What rules: man or machine?

A brand new element has entered the age-old man-machine equation. One refers to what is euphemistically called the computer virus. Some years back, news on the computer front was that a virus had ‘infected’ the drone’s ‘US-based cockpits’. US government officials were reported by news wires to be investigating how it managed to infect the “heavily-protected computer systems at Nevada, where US ‘pilots’ remotely fly the planes on their missions”. Reportedly “the virus had resisted multiple efforts to remove it from Creech’s computers”. What is more important, though, is the principle of the thing. It is now machine versus man, rather than the other way around!

A line or two about technological contraptions in general may be in order. Machines, as most are aware, have come a long way over the past few decades. All one was required to do in those good old days was to click one knob to turn the beastly contraption on, and then to fiddle with the second one in order to achieve whatever it was that one intended to achieve. Alas, that wonderful epoch of simple and uncomplicated living is gone forever. These days, one would be obliged to take private lessons in mastering the operating manual before one can so much as lay a hand on the machine — any machine.

An example or two may not be out of place. Not so very long ago, one had learnt about the invention by Japanese scientists, of a robot having surprisingly special features. This automaton possessed all the attributes of a gentleman’s gentleman. Anyone rich enough to afford one could, thus, become the proud possessor of a mechanised version of the inimitable Jeeves — without the latter’s unpredictable temperament, of course!

At around the same time, the world had also been introduced, through the courtesy of the ever-vigilant press, to the ‘intelligent home’. This dwelling could run automatically and efficiently just with the help of a computer. The refrigerator, for instance, could keep itself stocked automatically by regularly ordering ‘short’ items through the internet. What it amounted to was that the intermediate ‘variable’, aka the housewife, had thereby been neatly eliminated from the equation? Needless to add, the ‘home’ in question could also be run by remote control, if necessary, via a laptop computer. Another one up on the housewife!

All of the aforesaid brings to fore the fundamental question: who operates whom: man or machine? There is no denying that all technological thingamajigs owe their existence to nature’s super-computer — the human brain. And yet why does one continue to have the queasy feeling that it is the machine and not the human being that is calling the shots?

The time may well be at hand for humankind to be wary of its own creation. The critical juncture may thus be upon us when the moving finger points to the need for drawing a line at some point in time and space. Man may be well advised to take cognisance, before it is too late, of the vulnerability of his own position vis-à-vis the machine. The fundamental equation between Man and Machine needs to be defined well and proper and betimes, so that there is no ambiguity as to what (or whom) is the boss?

Needless to add, the treatise afore-stated is perforce founded on the presumption that the world is not about to end in a hurry. This is in itself the moot point. The way the world’s powers that be are behaving all around, though, understandably gives rise to grave doubts as to whether it is safe to accept the said presumption as valid. Given this state of affairs, it may yet be premature to write off the pessimistic scenarios spun by the merchants of doom. The latter may well be in the know of a thing or two, unbeknown to us lesser mortals. And who knows, the Machine may well be destined to eventually come out the winner.

A horrifying thought, that! Nevertheless, as they say, forewarned is forearmed!

Published in The Express Tribune, April 23^rd, 2018.

Like Opinion & Editorial on Facebook, follow @ETOpEd on Twitter to receive all updates on all our daily pieces.