

Is A Terminator Scenario Possible? - jpirkola
http://www.hplusmagazine.com/articles/ai/poll-terminator-scenario-possible

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walesmd
To everyone here at HN (because we know SkyNet will be built by someone within
today's hacker community). Please remember to program a kill command in an
area of memory in which SkyNet has no access.

I believe ↑↑↓↓←→←→BA will suffice.

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enomar
I'm much less scared of skynet than I am of a world where robots can do most
of the work. And I'm not talking about building cars. What happens when
computers can write software or manage a company better than humans can? What
place would we have in such a world? How would the economy work?

And what about war? Assuming we don't get "self-aware" machines, it seems like
humans would derive their power based on the capabilities of the computers and
robots they control. Then of course, natural resources also come into play;
you can't build machines without materials and you can't run them without
power. In the end, I think it's much more likely that the war will be humans
with robots versus (other) humans with robots.

~~~
dgallagher
My hunch is that computers won't suddenly outdo humans and overtake the
working world. Rather, I'd imagine that technology will meld with humans.
We'll eventually "technologically-evolve" into hybrid human-machines,
eventually leading up into being completely machine.

Pieces of our bodies and minds will slowly be replaced with enhancements and
superior components as technology evolves. I have no idea what we'll end up
as, but it's probably going to be different than what we are now. Evolution
didn't reach perfection when humans evolved. There are plenty of area's that
can be improved.

The beginnings of this are already happening. Computers are an extension of
our social existence. Technology is getting closer to "jacking in" to the
mind, Matrix-style ([http://www.engadget.com/2007/12/07/researcher-claims-to-
read...](http://www.engadget.com/2007/12/07/researcher-claims-to-read-
thoughts-from-neuronal-activity/)).

So will there be a human vs. robot war, Skynet style? I'd bet probably not.
Skynet turned on, became self-aware unintentionally (AI's one hell of a
"glitch" to code up!), was plugged into the military, and did its thing
instantly.

AI of that magnitude probably won't come-about suddenly. Rather, gradually,
like in evolution. It'll probably be built into us as it evolves. So if
Skynet-level AI does develop, each human mind will probably already have its
own copy running locally. It'll be pretty tricky for 1 instance of Skynet to
outsmart 10 billion other instances and take over the planet...

~~~
enomar
Interesting thoughts. I can't imagine that humans will uniformly adopt such
modifications to their bodies. Even if everyone could afford it, many would be
skittish about the idea. Things may happen slow enough for social norms to
change, but technology seems to advance faster than we can adapt to it. It
will be interesting to see how "augmented" people treat the non-augmented (and
vice-versa). We could see a more extreme version of the "digital divide".

