Mankind’s Invention and Weakness

Erik Duarte

Professor Steven Wexler

English 114B

March 10, 2011

Mankind’s Invention and Weakness

             Throughout history humanity has fallen to the idea of using war to resolve international conflicts. War has become a concept that is commonly accepted in the world to keep humanity safe, but safe from who? The objective of war is to protect on group of people from another. Technology has become a major aspect in warfare between nations. As more conflicts arise, nation’s technology advances to protect themselves from others. There is an idea that technology establishes a nation’s status in power, which creates a widespread epidemic to enhance and create technology for military use. This competition has afflicted the world and continues as technology continues to advance. The media has used this principle as a form of information and entertainment through movies, video games, news and other forms of mass media.  Humanity with the influenced of the media is in a constant war that is impacted by the evolution of technology.

            War has existed for as long as humans and continues to reside with it because it is an invention by humanity. A famous Anthropologist Margaret Mead, believes that war is an invented idea by humanity that has become so common that those surrounded by it develop an instinct of it. She states, “Warfare is nevertheless inevitable unless we change our social system and outlaw classes, the struggle of power, and possessions; and in the event of our success warfare would disappear…” (Austin 275). War is generally fought to attain natural resources, property, wealth and power, but if these issues were resolved. What would be the reason for war? There would not be a logical reason for nation to battle for the anything, but the media conflicts this idea through what they produce for the viewers. For example, after September 11 when the World Trade Center was destroyed by terrorist attacks, the news in the United States focused towards how a group in the Middle East (Al-Qaeda) was responsible for the attack and almost instantly the United States sent troops to several nations in the Middle East to fight to protect themselves from any other attacks. After that tragedy many American viewed people from the Middle East with disgust and fear because of what had happened. The media created an image that made people from the Middle East look as if they were part of the attack. The concept of war surrounds a person, which allows humanity to grow with a mentality that war is fine. Video games have become a significant part of a childhood and through these games the media has presented war as a normal thing. Children, teens and some adults play games that have violent content, war scenarios, and other war attributes that allow the player to kill, conquer, and fight. When the player defeats the enemy, they are considered the winner. How is killing other winning? The media has established methods to overlook basic human morality and focus on mistakes of humanity. Thomas Jefferson stated, “The world is indebted for all triumphs which have been gained by reason and humanity over error and oppression.” (Brainy Quote 1).

            The evolution of technology has a large impact to war and continues to progress the danger of it. War has been fought with all form of combat from clashing with sticks and stones to dropping weapons of mass destruction on each other. We are in the middle of the Modern age and a new age of technology, which could be for the better or worse for humanity. After the United States launched the atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, the idea of nuclear war is too dangerous that has become an option for a last resort, but many nations have been developing new technology that is more stable and centralized to certain targets. The United States has been proposing to send military humanoid robots to war instead of human. David Gutierrez a writer for online news Natural News announced, “Controversy erupted when reports emerged that the Pentagon was close to completing a robot designed to forage for its own fuel by consuming "biomass in the environment," raising concerns that the Energetically Autonomous Tactical Robot (EATR) might be intended to fuel itself from the bodies of the dead.” (Natural News).  Is it humane that the United States created a robot that fueled itself from corpses? No it is not, that is wrong in several ways because a dead human is still human and not fuel for a machine. Warfare is evolving with technology and now that we have created androids governments like the United States want to fight against others with these machines. Reporter from The Register, Lewis Page stated, “Two rival firms in the USA are vying to develop military exoskeletons - powerful motorized robotic suits intended to endow soldiers of the future with superhuman strength and other abilities.” (The Register). These companies have developed a suit to give people super human powers. War was hazardous when humans had there normal capabilities and now with extraordinary power, war will become more gruesome than before.

            Technology is progressing at a fast rate, which will create new forms of warfare. As I mentioned military humanoid robots were proposed to go to war. What will occur when fully functional androids are sent to war? With numerous technological research and development, the idea of machines going to war is highly probable. Renounced New York Times journalist, John Markoff stated, “War would be a lot safer, the Army says, if only more of it were fought by robots.” (New York Times). Logically it sounds good to send machines to fight instead of humans to die because it is inevitable that in war people die. Military officials say that the robots will only replace human soldiers when it is a “high risk situation”. War in itself is a high risk and to say that these robots will be on duty only in high risk situations is to say that they will always be at war. These machines are programed to fight against any threat and the target set by the controller. Androids are machines and just like every machine they have glitches. The androids are the future of warfare, but can our own creations turn on us? It is possible that they could because just like the thought that 15 years ago we believed android were just in movies. An example of technology going against humanity is the film Terminator 3. In this movie the humans creates a cyber-network that controlled numerous robots created to protect people and over time it became self-aware and launched an attack on the human race to terminate them. Some humans survived the attack and they fought against the machines to achieve freedom. A well-known computer scientist, in his essay “Why the Future Doesn’t Need Us” Bill Joy expresses, “If our own extinction is a likely, or even possible outcome of our technological development, shouldn't we proceed with great caution?” (New York Times). Congress has approved an amendment which offered to the America COMPETES Reauthorization Act that will help science, technology, engineering and math (STEM) students. If we educate our children to be aware of the consequences that will occur if we are not careful with our technological advances then the destruction of the human race may just be prevented. If all students are to be well educated about the possible technology of the future whatever that may be including androids then I can say that they will make the right decision based on knowledge.

            Technology a key factor to the advancement of war has evolved in the sense that war changes throughout time. War an invention of humanity is commonly accepted by people to resolve international problems. A new age of war is approaching mankind, where robots and machines will fight our wars at the risk that they might have errors. Albert Einstein said, “It has become appallingly obvious that our technology has exceeded our humanity.” Is the advancement of technology beneficial to civilization?

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