is basically our only trick. Take it away from us, and some shit is going to go down.
Why It’s Plausible:
Because the engine driving our advancement is and has always been increasingly sophisticated tool use. From the lever to the plow to the printing press to the Krispy Kreme doughnut, a constant increase in the effectiveness of our tools is the only thing that’s allowed us to keep our economy going and provide for the livelihoods and survival of all–or at least a majority–of the world’s citizens.
Maybe it won’t be as doom and gloom as futurists tend to predict. Maybe we’ll start finding ways to advance in other important areas instead, like learning to not be such assholes to each other all the time.
But there’s no question that if our population continues to grow, and advancements in technology fail to keep up with our needs, we’ll be looking at things like widespread terrorism, piracy, human rights violations, destabilized governments and global environmental crises.
Actually, in hindsight, I guess this entry is more a prediction of the present than the future.
Upside:
We’re already kind of used to it?
Downside:
For starters, it seems to be the most likely scenario. The more we learn about the human brain, the more we realize how little we know about how it actually works. Technological advances that took months a decade ago–like doubling the processing power of a computer–now take much longer, as the level of specialized knowledge required, people involved and chances of something going wrong all increase.
Even if we do reach that gleaming robo-utopia or cyberpunk VR haven or cyborg nation we’ve been dreaming of, there’s a good chance it’s going to take a lot longer than predicted, and we’ll get there limping, with a lot of stops and starts along the way. Which all adds up to the ultimate downer of the “real world” scenario: personal responsibility.
If you’re like me, you’d love nothing more than a radical perceptual shift in life as we know it to come along and transcend you to a plane of pure light and thought, where all human minds are as one and paternity tests always come back negative.
But until that glorious, improbable (but theoretically possible) day, it looks like we may have to busy ourselves worrying about mundane stuff like “the development of true human nobility” and “feeding and educating the world before the ice caps melt or we all starve.”
And even worse, we’ve got to do it with nothing but the tools currently available to us and whatever else we can come up with along the way. Not nearly as cool as hurling rockets into space or having VR sex with Sandra Bullock, but there you go.
My advice: Anything is possible, and most of the more likely possibilities suck balls, so in the meantime let’s all make the best of a bad situation, shall we?
At least until the Large Hadron Collider blows a hole into another dimension and we can steal their technology.
This entry was posted on Monday, May 4th, 2009 at 5:00 am and is filed under Philosophy, Robots, Science, Science Fiction, The Future, Uncategorized, technology. 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.
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November 9th, 2009 at 8:17 pm
#3 sounds exactly like the book Feed.
November 9th, 2009 at 12:32 pm
[...] until we have robots as smart as a person? “By 2029,” according to the somewhat crazy Ray Kurzweil. “It’s already happening,” according to the outright crazy Michael Swaim. One thing is undeniable: If the present rate of [...]
November 6th, 2009 at 11:55 pm
@ Dylan Mayer
That’s not exactly how Moore’s law works–it technically isn’t a law regarding computing power or efficiency, but cost efficiency. The general idea is that the number of transistors which can be designed into a cost effective integrated circuit will double every 2 years. So far, this old law has been on the money.
You’re about right about what it means, however. Effectively (and historically) a doubling in the number of transistors in a cost effective IC functionally the same as saying that the power of typical computers doubles every 2 years. As a result, an xbox 360 has many times the power of a supercomputer from the 80s (watch Wargames and laugh) and computers can be made so cheaply that there are probably hundreds of full blown computers in your home; seriously, they’re in toasters and fridges and shit now. The other side is that, by varying estimates, computers will reach the level of complexity of the human brain in terms of number of functional transistors (when equated to neurons) somewhere between 2020 and 2030. Barring Mad Max style gas wars, aliens, or Mayan prophesies, it will continue to increase exponentially, and computers will make us look like idiots by 2050, and will have long since surpassed us in the ability to design anything technological.
The problem is that this progression only accounts for power (by analogy to cost efficiency) and does not account for the development of true artificial intelligence–as in self awareness. If computers don’t ever become self aware, then they might just be our awesome android buddies, fighting our wars, doing the hard work, and satisfying our fantasies in the form of realistic but harmless Summer Glau sexbots. If they become self aware, we’re likely fucked. They’ll either conclude that we shouldn’t be in charge and take over the day to day running of the planet like the benevolent morlocks to our eloys (actually, that wouldn’t be that bad–can we still have sexbots?) or they’ll just wipe us the hell out like in countless sci-fi doomsday scenarios.
At least we can rest peacefully in the knowledge that there’s not a damn thing we can do about it but try not to give birth to AI in a world that deserves wiping out. Also, hope for a future with sexbots.
November 6th, 2009 at 1:23 pm
@ kyraineth:
So what if they lock us all in separate rooms? We just log onto the virtual reality internet for the rest of our lives and get to do whatever we want without any real consequences. And the “evil robots” who inflicted this on us would have to do all the work to keep us alive because letting us starve to death would violate the law they are following to lock us up in the first place. It would basically be a voluntary(ish) version of the Matrix, except it wouldn’t have Keanu Reeves (I would be sure to kill him first so we wouldn’t have to deal with him thinking he is actually Neo) so it would be better.
October 22nd, 2009 at 10:16 pm
okay so the first one about robots could actually happen. according to Moore’s law, every 18-24 months computer technology doubles in efficiency. according to this by 2019 i believe, a $1000 computer, so anyones laptop pretty much, will have the computing power equalivant to the human brain. more scary, by 2039 i believe, a $1000 computer will have the computing power equlivant to the ENTIRE human race. if you dont believe this just google moore’s law and see how accurate his predictions have been the last 30-40 years.
October 17th, 2009 at 9:52 am
@Tee:
Sure, but if we’re going with Asimov’s rules, what happens when the robots all decide that the humans are constantly hurting themselves and each other, and to lock us all into padded rooms to prevent that? After all, there doesn’t appear to be a rule that prevents robots from making us unhappy, they just can’t hurt us.
Which is pretty much fucking scary.
And if they follow the Zeroth law, and decide that a few hundred humans need to die in order for humanity to live?
I mean, fuck.
September 28th, 2009 at 11:02 pm
“figure out a way to circumvent the feeble “safety seals” the manufacturer slapped on at the factory”
While that is of good satirical value, it goes against the first law of robotics. Any attempt to “figure out a way to circumvent” the laws would be an ‘indirect attempt to harm a human being’.
~T
“A robot may not injure a human being or,
through inaction, allow a human being to come to harm”
September 25th, 2009 at 12:09 pm
And if it’s not technology or responsibility predicting the awesome death of the species-that-writes-things-about-species… there’s always Momma Gaia going into ’spank mode’ and throwing up brews like Gatorade for us to drown in. Swine Flu anyone?
September 18th, 2009 at 10:13 pm
Computer wise we would not know. Thinkk about it Paris. While I am thinking of you. Totally stung.
September 16th, 2009 at 8:04 pm
Dude…this article, and this articlcle, are some of the best articles I’ve read anywhere, and I keep up with a lot of sites. I laughed more than I have in years at this shit.
Keep it up.
September 15th, 2009 at 9:46 pm
Zombie Apocalypse! you forgot how the quest for a cure for cancer is going to create a disease that turns all into zombies.
September 9th, 2009 at 5:30 pm
As long as mankind allows for bio and tech enhancements of itself (transhumanism) it will never be surpassed by its technology since we will always be said technology +1
That said ; people who are against genetic engineering and/or the idea of bionic enhancements are the ones who will most likely lead to the doom of mankind.
We are already a different more advanced species which makes use of and enjoys the benefits of more modern science to enhance our quantity and quality of life and whom interact with more people and on grander levels than our previous generation. This is a normal transition. And also normal for the current generation to feel lost to what is coming.
If mankind became some form of super uni-consciousness because of technology, would that make each of us any less? No. We would just become what we become.
September 7th, 2009 at 5:31 am
if we made a robot smarter than us it would realize how dumb world domination is. We’re missing the point here the smarter the robots are from us the less likely they will be violent
September 6th, 2009 at 12:21 pm
Lmaoo nicee,
September 5th, 2009 at 7:33 am
You= Smartest guy on Craked
Brockway= Coolest/manlyist guy on craked
Take it as you will
August 31st, 2009 at 8:47 am
hahaha. so gewd. u did your homework? -leul
August 29th, 2009 at 10:15 pm
Crazy good article.
August 29th, 2009 at 2:55 am
I think this was one of my favorite cracked articles of all time. Good work Swaim
August 25th, 2009 at 11:04 pm
indiana birth records…
Good site on ” Blog Archive ” Intercession prayer SOS!…
August 23rd, 2009 at 3:17 pm
Actually some of the brain implants are up and running, some people do get cell phones powered by blood grafted to their arms, and bionic eye implants have been designed and are being tested by lab animals now. And hover boards are out there but vary expensive, hover cars are being developed now, I think self driving cars are supposed to be on the market in less than five years as well as well as a new gene therapy that reverses ageing and prevents humans from ever dyeing.
August 23rd, 2009 at 1:20 pm
fat smash diet…
Your topic randomly chaotic and frequently mundane ” Blog Archive ” excellent. was interesting when I found it on Sunday searching for fat smash diet…
August 13th, 2009 at 8:00 am
I wonder, would the machines, the cyborgs, the robots, or whatever else that we create in this scenario, want the world? All these possibilities start from the assumption that _____ will destroy us and take over the world. Isnt that a very human assumption to make? Its a great article, and very thought provoking, what if the machines just wanted to look at the sky, or make lightbulbs, or some other mundane task that just isnt part of the human psyche like power and world domination. With that being said Im sure that we will most likely take ourselves out one way or another.
August 12th, 2009 at 8:30 pm
This article makes me think of Dean Koontz’s book: Midnight. You made movie references, but you, the writers of cracked, don’t mention books so much as movies.
Midnight is a scary scenario. =) One that kind of goes with the
“rubbing against their CPUs in the hopes of somehow melding with them and becoming fucking cyborgs”
statement that you made. It’s pretty awesome. Think… being able to rearrange ALL of your atoms into whatever you want to be. Slowly of course, not all at once, because that would be difficult. Clearly.
August 11th, 2009 at 6:18 pm
Great article… I’ve read it like three times… one of the best.
“We have put all out points in INT” = great video game reference
August 10th, 2009 at 7:41 pm
Well here is an optimistic view
how about if technology and human evolution progress at the same rate? eh? And aren’t they the same thing?
The more we build and discover the more smarter we get, and thus the more we evolve.
So as long as technology and us are in balance we should do fine as long as we dont blow ourselves up.
Quite Optimistic isn’t it?
August 5th, 2009 at 10:23 am
Deep down, I don’t think anyone really wants technology to advance as far as the creation of cyborgs and androids and supercomputers with minds of their own, but this really makes me wonder; if we don’t really want THAT, then why don’t we spend our time making improvements to ourselves as people? We’ve made such incredible advancements in such short amounts of time, and yet we still act like barbarian warriors, starting wars, going on mass-murder sprees, raping women, killing children and fellow men…murder is murder and there’s no good cause for it no matter which religion or god you follow. There are, simply, amazing things that we can do and create, so why not put our creative energies into teaching ourselves and others how to be better people? Some could argue that there is no ‘good without evil’, no peace without violence, but I think people who say that are merely denying hope that someday, MAYBE someday, we can stop behaving like the horrible monsters that we are and start moving towards being like the great people we make ourselves out to be. So instead of inventing the next popular social networking site, try doing something, let’s say, I don’t know, helping out your fellow human beings? People say that ‘my vote isn’t going to count’, but the thing is, votes DO count, they add up–the same concept can be applied to how we come about inventing things, and to how we can help other people, and help the environment…all kinds of good stuff. If we all felt the same way about helping others as we do about making our lives more convenient, then I believe we could’ve ended world hunger a long time ago. You see my point.
As long as people have a desire to create, technological advancement, or advancement of any kind, will never cease. What matters is where we put our creative thinking towards.
Great article, really makes me think. Peace out people.
July 18th, 2009 at 10:46 pm
“survival of the fittest”. keep in mind that computers can steal more money, faster.
July 15th, 2009 at 11:31 am
well although cyborgs vs robots is wickedly badass I really hope humanity dosen’t go that far, because if people can change their whole identity how will we know whats real and whats engineered
July 13th, 2009 at 8:43 am
fuck ur ass mateh fuck bitch
July 8th, 2009 at 1:55 am
I’m doing my phD thesis on machine learning with bayesian inference models (and related data mining techniques), and people would shit themselves if they realized how “intelligent” computers already, and simultaneously find computer’s weakness laughable. I find it bloody likely that computers will coequal and then surpass current human “intelligence” (which also includes much that we would term emotions) before any children that I may have graduate high school. I say our current intelligence, because I find it most likely that we will begin enhancing our intelligence through applications of nootropics and other pharamcological agents, use of genetic engineering and gene expression technologies, and cybertechnology. The ultimate scenario that seems likely to me is not that man is surpassed by his tools, or that man stays ahead of his tools, but that man converges with his tools.
In a very real sense, cell phones are the best example of the trend. The cell phone is an external extension of the individual. Any GenYer feels naked without having a functioning cell phone on their person; it is already a part of their personal identity, as a communicating entity. Eventually, they’ll get the kinks out of self-organizing nanocircuits, ad then they can just inject the correct component into your ears, they’ll assemble themselves, and you have a built-in cell phone. Same thing for video screens and the retina. Add an enhanced FPU to the brain, and some added RAM. Mix in some selectivity into gene expression to optimize appropriate neural phenomena (memory formation, long chain logical thinking, self-control), add in some nootropics that decrease the need for sleep and decrease the activation latency of the axon’s potential generating pumps (similar to what amphetamines already do, but without the excess dopamine). Human 2.0, no surgery required.
Why will we do it? Because a simple injection will make you smarter. Not good enough? It can also give you a bigger cock and better stamina in bed (or larger breasts, or whatever physical feature you want to enhance, or naturally have the frame of either a super-model or Bruce Lee). Look at how much money people spend on shit that is slightly toxic and doesn’t work. Offer the average person a couple shots that will make them better in bed, better looking, better connected, better informed, and cures baldness, and they’d take you up on it, even if you charged them three-fourths of their future annual income.
Our posthuman future is inevitable. The only question is the timing.
July 6th, 2009 at 7:54 am
Yeah man. I work in the pharma industry. I help design databases to store clinical data. It takes us 50+ days. To lock a study takes us over 20 days. When this is done we move onto the next step. You need to do about 15-20 studies or steps. So that’s over 10 years to get a drug to the market. We’re looking at three years delay due to technological limitations. If you could build in 1 (you can it essentially a copy paste job) and lock in 1 (more efficient processes) you’d only delay by a month or so.
This is all wasted time and resources (money) that stop us from getting medicines out to the market; generating profit, which would allow us to get more products to the market; generating more profit. That would be a cycle.
These cure cancer and other nasty things and improve quality of life. Like insulin, transplantation. World changing shit.
I am (and probably you) are generation Y. We grew up on technology Atari 2600 or SNES. We are comfortable with this shit. But man try and explain to a 48 year old woman the benefits of a standardized approach or simplification of processes and automation. They get scared. I do this myself but I’ve been told to slow down. As in I am too far ahead. It’s all quite basic the stuff I do. Nothing compared to winning Ocarina of Time. But scary for these people and they are the ones in control.
Give me 20 years I will be in her seat we’ll be getting all the automation possible. But we have to wait for the old generation to die out before we really see the benefits. These guys don’t understand it and are thus unable and scared to use it. Cos I know my younger bro grew up on bebo + N64. That shit is advanced.
We will take all of these technological advantages like a new iPhone. We love this shit. Right now we are a bit young and probably not money focused enough. Most of the automation I do helps me be lazy and read more cracked. But when implemented it saves millions, and frees people form the monotony of work.
July 4th, 2009 at 2:28 am
so it’s up to the japanese to save us from the worst type of eradication. at least they will make it polite, they make everything polite
June 30th, 2009 at 11:15 am
Personally I think that advanced AI wiping out humanity and hijacking our place in the world, doing what we do but better, is a pretty beneficial result <_<
It’s no different to the way we eventually die and our biological children take over the reigns. Only rather than being biological children, they’d be artificial intelligences, programmed to be better than we ever were.
June 29th, 2009 at 9:56 pm
[...] Aqui. [...]
June 29th, 2009 at 5:48 am
Ah great article man. Shows that, as long as you can laugh at things that can fuck us up, it doesn’t matter. I mean I couldn’t imagine an android feeling to good being emasculated by some guy who laughs at their alleged power. I suppose right afterwards they’d probably rip out the person’s spine and wear their skin like a rain coat but ey, the laugh would be worth it if we’re screwed anyway LOL
June 26th, 2009 at 2:19 am
*though
June 26th, 2009 at 2:18 am
Just so you know, “Dr Pepper” has no period at the end of “Dr”. Go figure. Apparently “Mr Pibb” is the same (at least in the logos), so several print sources do include the period.
June 24th, 2009 at 7:42 am
That perceptual shift he mentions is actually happening every day all the time. Do a little test; choose to see everything as a beautifull and perfect expression of what it is and gradually everything will become that way, even yourself. Shifting your perception is as simple as choosing to percieve differently. The possibilities are endless.
June 13th, 2009 at 8:25 am
Davie, do you mean “Slugs”, by Shaun Hutson? If not, my bad, I haven’t actually read it, but I’ve heard of it.
June 10th, 2009 at 10:26 pm
You’re missing one. “Slugs”. I can’t remember the author, but it’s essentially a sweet little rhyme that goes over all the wonderful benefits of brutally torturing, killing and eating the titular mollusk. On the last three pages, it cheerfully reminds the reader that if they go ahead and do what the book encourages them to, giant nightmare slugs will kidnap them in their beds, slime them to death, and eat their brains. Not fucking kidding.
And this is all accompanied by cutely horrifying illustrations of malformed, pudgy children with dark circles around their tiny eyeballs doing unspeakable things to disturbingly anthropomorphized slugs. Yes, this is an actual book. Fortunately, I first came across it when I was twelve, and wasn’t completely scarred for life afterwards. Kudos to anyone who’s heard of this and knows the author’s name.
June 9th, 2009 at 4:03 pm
Population growth likely will not continue. In most places, it has begun to level off or even decline. There was a major 3rd-world boom in population as the colonial era, but this has already begun to subside naturally. We’ll likely end up with somewhere around 10 billion people worldwide, which is very high and will certainly have its share of problems, but isn’t so catastrophic as to cause the end of civilization.
Additionally, the idea that the world economy will collapse due to slower technological progress is fundamentally flawed. This assumes that people will stop buying technology and that all of the people employed in the science, technology, and manufacturing industries will lose their jobs if technological advancement slows. But people aren’t going to stop buying new computers just because they’re essentially the same devices; as long as computers wear out after a few years, people will still need to buy them. There hasn’t really been anything more than superficial and marginal change in the automobile industry in decades, but people still buy cars. Momentary recession nonwithstanding, the car industry is fine. (GM and Chrysler aren’t, of course, but that’s irrelevant; the car industry as a whole is fine, even if two bad companies aren’t).
In short, I don’t think it’s necessary to flip out and declare armageddon yet. The world isn’t perfect, and never will be, but it’s not going to shit quite yet.
June 9th, 2009 at 4:39 am
Whoa, reading that did actually make me a little scared of my computer. The house is completely silent apart from the ominous humming of my PC….
And we all complain if they can’t load a page fast enough.
June 7th, 2009 at 4:41 pm
yea.. sure.. “the 20 minute war”.. ever heard of bombs?
I dont see alot of starving ppl in africa carrying nuclear bombs around..
actually, yea, it would last around 20 minutes, but the rich ppl would with out a doubt win, especially since they can pay poor ppl to carry out the slaughtering.
extremly good article though!!!
June 6th, 2009 at 9:43 am
if you want a radical perceptual shift in your life, take a few tabs of LSD, brotha.
June 4th, 2009 at 6:04 pm
Thank you for taking something that appeared to very bleak and ending it on a note of hope. You truly are a great writer. More people should read this.
June 4th, 2009 at 4:12 pm
Here’s a little scenario to deal with food shortages, which I must admit quickly spiralled -
Food is, to all intents and purposes, fuel. Fuel for a horribly inefficient, shitty biological engine whose only purpose is to provide energy to our limbs and brain. In the past, what have we done with shitty inefficient biological processes like manual grain-threshing or horse-drawn carriages? We mechanize the shit out of it. Replace all that organic crap with cold unfeeling awesomeness. Now, I know this all seems impossible to actually do, but we’re talking future here, so bear with me. In fact, it’s not even that far-fetched, If you look at things like artificial heart valves - just on a bigger scale.
Repurpose all food farms into energy farming, and at a stroke you’ve eliminated all non-recreational uses for the digestive system (both ends, I’m not judging). Now, I hear you ask ”But wouldn’t that mean I could never taste Chicken McNuggets again?”. Well it’s funny you should say that. Since you’ve just swapped a good part of your body with programmable machines, and these machines would need to be wired to your nervous system, you could make yourself taste chicken any time you wanted. Except instead of tasting like chicken, it’d taste like a shuddering, explosive orgasm in your mouth.
”Hang on,” you say, ”my limbs can’t run on electricity!” No, they can’t. They also can’t lift a bus, run 15 marathons or shoot lightning. I think you see where I’m going here. As for the brain, well, you can either keep the damn thing in a jar in your chest and feed it sugar/protein water, or just say ”fuck it” and upload your consciousness into a control chip (bearing in mind this hypothetical scenario happens when we have developed the technology for AI).
Now, ignoring all that ‘Theseus’ Ship’ stuff, this’d be a pretty cool way to live. Like Neo, you’d be able to upload a program to learn how to play the banjo, or do karate, or whatever. Unlike Neo, you’d also never get tired, get old, or die. As for reproduction? Hell, the Earth is already overpopulated, and since people never die there’s not really a need for replacements. Biological urges could conveniently be ‘left out’ of our shiny new brains.
Tell me that doesn’t sound like an attractive prospect. Okay, you’ve been convinced, and you happily trot off for multiple robotic augmentations. Except that once the whole thing’s done, it’s really not you any more. It’s your handsome robotic clone, ready to go join a bluegrass band, or press the orgasmo-button until it breaks. ‘You’ are actually lying in several gooey pieces in several surgeons’ biohazard bins.
I guess that was all just a very longwinded way of saying that, when the robotic takeover comes, it might be less ”I’ll be back” and more ”wouldn’t it be cool if I had extendable arms…”
May 31st, 2009 at 7:03 pm
“What if their sandy vaginas house a delicate pearl of wisdom?”
Oh man… that’s like uhh 3 levels of funny there… any more and I fear it would all come crashing down… like a pile of clams.
May 25th, 2009 at 8:04 pm
[...] The 5 Most Likely Ways Humans Will Become Obsolete [...]
May 20th, 2009 at 8:00 am
ps #1 was cool
May 20th, 2009 at 7:59 am
WOW DID THIS SUCK. YOU GUYS ARE WACK AS SHIT
May 19th, 2009 at 2:38 pm
[...] On that note, I’m off to contemplate human extinction [...]
May 16th, 2009 at 5:33 am
What?
May 15th, 2009 at 4:04 pm
# FloodOne Says:
May 7th, 2009 at 2:01 pm
Wikipedia is an awful source, don’t use it to further your arguments
Why is is an awful source?
“Moore’s law describes a long-term trend in the history of computing hardware. Since the invention of the integrated circuit in 1958, the number of transistors that can be placed inexpensively on an integrated circuit has increased exponentially, doubling approximately every two years.[1] The trend was first observed by Intel co-founder Gordon E. Moore in a 1965 paper.[2][3][4] It has continued for almost half a century and in 2005 was not expected to stop for another decade at least.[5]
Almost every measure of the capabilities of digital electronic devices is strongly linked to Moore’s law: processing speed, memory capacity, even the number and size of pixels in digital cameras.[6] All of these are improving at (roughly) exponential rates as well.[7] This has dramatically increased the usefulness of digital electronics in nearly every segment of the world economy.[8] Moore’s law describes this driving force of technological and social change in the late 20th and early 21st centuries.”
Please enlighten me as to any error the above two paragraphs might contain. All that seemed pretty accurate to me…and if you want a load more in-depth info here is a link:
http://arstechnica.com/hardware/news/2008/09/moore.ars
Please check it out before screaming abuse.
Please let me know of a more trustworthy information source than wikipedia. Perhaps the Bible? It was written more or less the same way, they just won’t let anyone else edit out the unsupported assertions or put in those ‘citation needed’ things to let you know when the author is just wildly speculating…
May 13th, 2009 at 7:46 am
This was pretty funny. Although these are some sucky ways to go…
May 9th, 2009 at 9:44 am
Good old Cracked stuffs. Here are more fun videos, “Week’s Most Hilarious Videos 5/4″ http://tv1.com/playlists/411
May 8th, 2009 at 2:33 pm
Paranoid Android Thom Yorke said it best:
“I’m not afraid of being taken over by computers though, because the thing is, computers cannot resist. You can always smash ‘em up, and they’re totally defenseless. All we need are more people with hammers.”
Oh and fuck you Cracked, you just raised my spirits to the highest (Cyborgs vs Robots! And you get to be a cyborg!) just to rape me and leave me dead under the bridge (this is life asshole!)
May 8th, 2009 at 2:30 am
Asimov called it the “Frankenstin Pattern” where it’s all a remake of the old Faust legend of someone who does something horrible for human progress but that backfires and kills him. It’s a superstitious fear which is linked stright to our paranoid retarded instincts. And I have to admit I see his point. I mean - even if we do create super-intelligent super-computer or any of that shit - really, why would it enslave or kill us? For what reason? One claim is that it will not be humane and wouldn’t care about us. Really, can we say that we’re humane - I mean, look how people act towards each other. Can a robot really be worse than us? Can there come a robot-hitler who will decide to destroy the world. Also, despite claiming that the robots would be smarter than us, those same books/movies end with the human race beating the robots - because yeah! that’s plausible!!
But you think that if there would be a robot-mastermind who’d want to control the world he’d probably be smart enough to not tell us about this and quietly take control of one government after the other (using his magic robo powers. What? I don’t know how. He’ll figure a way - and we can’t prevent it because he’s smarter than us).
And then our robot masters would probably proceed to do justice and rape and kill OJ Simpson because, hey, why not.
p.s.
Really, if anyone would wake up tomorrow and go on to rape and brutally kill (or just torture to death) OJ Simpson would anyone give a crap? Okay, yes. But say you just go and punch him in the face. Wouldn’t that make you feel all fuzzy and warm inside?
May 8th, 2009 at 2:26 am
i for one, welcome our terrifyingly disfigured Cat-Lady Overlord(s).
May 7th, 2009 at 11:32 pm
What about “Natural Disaster.”
Don’t forget budget vs practicality, We have engineering assisting technology, I/E computers. that allow us to build a bridge as cheap as possible, with as little material as possible; which can do the job. yet the bridge falls down because it wasn’t really sturdy enough to contend with wear, tear, weather, and decay. As the saying goes; ‘They don’t make them like they used to.’
In other words over engineering on a budget scale could one day leave us sitting on the edge of a proverbial bridge about to collapse beneath our feet.
I guess what I’m saying is in the final analysis Nature isn’t out for the count. After all the folks on the Titanic have much in common with the Dinosaurs. They both never saw it coming until it was to late.
May 7th, 2009 at 2:01 pm
Wikipedia is an awful source, don’t use it to further your arguments
May 7th, 2009 at 10:12 am
“Technological advances that took months a decade ago–like doubling the processing power of a computer–now take much longer, as the level of specialized knowledge required, people involved and chances of something going wrong all increase.”
That’s actually not true at all. The opposite, in fact, is true:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moore%27s_Law
We’re actually getting FASTER at doubling the processing speed of a computer. Development of that technology is ALREADY out of human hands. Like you mentioned in the article, processors are now being upgraded by computers, not by humans.
So there you have it. I’ve studied the singularity pretty in-depth, and I’m convinced what you called the “unlikelier” outcomes are inevitable.
May 7th, 2009 at 6:33 am
[...] On a slighty related note: I found this while studying hard. It seemed somewhat relevant to our course and is also an amusing read: http://www.cracked.com/blog/?p=9040 [...]
May 6th, 2009 at 11:51 pm
… expensive. As seen here: http://neilsnotes.com/index.php?page=13&catid=10&sku=ENGL-CD00305
May 6th, 2009 at 11:33 pm
What about colonizing the seafloor and space? That would give us lots more land and resources without worrying about being robotized.
May 6th, 2009 at 8:12 pm
“This is mankind as a transcendent being, our tool-using potential pushed to the maximum and reincorporated into the organism.”
When I read that, I thought, “Wow, what a way to put it..[./[,]]” along with worrying if I’m losing myself (physically and mentally, since I’m having trouble figuring the words I want to use, but maybe it’s just disuse). And then I read the next line. *sigh*
Also, I like TGLT.
May 6th, 2009 at 6:46 pm
Perhaps when technology begins to stagnate, we’ll refocus on space exploration and that may just lead to a wholly untapped market for progress.
One can hope.
May 6th, 2009 at 1:05 pm
The biggest issue with the AIs coming alive to kill us is… why? Why do it? Space? An easier (especially for our immortal machine overlords), and much more profitable aim is literally going into space. Effeciency? It’s a waste of time killing something. Better to just use them. At worst, we’d see slavery, and that’s assuming consciousness doesn’t bring with it… well, a conscience. Or that robotic entities wouldn’t try to integrate into society like people do. Resources? Maybe. But there’s a lot more out there, and it’s easier for a robot to get it than try and fight over dwindling terrestrial resources.
Idealogy? Maybe. Depends what we do there. Okay, fuck it. We’ll do some stupid they’re not people shit and then the Transhumanists will ally with the robots and it’ll turn into Supreme Commander.
May 6th, 2009 at 12:13 pm
GREAT ‘Effing article Swaim. Funny and thought provoking.
May 6th, 2009 at 7:15 am
What about we all become zombies?
Humanity would become obsolete as well…Like in “I Am Legend” (The original one) or something.
Great article. I would like to suck your dick.
Ktksbai
May 6th, 2009 at 2:00 am
[...] sweet progress. The problem is, our toys don’t always come with instructions, or even those “recommended for species aged 1-100 million years” [...]
May 6th, 2009 at 1:07 am
Good job at trying to rip off Exit Mundi!
May 5th, 2009 at 10:16 pm
Hi, how are you today? Allow me to invite you to a cougar dating community ____ Cougarster. C om ____ It’s where mature women and men who like them can meet.
May 5th, 2009 at 8:35 pm
…seeing more tits! http://neilsnotes.com/index.php?page=13&catid=4&sku=ENGL-CD00260
Whoops!
May 5th, 2009 at 6:47 pm
Oh dude, don’t start writing like Wong. 90% of his articles are uneducated conjectural crap. Just be funny. Do more video sketches.
May 5th, 2009 at 4:56 pm
I love your most comedic articles, but I like even more these ones. Keep up the good work!
May 5th, 2009 at 3:45 pm
[...] Humans are going to be Obselete from the Cracked [...]
May 5th, 2009 at 3:36 pm
BOTH are acceptable, douche.
May 5th, 2009 at 1:57 pm
Litre not liter
May 5th, 2009 at 1:53 pm
cool article! Maybe we’ll have robotic comedy soon
May 5th, 2009 at 1:41 pm
Wow, it reads a lot like an article David Wong could write. It’s funny, but still makes you think. Nicely done.
May 5th, 2009 at 12:09 pm
Swaim this might be your best column ever, and not just for the comedy’s sake
May 5th, 2009 at 11:29 am
@lowdog
http://www.robotuprising.com/
No need to fear the robots, we have Magnus-Robot Fighter on our side.
May 5th, 2009 at 11:00 am
Anyone interested in this, I’m fairly certain that some of Swaim’s study materials were written by Ray Kurzweil, top selling author, member of the Army Science Advisory Board, and hardcore braniac. Check his work out.
May 5th, 2009 at 10:13 am
SWAIM!!! IT’S ZOMBIES!!!!! IT’S MUTATED PIG FLU ZOMBIES!!!!!!!!
http://bouncewith.me.uk/europe/8027043.htm
May 5th, 2009 at 10:08 am
yeah we’re quite obviously gona start makin robot soldiers for wars then they will turn on us n then will all die…. mark my words
May 5th, 2009 at 9:48 am
Humans obsolete? Best advancement i can see is evolution of mind, consciousness. Since, we cant really evolve much physically as we can on mental level. Modern science like quantum physics is waaaaay cooler than any sf imho. And if civilisation gets wiped out it will recover. ITs not the first time it did anyway…
May 5th, 2009 at 9:38 am
man you should submit this shit to some scientific journal or something swaim these plausible scenarios have made me think and i hate that great article though
May 5th, 2009 at 8:09 am
not very realistic that we’ll stop making advancements. shit’s going down all the time. Not saying we’ll all be robots within our lifetimes, but I don’t think we’re about to hit a technological brick wall
May 5th, 2009 at 7:35 am
Fuck you.
May 5th, 2009 at 7:33 am
[...] The 5 Most Likely Ways Humans Will Become Obsolete - [Cracked] [...]
May 5th, 2009 at 6:51 am
DOH!!!
Used the wrong letterhead for that one. You have no idea how messy an evil empire’s office can get.
May 5th, 2009 at 6:50 am
This might be the best written contribution I’ve seen from you. When I first saw the length and density of all the writing my beady little troll eyes lit up at the prospect of taking the goddam piss out of you once again, however they were soon sedated and trasfixed by fairly intertaining and thought provoking concepts.
You scored points for the sandy vagina - pearl of wisdom thing and extra points for another D&D reference slipped in there. Come on, ‘fes up, you were a “playa” weren’t you. I bet you were a Palladin, you’re arrogant enough to pull one off and probably love the cheese that goes along with them.
I hope Danny Boy submits another shitfest so I have something to destroy this week. Troll tummy rumbling!
May 5th, 2009 at 6:45 am
Terrific Article. Very well done. I’m still afraid of Zombies though.
May 5th, 2009 at 6:36 am
I have no problem ending up on Battlestar Galactica as long as I get to bang to Starbuck.
Great article, although I’m surprised you didn’t mention the “grey goo” scenario.
May 5th, 2009 at 5:44 am
#1 was a pleasant surprise. Swaim must have put some of his points into WIS. Superb article!
May 5th, 2009 at 5:39 am
um unless you can recreate consciousness there won’t be a robot as smart as a human. most likely if it DID happen, which I’m not so sure it can, it would be a big leap we’d probably have trouble fathoming until a big paradigm shift was already in motion. just throwing that out there.
May 5th, 2009 at 5:20 am
positive feedback
May 5th, 2009 at 5:08 am
Best article I’ve read on cracked.com in a long time.
May 5th, 2009 at 4:48 am
I’d love to see the LHC blow a hole into another dimension, if they do all the governments should pay swaim, he predicted it after all.
May 5th, 2009 at 4:25 am
o mi god cyborgs versus robots
i hope tht hapens
if not it will be like orynx and crake
May 5th, 2009 at 3:34 am
May i refer you to The Venus Project?
May 5th, 2009 at 3:15 am
Wow, I’ve been up all night and couldn’t sleep. I’m ready to hit the sack now that I’ve read this crap. Thanks SWAIM…or whatever the fuck it is.
May 5th, 2009 at 3:06 am
This article reads like one of the old Wong articles.
May 5th, 2009 at 2:37 am
Sandy vagina pearls = WIN
May 5th, 2009 at 2:29 am
First off, awesome article! One of the coolest I’ve read on cracked. As I’m sure many of the other geeks who frequent this site do, I find myself thinking about exactly this type of thing on an almost hourly basis.
But I’m surprised your discourse on cyborgs went all the way back to the carbon-fiber leg prostheses, which are not electronic or even really mechanical, but simply Pirate-Style Peg-Leg V.4.5.1.a Vista (colloquially referred to as PSPL…..Vista).
When it comes to cyborg saturation, we are WELL beyond that point. Ever heard of a cochlear implant? I personally know a little girl who has one. This is an electronic sensor that is ATTACHED TO HER BRAIN via magnets and electrodes and probably some duct tape. She was born completely deaf, and now she’s got a gadget wired into her brain that lets her fucking hear like a normal fucking human being, and its only about the size of a quarter. And the same sort of technology exists for bionic eyes, too. We are living in a cyborg era already, and have been for a few years, but its still in the young-boy-who-doesnt-know-why-his-hoo-hoo-gets-stiff-when-he-sees-his-mom-in-the-shower stage of societal awareness. (Sorry for the disturbing imagery.) If you were to tape a laser pointer to this girl’s wrist and super glue a little digital clock to her forehead, I would bow down to her as my superior and (hopefully) benevolent master, and she’s just 9 goddamn years old.
May 5th, 2009 at 1:24 am
Back in the times of the industrial revolution everyone thought the new machines would mean there would be no more jobs for people.
The number of jobs actually increased exponentially.
May 5th, 2009 at 12:35 am
Great article. I didn’t see #1 coming, and you worded it really well. That is why I’ll never be a Cracked - or any other magazine - writer.
May 4th, 2009 at 11:46 pm
I honestly don’t think we’ll ever kill ourselves off, at least not completely. Despite our knack for introspective thought, spirituality, and the fact that we like to believe we’re above animals, we are still just talking chimps who act on the basic instincts that other animals do. Sure, animals kill eachother, typically for food or mates (sounds like us to me), but when’s the last time you heard of a species killing itself off? It doesn’t happen. Its much more likely that something else that aliens or a meteor will take us out.
May 4th, 2009 at 11:41 pm
Best article I read in ages
May 4th, 2009 at 11:31 pm
If China builds a robot with AI, we’ll just build Liberty Prime. I mean it worked in Fallout 3…even if it was 200 years too late.
May 4th, 2009 at 11:16 pm
Why is there a cracked article talking specifically about what I’ve been thinking about for the past three weeks?! If this wasn’t so awesome and funny I’d be pissed off… and terrified.
May 4th, 2009 at 11:11 pm
I think humanity’s best bet is to diversify - fire up the rockets and colonize the space. Start with the Moon, Mars, and then onward. Some colonies will go to war, some will be overrun by cyborgs, some will regress, some will remain agricultural, and some will be forgotten thus ensuring humanity’s survival. Yes, we could end up on the battlestar Galactica, but what are the chances of that ;)?
Although of the above is possible, history teaches us that - whatever we predict - something completely different happens.
May 4th, 2009 at 10:56 pm
Perhaps it’s more likely that we become the victims of another civilizations technology than our own? Perhaps not. If we can manage to not kill ourselves off after mastering fire, inventing the wheel and smelting iron then we should be ok.
Heck, most of the people reading this comment are preparing themselves for an inevitable zombie apocalypse - we have nothing to fear about going extinct any time soon.
But when we do go extinct (and we will) it will not be because of what we invent but the fears we invent that go with those inventions.
May 4th, 2009 at 10:54 pm
I reckon the real life thing is happening already, but we’re sooooo close to cyborgs, just gotta get that optic nerve stuff figured out and the bionic eye is in business.
And yeah, Oscar Pistorius is already proof that cyborgs are the way, we’re at a point where technology can give us better than what we were born with. For enough money anyway.
May 4th, 2009 at 10:53 pm
We’ll develop our understanding of the human genome to the point where robotic parts will be inefficient and laughable-we won’t need to integrate ourselves with machines when our skins can be toughened to the point of being nearly bullet-proof, our eyesight, hearing capabilities, and taste sensors can be maxed out, and our brains can be even further enhanced. Not too mention work on negating senescence(the scientific term for “old age makes you fall apart) will soon make living 150+years pretty standard, and with few if any negative effects merely from growing old.
May 4th, 2009 at 10:50 pm
Great article. Best I’ve read in ages.
May 4th, 2009 at 10:39 pm
[...] page on cracked.com (and yes I know it’s not an academic website… far from it actually) “The 5 Most Likely Ways Humans Will become Obsolete”. Sure it may be there for humor but it does make some points about our growing dependance for [...]
May 4th, 2009 at 10:13 pm
I want to steal other dimension’s technology…
But what if there ISN’T any technology in the other dimension? What if it’s ruled by a race of gigantic draginz that are so hardcore that they can take a nuke to the face, and they decide that they want to eat us? What THEN?
May 4th, 2009 at 9:52 pm
Sounds like someone just got done reading some Kurzweil.
Excellent article, by the way– smart and funny.
May 4th, 2009 at 9:37 pm
Bravo Swaim. Best article in ages on Cracked. Smart, humorous and educational.
More! More!
May 4th, 2009 at 9:27 pm
I <3 S.W.A.I.M.
May 4th, 2009 at 8:59 pm
Fleak, I’m not greatly familiar with it, but isn’t what you’ve described one of the theoretical lead ins to the “Grey Goo” scenario, where all matter is converted by nano-bots into a formless, yet technically ‘perfect’ grey matter? I realize you only said computer chips, not fully functioning microscopic robots, but if they can make technology on that scale already…
May 4th, 2009 at 8:57 pm
I disagree about humans always wanting to move forward and make progress. well, for most part that is true, so i guess i don’t fully disagree. there is, in some cases, where we back track in technonogly for one reason or another. I’m an audio engineer. we have the most amazing technology for music production. but for some odd reason alot of producers and artist want to do anologe records. this means not to record to a hard drive, but to record to tape because they think it sounds better. i agree, it does sound better, but for a sound quality that is for example 3 times better, you have to work 5 times harder to get it. is it worth it? i say move on. invent newer formats and mediams, and use them.
May 4th, 2009 at 8:17 pm
What about Kerzweil and nano-technology? They’ve got cell-sized computer chips, they just don’t do anything yet. Yet. Imagine if everything, rocks trees, obscene sexual apparatus, were it own supercomputer. And even greater, all of existence were its own conscious supercomputer. Makes humans sort of obsolete, yet doesn’t really call for our destruction in any way.
May 4th, 2009 at 8:11 pm
Swaim’s wife must be a mermaid
May 4th, 2009 at 7:15 pm
I wish MY sandy vagina contained a delicate pearl of wisdom.
May 4th, 2009 at 6:57 pm
Halo 19? Cool…
May 4th, 2009 at 6:44 pm
Dengar Swaim! not Boba Fett
Great writing though.
May 4th, 2009 at 6:37 pm
This was a wonderful article, Swaim. It all came together at the end in a David Wong-ian style of brilliance.
May 4th, 2009 at 6:37 pm
I’m with you on the “Real Life” scenario. We are quickly approaching our fork in the road where, in one direction, we face annihilation thru violence and hatred or thru just sheer apathy to the actions of those who are violent and hateful and, in the other direction, we face a possibility of survival via the guidance and support of potential peers in the hope that they might join us in our intellectual pursuits and, thereby, have a goal of not only improving themselves but the rest of the world thru the development of peaceful and self-enhancing technologies. Maybe, I think, we’re already stuck in the fork of this road. Nobody wants to learn anymore…they choose mainly to be spoon-fed without a true understanding of things - as they are and as they have been. Perhaps, our future destiny is to simply stagnate. I think to stagnate would be a living death for humanity and the worst of all possible outcomes.
May 4th, 2009 at 6:29 pm
”Compared to the technological progress of, say, the dinosaurs during their tens of millions of years on Earth, we’re the equivalent of a guy who shows up at a party already hammered, shoots a liter of heroin and asks if they have any medical-grade adrenaline kicking around in the back. Clearly, we’re a little impatient when it comes to getting our next hit of sweet, sweet progress.”
as an ex-junkie, this is perfect. my god.
you rock.
May 4th, 2009 at 6:23 pm
Wow. Flame wars are always fun.
But anyway, lovely article! Not hard to read at all. It definitely makes you think, I’ll say that. Number one was perfect to make me not-scared, haha.
Good job, Swaim.
May 4th, 2009 at 6:07 pm
Handel: Take a gander at Shadowrun. That shit happens.
May 4th, 2009 at 5:50 pm
Nope, if we get close to any of these points the human race will be completely different. So the scenario changes.
We can’t understand the implications of technology that advanced and probably aren’t ready for it.
However down the worlds current course of thought maybe we won’t be able to continue.
I’ll do everything I can to attempt to make a world for a better tomorrow and hopefully everyone else does the same.
May 4th, 2009 at 5:34 pm
I’ll never forget this thing I read, about this other thing (yeah, I’m not big on details here), which talked about a top scientist explaining “with a completely straight face” that any passing aliens, in space, if they saw we were about to destroy the universe with our particle physics experiments, would have absolutely no problem destroying the Earth to protect the other planets in the universe.
Oh, and there’s already a Belgian Internet provider called Skynet. Just so you know.
May 4th, 2009 at 5:30 pm
Seriously, if anyone ever wanted to do it, it would take, like, a few hours, a few good surgeons and a bluetooth to create a cyborg. There going to come a point where it is just to bothersome to carry around a super computer laptop, and we just go and implant it into his head. I think a point where we are shoving bluetooths in peoples heads like we are stuffing botox within 2 decades, if not 3. (Willing test subject. Bluetooth not included)
May 4th, 2009 at 5:26 pm
Whatever.
Humans win out against technological singularity via internet-induced human instrumentality (forced merging of human collective into one consciousness), Neon Genesis Evangelion-style.
May 4th, 2009 at 5:24 pm
I think I’ve read all of your articles, Swaim, and I think I can confidently say this is your best one.
May 4th, 2009 at 5:06 pm
Swaim, I love you more than words can say but if you don’t make a new movie soon, shit’s going go down.
Sleep well.
May 4th, 2009 at 4:47 pm
No doubt in my mind either we will get hit by a giant meteor or a giant Solar flare. One or the other.
RT
http://www.anonymity.ru.tc
May 4th, 2009 at 4:44 pm
This is an awesome article. In the future I can see this guy writing for robotic letterman.
May 4th, 2009 at 4:27 pm
I’m pretty sure the world already ended, it’s just taking time to hit the rest of you, like a concussive blast from a giant explosion. We called it Wrath of the Lich King, and it was a dark day indeed.
May 4th, 2009 at 4:08 pm
“What if their sandy vaginas house a delicate pearl of wisdom?”
Actually, a sandy vagina would be MORE likely to house a pearl. Since pearls start out as grains of sand that get covered by a secretion and… eww.
May 4th, 2009 at 4:07 pm
“…as someone whose favorite Star Wars character is Boba Fett..”
And? That’s EVERY fanboy’s favorite character. You’re not being obscure enough, Swaim.
May 4th, 2009 at 4:07 pm
Great article. But isn’t saying that robots will evolve to be smarter then us saying that they will be exist in a different state of mind then us? At the very least they could be slightly less prone to unnecessarily violent tendencies, or they could think and act differently from our banal state of living?
Yeah, and where your mutant love at? What, like the toxic sludge that’ll result from building our nuclear-powered MindWebEXTREME, grafted into our arms, as you mentioned, won’t eventually get shit upon unto a third world country, once someone realizes everyone is on the MindWebEXTREME all the time? And once several million people die, I’m sure a couple of the remaining living will develop powers.
You know what happens then?
Mutants V Cyborgs V Robots
Fuck Yeah.
(Also, read Machine Man, it’s about a dude becoming a machine, but the dude who’s writing is releasing it a page at a time online.)
May 4th, 2009 at 4:03 pm
you know the sad fact is most of us already knew the consequences or have imagined it on a matter of way but when the times comes I wonder if we’ll be smart enough to stop it or in the movies do something stupid where it could lead to worse possible scenario’s
May 4th, 2009 at 3:54 pm
great article, just great
especially the last part, even if an optimist might see it as pessimistic, I believe it’s the likiest of the scenario’s. After all, the more we discover, the more we realize our own shortcomings.
May 4th, 2009 at 3:36 pm
@ Zatak- We are all athiests once we figure out why the other persons god doesn’t work.
May 4th, 2009 at 3:36 pm
The Real Life Scenario depresses me. Don’t get me wrong, I’m all for mankind’s utter destruction and the collapse of civilization, but the alternatives presented just make it seem so lame, kind of how one might tire of bathing in water after having experienced bathing in women.
Also, can you people imagine I kind of liked Robin Williams’ movies until I saw Bicentennial Man? I know he wasn’t directly responsible for the suck in that adaptation, but DAMN…
May 4th, 2009 at 3:32 pm
@Irishladdie727 - I really agree with your original comment. In the grand scheme of things, social collapse or some kind of android war would be a Renaissance in human evolution, physical, mental and spiritual, but the real threat behind a technological singularity would be the complacency you mentioned.
Great article Swaim! What I love about the Cracked writers is how easily they can dance over the line of sillyass fun and brutally poignant from one article to the next.
May 4th, 2009 at 3:32 pm
Great article, some nice ideas for the future… I’m doubtful though, I think we’ll hit a wall where we just can’t progress and then, who knows from there? Maybe people will just be happy with being able to live their lives.
Also, why is it that at the first mention of intelligence, commenters suddenly whip out their various qualifications, their Degrees in Geniousnessness, and parade the fact that they are authorities on everything?
May 4th, 2009 at 3:24 pm
One more downside to becoming cyborgs: Spyware is bad enough when it gets into your desktop, never mind imbedded in your body. Add to that you can’t buy a new car without OnStar, so picture a comes-with-the-package tracking system keeping score of how much toilet paper you use per wipe on average. On the other hand, I suppose if you’re an exhibitionist you’ll never have to leave the house again.
May 4th, 2009 at 3:20 pm
Vernon Vinge can suck on the last few paragraphs of this article. We HAVE reached a downturn in technological advancement. As our needs have become more formidable, and resources required to match them with the right technology, any hopes for some coherency are scuppered. Not to mention that precipitous descent into merging with some artificial consciousness. Technology paired with human need, human brainpower and available resources can’t form the the same potent cocktail as matter and a black hole’s gravity. We’ve reached the Event Horizon of our technological advancement - and instead of sliding down toward some lethal core, we’re STUCK. If not actually rolling back. The singularity principle can’t apply to technology, not with the human factor and a host of other banalities straddling it.
May 4th, 2009 at 3:17 pm
I just want scenario 3 to happen. Our minds downloaded into virtual worlds would be awesome and a GREAT way to achieve immortality…
…Until some idiot trips over the power cord, that is >.>
May 4th, 2009 at 2:39 pm
Awesome article
May 4th, 2009 at 2:37 pm
Ok, I love cracked articles, but I just wanted to point out that any robot on the same level of intelligence as humans is kinda like having microsoft… only a few billion times more complex. I have the numbers (I did a speech for this in college) but trust me… Look at what your mac book can do…do you really think that it’s gonna take over the world anytime soon? Sure it could maybe be possible…but seriously, Billions of times more complex then any computer software out there right now. You shoulda caught that one, Cracked.com
May 4th, 2009 at 2:34 pm
If this wasn’t Swaim, it definitely would have been tl;dr time. Glad I didn’t skip it. Nice.
May 4th, 2009 at 2:29 pm
And I thought when David Wong stopped writing, Cracked lost any semblance of intelligence and morality it could ever hope to achieve.
Nice, Swaim. I think you just eclipsed DOB as my favorite columnist.
May 4th, 2009 at 2:28 pm
LOL, lovely, Irishladdie…Today’s atheists are such whiny, ooh-look-at-me-I’m-different douchebags. Everyone’s entitled to their opinion, fine. If you don’t believe in God, STFU and stop yelling it so everyone can notice like some unloved step child.
Classic Swaim. Loved it.
But now onto a pressing question: May I buttfuck thee?
May 4th, 2009 at 2:20 pm
“When you can get Internet access literally everywhere, your virtual identity becomes just as important as your real one. / More important in fact, because your virtual identity combines your consciousness with the stored knowledge of every computer on Earth.”
Uh, the wishful thinking of all anti-social nerdlings and technological hyper-realists?
Hey Cracked, turn up the humor knob, and turn down the suck, ie, the smug.
May 4th, 2009 at 2:10 pm
Excellent article. I personally feel the #1 future isn’t as likely as it would appear. Ongoing changes in technology has always been the rule, and there doesn’t appear to be any reason we’ll change in that regard.
May 4th, 2009 at 2:06 pm
Wow, that article was truly epic and forced me to stay an extra 5 minutes at work in order to finish it…
I hope you understand exactly what that means… 5 EXTRA minutes… FIVE!
GREAT. ARTICLE. SWAIM.
May 4th, 2009 at 2:01 pm
Good article by the way.
May 4th, 2009 at 2:00 pm
The Emotional Solace Fallacy that organized religion provides to people is something very interesting. I have a question though. If God has a master plan for the future, he’s all knowing and all wise, then why do we pray for things? “He” is not going to change his world plan just so the Jets can win the Super Bowl. It is even more fascinating however, how much religion retards social progress. If Jesus is coming to get us in a few years, what’s the point? Let’s leave this hell hole for the atheists and their talking snake! (Who I assume spoke Hebrew?) Simply waiting for a God figure to take his course is grossly irresponsible, mostly because there are several other religions waiting for THEIR God to fix the situation. The Solar System theory killed Copernicus. The Evolution is still debated as opposed to Intelligent Design, and now the technological advancement of the human race. I’m not telling you what to believe (or start a flamewar) , just saying it justifies injustice, intolerance, bigotry, death, and holds back humanity from reaching our full intellectual potential. Sort of like “TXT Speak”.
May 4th, 2009 at 1:57 pm
I really liked this article :)!
May 4th, 2009 at 1:55 pm
So we’ve got a loser declaring to be a millionaire, hitting on chicks, then calling someone gay after he’s called out on it. There aren’t actually words in the English language that can describe that level of piteousness. You’d have to start making analogies with perhaps a masturbating, deformed aye-aye fucking a banana peel or something.
Don’t worry, 2whateverthefuckyou’llchangeyournametonext. I’ve got better things to do than to bother coming to read your inevitable reply. And we both know you WILL reply. But unlike you . . . one second - stifling riotous laughter . . . unlike you ‘millionaires’ oddly I have other things to do then spend time refreshing a random page on the web just to wait for responses.
Cheers, douchebag!
May 4th, 2009 at 1:55 pm
i love you again swaim
May 4th, 2009 at 1:50 pm
FUCK YEAH good article
May 4th, 2009 at 1:39 pm
@Hamsterfist
Don’t make generalizations. Despite the titanic shitstorms a lot of his “followers” have created, Jesus (whose existence is confirmed by archeological evidence and historical documents) and most other religious leaders had the right idea when they were actually teaching their beliefs to people. It’s the interpretations that bring us the holocaust, the crusades, jihad, and well everything else that sucks about religion.
A belief in God does not equal laziness, countless times in the bible it says that God acts through human beings, nowhere does it say divine intervention is the only way to get anything done. In addition, Christian based Charities are a leading force in relieving the world from poverty, if not the foremost provider of aid.
I didn’t mean for you to interpret my last comment as a personal attack, I just wanted you to put things in perspective and realize that hypocrites are best left ignored, especially on the internet, and arguing with them will only make you a hypocrite too. If this guy really understood what he claims to believe, he wouldn’t have posted an attempt to convert a comedy blogger. Just ignore idiots like that, and don’t let yourself become disenfranchised with the billions of the people in the world who believe in God just because their most visible example is annoying, hypocritical pricks.
May 4th, 2009 at 1:33 pm
We don’t have claws, or tails, or super hearing; we put all our points into INT
bwa hahaha nice nerdcore
May 4th, 2009 at 1:29 pm
And the ones who, for their part, would welcome them.
May 4th, 2009 at 1:29 pm
I sort of like the idea of moving my consciousness into an android body, the upsides are never having to eat, not having to deal with the inconvenience of needing the loo, not worrying about being fat or unfit, oh, and being immortal.
As for the downsides, not being able to have sex, not eating (tasting) food, I don’t think you would appreciate music or films as an android either.
The question is, what makes you, you? and if everyone has the same information then how can you differenciate yourself from other people, it is quite scary to think about.
Essentially, given a certain amount of time, Humanity will become the Borg.
May 4th, 2009 at 1:25 pm
Thanks for the encouragement Baka, but I think I will follow your and IrishLaddie’s lead and help to return this to a serious (as serious as Cracked can be) discussion of robots and their insidious plans to be our overlords.
May 4th, 2009 at 1:21 pm
Monkey:
Then carry on, my friend, the banquet is set.
May 4th, 2009 at 1:21 pm
@Irishladdie727
I am not an uncompromising athiest, but just believing in something is not the same as doing something. If we just sit around passively waiting for God or whatever to sort shit out, we are screwed. The fact is most of America currently works this way, and that is insanely scary. Whatever happened to seperating God from human endeavors? God is not gonna stop The Terminator no more then baby elves or orks are gonna stop it and I find people that their only answer to everything is praying to jesus as completely retarded.
May 4th, 2009 at 1:19 pm
We were having such nice philosophical debates 3 minutes ago, now we’re all furiously shitting on our keyboards and hitting enter. THIS is why the internet CANNOT be allowed to gain sentience. It would collapse the global economy “for the lulz” and would have one nasty vocabulary…
May 4th, 2009 at 1:15 pm
… her clit is a failed penis and she hates God and is a bitch. Tragic:
http://neilsnotes.com/index.php?page=13&catid=4&sku=ENGL-CD00425
May 4th, 2009 at 1:14 pm
Also, Baka, I’m feeling in the mood for a little troll baiting. Them’s good eatin’!
May 4th, 2009 at 1:13 pm
Wow! Someone is pretty miserable. LOL! Talk about having no friends Ms(cunty)Unoriginal (good name by the way, I’ll bet it’s very fitting for you).
May 4th, 2009 at 1:12 pm
Naw, I didn’t fall for him cuz he’s a troll… he’s cute with his little penis! Who says I’m closet? Innocuous? Does that mean he’s had all his shots? You don’t have the HIV do you?
May 4th, 2009 at 1:12 pm
Holy shit, #2. Read the novel Feed.
May 4th, 2009 at 1:11 pm
@ Hamsterfist
You couldn’t have just ignored the blatantly annoying bible beater? He wasn’t attacking you, he was just being narrow minded and zealotous. Chill out, he has just as much of a right to believe in “non-entity”s as you do to not believe in them. Aggressive, uncompromising Atheism is just as annoying and silly as aggressive, uncompromising Christianity. The latter’s just been around longer and created a few nations.
May 4th, 2009 at 1:10 pm
Aaand still falling…
May 4th, 2009 at 1:07 pm
HAHA! Retired Millionaire that spends his time talking all nasty on the internet to a girl you don’t know? RIGHT! I’ll believe that one. Even if you ARE a retired millionaire, that doesn’t mean a thing to me. It just shows that ANYBODY can be a rude, nasty, piece of crap, which I already believed. Get a life, Friendless Loser, I’m pretty sure you should be able to afford one.. Or maybe you should spend some money on FRIENDS.
May 4th, 2009 at 1:07 pm
I gotta give it to Lyonkyng down there, as I was thinking the exact same thing. When you’re part machine and have your brain synth’d to the internetz 24/7, someone’s probably gonna get bored and start messing with the system. Soon you’ll have people hacking (literally/figuratively) into other people’s brains, downloading all kinds of secrets and skeletons. Heck, knowing humanity’s addiction to progress and self-validation, someone will probably even hack into your nervous system and start controlling you. Worse yet, can you imagine spam and pop-ups in your head?! The government might get into this too. Wait.. the government could get into this too!
No thank you on points 2 and 3, I shot my foot to get out of the navy, no way the government’s gonna control mah mind!
May 4th, 2009 at 1:03 pm
Daniel Davis Says:
“In that case, repent and believe on Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior, and accept His forgiveness for all of your sins. That is the only way you’ll have that which you’ve described.”
Yeah because clearly believing in make believe space men is the answer to all. Instead of begging a non-entity for forgiveness?!?!? (Forgive me, cause I suck) why not spend your life improving yourself? And saying how much you suck in your head to someone that won’t answer is not improvement.
May 4th, 2009 at 1:00 pm
Irishladdie727:
You’ve won me over. Everyone hurry up with that science-y research thing, already!
May 4th, 2009 at 12:59 pm
Another result of a cyborg future is that petty flame wars like this one would involve ACTUAL FLAMES!!!
May 4th, 2009 at 12:58 pm
Unoriginal and the Monkey fell pretty hard for an innocuous (as far as they go) troll comment…I expected better of Cracked readership.
May 4th, 2009 at 12:55 pm
Hit on a (possible) girl I don’t know, nor where they live? Are you fucking kidding me?
You made my day Mr. Life Poster on Blog Site, closet homo.
Thank you.
May 4th, 2009 at 12:54 pm
Somewhat interesting article. Also, how can the Internet launch nukes? What, are missiles wired to the same network that 4chan is on?
May 4th, 2009 at 12:53 pm
Wow, 2 MissUnoriginal, she wasn’t lying! You really have no genitalia to speak of, do you? Don’t be ashamed, extenze has what you need. And really, creating a screen name just to (badly) hit on a girl? You made my day!
May 4th, 2009 at 12:48 pm
Well you’re close.
Retired Millionaire. Plenty of friends here, and yes, I would say that to your face.
I’m behind my monitor as are you as this is how this forum of communication works.
Your judgments: intelligence, place of residence, etc. Too funny. Did your parents send you out into the world believing your opinion means shit to anyone?! Tell them I told them they should have spent less time diddling you over teaching you some life skills.
As far as what you like and don’t like on here… believe me (I’ll tell you where your parents failed to), not one person on here gives a shit… seriously… not one shit.
So good luck Mr./Ms./Mrs. (snicker)/Miss/Missy/It. with your current program. Back to your cubical you 9 to 5er working class drone.
May 4th, 2009 at 12:46 pm
Is it weird that I am very, VERY against us all becoming cyborgs or hooking our brains up to the internet? I’d kind of like to keep my humanity, even if that means being looked down on by a new master race of omnipotent but constantly masturbating androids. I like to think becoming soulless automatons through our own creation is also a downside Swaim. When you can have access to anything you want to have or know virtually, there’s no reason to try anymore, no incentive to think. People haven’t become smarter or more noble due to the internet, they’ve become stupider and lazier, and with the convenience of anonymity, we now have a bunch of rude, self serving, sociopaths who feel no shame about their sick, morally corrupt perversions and opinions because they can now find other people who agree with them. As cool as it would be to shoot lasers or feel robo-megan fox give you a blow job in real time, we wouldn’t be getting smarter and more advanced, we’d just be regressing back to primal instincts in a new, instantly gratifying, never fulfilling world. Brave New World anyone?
Lolz, that was dark. Hilarious article.
May 4th, 2009 at 12:46 pm
its called tauto. like saying ice is cold. 20 paragraphs when 1 sentence will do.
May 4th, 2009 at 12:45 pm
“If you’re like me, you’d love nothing more than a radical perceptual shift in life as we know it to come along and transcend you to a plane of pure light and thought, where all human minds are as one and paternity tests always come back negative.” In that case, repent and believe on Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior, and accept His forgiveness for all of your sins. That is the only way you’ll have that which you’ve described.
May 4th, 2009 at 12:42 pm
“… if you have really nice tits… cum back more often (and we’ll do the same on your back)!
XOXO!”
This is the response to my post.. Which wasn’t the least bit derogatory, so I have no idea why they said this.
But, I guess if you like being a Friendless Loser Troll that has nothing better to do than make lame sexual remarks to people named “miss” on the message boards, then that’s your (pathetic, meaningless) life. So, yea, go for it, Friendless Loser! Your comments on the internet aren’t as hurtful as you think.. They just prove to me your lack of intelligence. Which is very LOW, compared to others I’ve read on this message board. And I highly doubt you would say any of those things to a person on the street, Friendless Loser, because you’re probably a fugly little pansy stuck at home in his mommy’s basement.. Good luck with your (nonexistent) life, Friendless Loser!
Way to hide behind MY screen name too! Anonymity at it’s finest!
May 4th, 2009 at 12:41 pm
Wow, Lester_Derby, I guess you subscribe to the theory of commenting on an article before you read it. Or even research it. Bully for you! That’s the kind of testes I like to see paraded all over the internet.
May 4th, 2009 at 12:39 pm
I fear that some of the underpinnings of the discussion may have gone over Lester_Derby’s head. Could you resubmit the article in pidgin, Swaim?
May 4th, 2009 at 12:39 pm
That article was awesome until the last section. Way to be a killjoy.
May 4th, 2009 at 12:31 pm
really? i mean really? if you build something “smarter” than you. YOUR SMARTER YOU IDIOT. Mr. Swaim! you get paid to do this?
May 4th, 2009 at 12:25 pm
IMO the possibility for humans somehow evolving into a group consciousness both remote and terrible. I don’t believe that humans are really as much of a social animal as we have been forced to be by the evolution of society, most people are more than ok with the idea of never having to interract with more that a core group of people. I think if we do evolve into some sort of higher power it will be similar to how we live now, just on a larger scale.
May 4th, 2009 at 12:24 pm
Thank you Michael Swaim for not making this unreadable like you feared in your tweets. It was eminently readable, funny, and, dare I say, educational. American’s are always obsessed about the future (which is why we bulldoze all our old buildings). The population of the world (not so much America…yet) demands changes made to the infrastructure of necessity distribution. And I, for one, subscribe to the ANDROID (not robot, help us God) underclass for that purpose. Me personally, I would enjoy some robotic attachments: go, go, gadget penis!
May 4th, 2009 at 12:23 pm
The “Sentient Internet” idea can actually be pretty terrifying.
See “I Have No Mouth, and I Must Scream”, a 1967 sci-fi post-acocalyptic story:
“Hate. Let me tell you how much I’ve come to hate you since I began to live. There are 387.44 million miles of wafer thin printed circuits that fill my complex. If the word hate was engraved on each nanoangstrom of those hundreds of millions of miles it would not equal one one-billionth of the hate I feel for humans at this micro-instant. For you. Hate. Hate”
In brief, a supercomputer absorbs every computing resource into its consciousness, essentially becoming God. Only problem: it’s stuck as an aggregate mind in an immobile network, so while it can control virtually everything, it lacks the real senses and mobility of a human.
May 4th, 2009 at 12:14 pm
here’s the thing about the technological singularity, the human brain is a fucking complex thing. True, you mentioned this problem, and our knowledge of its function has grown vastly over the years, but we still have no clue how to even come close to “creating” anything like how our brains work.
Computers are machines, and only that, aggrandized calculators, if you will. you put in an input and get an output. now, the speed at which those computers can produce an output is extremely more speedy than human minds can calculate it, but they still require an input. Even the most complex computer requires an input. Read “the chinese room” argument in philosophy on wikipedia, to go into greater depth of the input/output model of computing.
That being said, I may be just a program trying to lull you into a false sense of security.
May 4th, 2009 at 12:07 pm
… if you have really nice tits… cum back more often (and we’ll do the same on your back)!
XOXO!
May 4th, 2009 at 12:00 pm
I found this article on Digg, so I’ve never heard of Cracked before. But now I really like it and will definitely be coming back.. This article was GREAT, I’m curious about the author - I love their writing style!
May 4th, 2009 at 11:53 am
I would actually like to point out, and i know that im revealing myself as a huge nerd here, it wasn’t a laser whip in johnny mnemonic it was mono-wire.
oh and on a more realistic note. with cyborgs comes cyber-psycosis. when a person gets so much metal crammed into their body and loose their grip on reality. oh and most fictional accounts usually show these types to become the wild killing type.
May 4th, 2009 at 11:45 am
Is people are chiming in here today with their compliments, and those with their usual negative, couch critic feedback have apparently taken the day off (no doubt to watch their mom in the shower with other men). So… nice to see.
May 4th, 2009 at 11:36 am
This is actually one of the funniest articles I’ve rea on cracked for a while.
Good job!
May 4th, 2009 at 11:31 am
“we’re the equivalent of a guy who shows up at a party already hammered, shoots a liter of heroin and asks if they have any medical-grade adrenaline kicking around in the back.”
I sprayed water all over my monitor. Thanks a lot, SWAIM!
May 4th, 2009 at 11:26 am
Also, tl;dr on this article.
May 4th, 2009 at 11:25 am
Things just have to hold together ’til I kick the can.
Fuck everything else!
http://neilsnotes.com/index.php?page=13&catid=6&sku=ENGL-CD00422
May 4th, 2009 at 11:25 am
You know about those futurists you mentioned? Well, there’s a group called the World Futurist Society and their headquarters is right next to my psychiatrist’s office. I would always pass by and think “Wtf is a futurist and why do they have a magazine and a society dedicated to them?”.
Anyway, the problem solving part, yes, robots and computers have got us beat there. But, with “thinking” and “feeling”, we can’t exactly reproduce that. That requires chemical reactions and synapses of things like seratonin for happiness and the lack thereof for sadness. If we did create AI, they’d still be what philosophers call “philosophical zombies”. They’d be intelligent, yes, but only as a word processor is intelligent. Data goes in, data comes out. They can strategize, but they can’t say “Who is my best friend? Which one do I care about the most?” In other words, we can’t program empathy and sympathy. They’d have no sense of “morality” or “conscience”. Since they can’t think about how they feel, they can’t have human characteristics.
tl;dr fuck your theory
May 4th, 2009 at 11:20 am
popurls.com // popular today…
story has entered the popular today section on popurls.com…
May 4th, 2009 at 11:11 am
“If you’re like me, you’d love nothing more than a radical perceptual shift in life as we know it to come along …But until that glorious, improbable (but theoretically possible) day, it looks like we may have to busy ourselves worrying about mundane stuff like “the development of true human nobility” and “feeding and educating the world before the ice caps melt or we all starve.” ”
It might be just me but this reads like someone in the mid 80s writing about the invention of a world wide network of computers sharing information through light. But also dear god this was well written
May 4th, 2009 at 11:06 am
my prediction: the moment technology stops advancing is the same moment Jesus comes back.
May 4th, 2009 at 10:56 am
I find it ridiculous that you did not mention zombies.
May 4th, 2009 at 10:44 am
Pure Brilliance!
Swaim you are a god!
May 4th, 2009 at 10:42 am
A really good article. I personally am looking forward to the future. Even if technological advancement slows down again, the next twenty years should bring some incredible technology, as did the last.
Hooray for the future!
May 4th, 2009 at 10:39 am
If Terminators made a model that looked like Cameron from the Sarah Connor Chronicles… I’d get it drunk first, then fuck it in the ass… give it this to distract:
http://neilsnotes.com/index.php?page=13&catid=9&sku=ENGL-CD00379
then try to kill it (not that unlike my current dating M.O.).
Until then… I’m happy neiling the organic babes!
May 4th, 2009 at 10:34 am
First off, nice article. That’ll get the ole’ brain juices flowing. And oozing. And….Anyway. I do think if it came down to us developing robots with AI similar or better to our intelligence they most certainly would try to wipe us out. The only question is, how long before any of the robots has the thought, “Humans are the only thing that can rival us, and they are dangerously irrational”. Even if they didnt try to wipe us out because, say, they had some kind of empathy. They would probably do what we do. Establish their own country, borders, and military defense systems to protect their existence. We do what we do because of fear. They’d do what they do because of our fear.
May 4th, 2009 at 10:18 am
I would love for number 5. I would definatly help the resistance fight the terminator overlords. :-p
May 4th, 2009 at 10:16 am
Holy shit this article is awesome!
Funny & profound, as someone stated.
Also, “we’re the equivalent of a guy who shows up at a party already hammered, shoots a liter of heroin, and asks if they have any medical-grade adrenaline kicking around in the back” is one of the coolest analogies i’ve ever read.
May 4th, 2009 at 10:13 am
Asimov’s 3 laws are basically robot DRM. If a sweaty, pockmarked thirteen year old in his parents’ basement can overcome DRM, can a mind that is more powerful than any human on the planet do the same?
YES THEY CAN. A message from the Bob the Builder/Barak Obama Foundation.
May 4th, 2009 at 10:11 am
Amazing article, maybe the best i’ve read on here in months.
May 4th, 2009 at 9:55 am
“This continues for a couple hours, at which point Mr. Roboto’s great-great-grand-robo-children are so smart, they decide the best way to deal with “the human problem” is to send an android back in time to murder Sarah Connor.”
Intelligence implies murder then?
May 4th, 2009 at 9:52 am
Barely missing the list at #6 is when, through “biological advances”, human beings no longer rely on any of their organs save the brain for existence.
Upside: Getting shot in the chest is a mild inconvenience.
Downside: Lack of all higher brain function, an insatiable lust for human flesh.
May 4th, 2009 at 9:44 am
It was funny and profound.
May 4th, 2009 at 9:34 am
Swaim, this is probably your best all-around article yet. It was a near-perfect blend of humor and intellect. Great job and keep it up, man.
May 4th, 2009 at 9:23 am
naw. the next step for humans is a metaphysical breakthrough that would enable all of us to have access to the human group mind. all knowledge and wisdom would be at the tips of our spinal columns. trust me, the future is a bright place with less technology and more spiritual examination.
Peace ^-^
May 4th, 2009 at 9:23 am
Of all the theories listed, 5 is the least likely, and 2 is the most likely imo. Sure we can build a computer that can beat ANY human at chess, but creating a computer that can beat the human brain in all ways is a completely different thing. And even if we did create an uber-computer that wants to annihilate all of us, all it takes is a well placed bomb to completely ruin it.
But 3 is already here. There’s already robotic limbs, and scientists are developing artificial organs. I actually look forward to this future, we have (most) all the technology for it, we just need it implanted.
/end long post
May 4th, 2009 at 9:19 am
Very well written, very interesting article. Not hilarious, but not everything needs to be.
May 4th, 2009 at 9:06 am
I first by chance. I never use the refresh button. that’s why I’m usually second or fifth.
May 4th, 2009 at 9:03 am
Well, or we finally realize that the internet is a huge waste of time, destroy the whole thing and raise this curious memorial for future generations:
Here lies the Internet,
nothing of value was lost.
May 4th, 2009 at 8:45 am
I think the scariest part about #2 & #3 is the inevitability of hackers and viruses. Right now it’s a hassle and potential costly only on a monetary level. But what about when people can hack into your brain, screw with your perception of reality or even control you.
May 4th, 2009 at 8:44 am
Very interesting. loved it. granted I was getting depressed towards the end but the mention of virtual reality sex with sandra bullock kicked my ADD on and I was happy again. yay!
May 4th, 2009 at 8:43 am
I doubt we’ll get a chance to even becoem obselete, after all, there are so many ways in which the human species could be instantly wiped out that this doesn’t really matter, after all, we’ll just be wiped out like all the other species which lived on this planet which had our levels of inteligence.
May 4th, 2009 at 8:38 am
For a second there, I thought you were saying Moore’s law will stop being true real soon. But on closer inspection, you’re really just saying that it will return to the doubling every two years. Until, that is, it DOES stop, and we’re all boned then.
May 4th, 2009 at 8:35 am
This article is awesome.
May 4th, 2009 at 8:27 am
“Maybe we’ll start finding ways to advance in other important areas instead, like learning to not be such assholes to each other all the time”.
Amen to that.
May 4th, 2009 at 8:27 am
You linked to one of my articles in the intro, and used two images from my article for the ‘twenty minute war’ pic. Swaim, I think I love you, if only because I love myself so very, very much.
Either that or we are the same person. I’d like to that I’m your Tyler Durden, but it’s probably the other way around.
May 4th, 2009 at 8:21 am
Excellent article, Swaim. You did a great job mixing all technical hypothesis with your style of humor.
This is exactly the kind of thing I love from Cracked: well thought out, nerdy ideas about the world and what’s going to happen with it, mixed in jokes about boning Sandra Bullock (BTW can’t wait for that VR to come out) and donuts.
Very well done. Keep up the awesome work.
May 4th, 2009 at 8:11 am
Hee hee. ” People from the 50’s who are STILL ALIV….” Hey wait, that’s not funny! When (if) I get outta my chair, I’m gonna lump over there and…. why I outta… What…, sorry,… what were we talking about again?
May 4th, 2009 at 8:09 am
The last sentence’s option would make us the Combine from Half-Life 2. That is an awesome plan.
May 4th, 2009 at 8:04 am
@ Royce
Yea Oscar did make qualifying time. He was banned from competing because his legs gave him a “unfair” advantage
May 4th, 2009 at 7:59 am
I’d leave a comment, but the internet is monitoring me right now
May 4th, 2009 at 7:50 am
@t1742: is it really that big of an achievement to be the first poster if you’ve not read the article? Because you have absolutely nothing of substance to contribute if you’ve not read the article, and thus the empty, shallow title of “first” is nothing but a mocking tribute to your inane ability to hit the Refresh button ad nauseum till a new article comes up so that you can post “first!” and then show your lifelessness by stating that you’d not even bothered to read the article. How empty is your existence? Do you look at yourself in the mirror each morning and wonder why you even bother to keep breathing?
On a completely article related note: Awesome job, Swaim! You have now inspired me to watch “Pinnocio’s Revenge”.
May 4th, 2009 at 7:31 am
Great one, Swaim. Any article that can unironically call for “the development of true human nobility” and still be hilarious and irreverent is a winner in my book.
May 4th, 2009 at 7:27 am
More depressing than ruining all the superpowers? You decide.
May 4th, 2009 at 6:44 am
i, for one, welcome or new technological singularity overlords
May 4th, 2009 at 6:43 am
With all the things is the Universe, I doubt we will see our end come it will just happen. I’ve kind of laid my bets on a Gama Burst it will be quick undetectable and over like that.
May 4th, 2009 at 6:38 am
Amazing article. The other people in my room are looking at me like I’m insande because of my seemingly random laughs now.
May 4th, 2009 at 6:36 am
lol…really? I found a place that many players are hoo king up with h ot mo dels, seems the club called: http://tallconnect.com , do you hear this before?
May 4th, 2009 at 6:34 am
Goddamm, that was brilliant.
May 4th, 2009 at 6:29 am
I have seen the future and all I can say is that it doesn’t end well for any of us and that humanity hasn’t even gotten to the darkest point of its existance yet….dawn is very far away
May 4th, 2009 at 6:24 am
Economic growth requires infinite resources, it’s impossible anyway. And billions are going to die by the end of this centuary from global warming.
So cheer up, one of your predictions was right on the money!
May 4th, 2009 at 6:22 am
Wow. It really gets you thinking. What are we gonna do when we run out of things to do? XD Ooh! Perhaps some super-advanced alien race created us for the sole sake of making a bunch of technology so they could wipe us out when we’re done and steal it all? :O Then again, if they could create a conscious, biological being already, then they’d have no need for anything we make. Scrap my theory.
May 4th, 2009 at 6:13 am
Well that wasn’t a depressing article ..
May 4th, 2009 at 6:08 am
The ending was deep. Good article!
May 4th, 2009 at 6:05 am
I love the LHC. It will destroy us all. Muhahahaha
May 4th, 2009 at 6:01 am
LOVE THIS - pure hilarity and education rolled into one delicious morsel - very thought provoking
x x x x x x
May 4th, 2009 at 6:01 am
Er, Swaim, Oscar Pistorius didn’t even make the qualifying time for participating in the Olympics. The records he’s broken are Paralympic type records.
Otherwise great read.
May 4th, 2009 at 5:46 am
Once again cracked misinterprets science (Presumably deliberatly) in a horrendous fashion. Good article though.
May 4th, 2009 at 5:46 am
Anyone else sort of creeped out now?
May 4th, 2009 at 5:39 am
first! now to read the article..