THE GREAT SCIENTIFIC FUTURE, MINUS PEOPLE

Some scientists just won't let go of the notion that the machines we have created will soon supplant us, an idea as old as Frankenstein. Like a dog with bone, they won't stop chewing on that silly theory. These are the same people who put the first lens in the Hubble space telescope in backwards, mind you, haven't cured a disease since polio back in the 1950's and can't for the life of them come up with a replacement for internal combustion engines, a technology dating to the 1600's. Recently they got all huffy because millions and millions of us didn't drop dead from the swine flu just because they predicted we would. So you've sort of got to take scientists' predictions with a boulder of salt. As far as this "singularity" they predict will happen around the middle of this century, they can't even agree on what it will entail other that the machines surpassing us in intelligence. Well, speak for yourselves, Einsteins.

Some of these guys say that the "Terminator" scenario will occur, with the world's interconnected computers deciding that humanity is obsolete and needs to be exterminated like so many termites. Others say that machines will begin designing and building super-intelligent robots on their own, and doing it so quickly that their evolution will be measured in months, not millennia like every other creature. These new uber-creatures will kill us off and inherit the earth within the space of a decade or two. Exactly how they will accomplish that is open to debate, since we're the ones that are armed to the teeth and have a very long history of killing other creatures and one another on a grand scale, not the imaginary robots. Lots of guys would like nothing more than to shoot the hell out of a bunch of androids.

Still others hold out hope for some sort of chip-enhanced immortality for some humans, getting fitted with all kinds of tiny artificial intelligence implants to super-size our own brains, while replacing our organs and muscles with plastic and steel replacement parts. Naturally the "some humans" they envisage gaining immortality are themselves.This sounds like a lot of wishful thinking on their part and a huge dose of egotism, and some have even said out loud that they hope to preserve their advanced knowledge and valuable expertise for the benefit of mankind, like they are some sort of indispensable people. Naturally no mention is made of their complete lack of any discernible personality, which would be pretty much the same as having that race of robots that others predict. No, thanks.

Who do these people think they're kidding? While the internet and the rise of computers has been a beneficial and world-changing occurrence, these machines haven't yet shown any ambition towards conquest of any sort. Any harm done by machines is done with people running them. So far, of all the thousands of deaths in car crashes, not a single one occurred as the result of a car acting on its own. And as sophisticated as computers are, they don't do a damned thing on their own either. Attributing human treachery to machines is an odd conceit, and pretty nuts. If mankind meets its demise at the hands of machines, it will be with one of us at the controls doing something stupid or malicious.

As far as replacing body parts, doctors seem to be doing just fine using donated human organs, even replacing a couple of faces lately. Sure, we've got some titanium hips, plastic heart valves, pacemakers and the like, but they don't last as long as living human tissue, still the best bet for people. The few dorks that have had chips implanted into their wrists have only succeeded in becoming human GPS devices, with no change in their IQ. Which is too bad since you've got to be pretty stupid to put a GPS chip in your wrist. Just who the hell would care where they are? Might come in handy to avoid them, though.

So far nothing remotely exciting has happened to these fools who can't wait to become human cyborgs like their favorite Star Trek characters. These people need to get out more, mix with regular people a little bit, maybe come to their senses and start working on something useful. There's a few pressing problems where they might want to turn their attention, things like the daily genocide of world hunger that kills a child every 3 seconds. There's still all those pesky deadly diseases they haven't gotten around to curing; cancer, diabetes, AIDS and malaria. There's a worldwide energy shortage, a pollution crisis, a shortage of sanitary fresh water resulting in 6 million deaths a year, all sorts of things that need attention. Maybe those expensive educations could come in pretty handy if our science people could just pull their heads out of their butts and get real.