Jason Torchinsky is a guest blogger on Boing Boing. Jason has a book out now, Ad Nauseam: A Survivor’s Guide to American Consumer Culture. He lives in Los Angeles, where he is a tinkerer and artist and writes for the Onion News Network. He lives with a common-law wife, five animals, too many old cars, and a shed full of crap.
This article from the NY Times is a great read for those of you who feel, what with the lack of jetpacks and pizzas-in-a-pill, the present just really isn’t the future you’d been promised. This is an article in a major, established, old-school publication talking about established scientists hand-wringing about how the robots we’re building may become smarter than us, and, um, take over.
It’s a fascinating thought, and one that a number of years ago still seemed well within the realm of science fiction. Autonomy has come very far in recent years, and the use of armed, semi-autonomous drones is now commonplace; it just makes sense for scientists and technologists to start thinking about some of these big issues now.
So, don’t kick your Roomba.
( Also, it’s interesting to take a look at where this all really started.)