WHAT SORT OF WORLD WILL YOUR GRANDCHILDREN LIVE IN?

Advances in technology have often been sudden and unexpected.  Their speed and acceleration are exemplified by the fact that in one lifetime, people born before airplanes were invented saw, on television, men landing on the moon with 1960s technology.  Unpredicted was the invention and wide use of desktop computers, which not even the writers of science fiction had foreseen.

I have a memory of watching a television show as a child, hearing my parents remark that I had no idea of what life had been like before there were any televisions to watch.  I do remember a time before microwave ovens and pocket transistor radios.

As I was playing with my grandchildren, watching them use gadgets that did not exist when I was their age, it occurred to me that they had been born into an era where technology was influencing their lives, their attitudes, and their expectations in ways that we might scarcely imagine.

What’s next for them?

The biggest emerging technologies include the innovation of artificial intelligence (A.I.).  It is today what the airplane was, when it first flew (and for only a few yards) in 1903.  A.I.’s ramifications are even more poorly understood than were those of Orville’s and Wilbur’s motorized kite.

The small children of today will likely see their own children being served by robot nannies.  They may never need to learn to drive a car, as self-driving vehicles may become the standard.

If there is another major war, the opening battles may be fought entirely between the drones and robots of the opposing armies.  That may seem like a good idea at first, but soon thereafter, robots will be empowered to make “kill decisions” against humans.  If the order is given to cease fire, will the robots obey their human masters?

Will humans still be their masters?

As your grandchildren become adults, they may find themselves dating “love-bots,” perhaps seeking the right to legally marry them.

There are already early indications of a “robot rights” movement.  As absurd as that sounds, serious discussions center on the question: Can computers become conscious?  They cannot, but they can so persuasively mimic an actual human that some users of A.I. actually “fall in love” with chatbots.  Just as a man can appear to be a woman, so also can people be persuaded that a robot has achieved sentience.  If a computer is conscious, is it not murder to unplug it?

Aside from standalone robots, human enhancement technology is another area of unpredictable advances.  It is already possible to electronically stimulate the brain to prevent seizures.  The future implantation of computer chips in brains for other purposes might not be far off.

Relief of pain and cures for depression seem possible, but more sinister applications also enter the picture.  Thought control is avidly sought by totalitarian regimes.  The same technology that might relieve pain can also inflict it (see Revelation 9:5-6), perhaps as a form of punishment for “wrongthink.”

A particularly disruptive technology combines human genes with animal genes.  If that is perfected, it may become possible to produce human-gorilla hybrids, creatures intelligent enough to be taught tasks that no human can perform.  Such creatures could be denied the protections of anti-slavery laws.  This, along with “robot rights,” could result in a redefinition of what it is to be human.

Travel to other planets and moons may be accomplished by sending robots as explorers and advance construction parties to set up bases habitable for humans.

All of these possibilities occur to us in the fog of the present, soon to become the recent past.  The future is misty.  As the saying goes, we do not know what we do not know.  Future discoveries and developments may be just around the corner, waiting there to surprise and astonish us.

Let us hope and pray that those surprises will be pleasant.

Robert Arvay is the author of The God Paradigm.