{"id":3986,"date":"2005-04-16T09:35:57","date_gmt":"2005-04-16T13:35:57","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.thecarpetbaggerreport.com\/archives\/3986.html"},"modified":"2005-04-16T09:35:57","modified_gmt":"2005-04-16T13:35:57","slug":"rule-by-robots-or-the-religious-right-we-compare-you-decide","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/rule-by-robots-or-the-religious-right-we-compare-you-decide\/","title":{"rendered":"Rule by robots or the Religious Right — we compare, you decide"},"content":{"rendered":"

Guest Post by Morbo<\/a><\/p>\n

Federal Appeals Court Judge Richard A. Posner has penned a new book titled Catastrophe: Risk and Response<\/a>, which examines various disasters that could befall humankind.<\/p>\n

Posner discusses the usual eco-threats — global warming, pandemics, massive earthquakes and so on — but I found his discussion of man-made disasters more interesting, specifically, the possibility that we might someday be enslaved by robots.<\/p>\n

“Superintelligent robots with a silicon or other inorganic base (or an organic one, for that matter) may be the next stage in evolution,” Posner writes. “Human beings may turn out to be the 21st century’s chimpanzees, and if so the robots may have as little use and regard for us as we do for our fellow, but nonhuman, primates. The robots may kill us, put us in zoos, or enslave us, using mind-control technologies to extinguish any possibility of revolt, as in the movie ‘The Matrix.'”<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

(Full confession: I have not read the entire book, just an excerpt in Skeptic magazine<\/a>.)<\/p>\n

At first, I was alarmed by this. But a moment’s reflection caused me to start to wonder if robot overlords might be better than the ones we have now — the Religious Right.<\/p>\n

Let’s face it, America is rapidly becoming a Christian fundamentalist theocracy. If the glazy-eyed followers of some TV preacher or “beat-your-kids-for-Jesus” Christian radio counselor don’t like your end-of-life decision, their minions prod Congress to butt in. And Congress, instead of telling them to go jump in a lake, meets in special session to pass the law. Pharmacists will no longer turn over your birth control pills if Jesus tells them not to. The president wants to spend $2 billion of taxpayer funds on “faith-based” initiatives, and many public schools are afraid to even mention the word “evolution.” Teens are offered Bible stories in lieu of sex education, and courthouses are being redecorated to include huge Ten Commandments displays.<\/p>\n

Rule by robots might be better. Let’s compare the two, shall we?
\n
\nYour Daily Routine<\/i><\/p>\n

Under Robots:<\/b> Day: working in salt mines. Night: posing in zoos for amusement of your robot masters. Weekends: polishing robot overlord<\/p>\n

Under Religious Right:<\/b> Day: watching “700 Club.” Night: church. Weekends: church (with annual break for Promise Keeper meeting) <\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Attitude Toward the Arts<\/i><\/p>\n

Robots:<\/b> Controlling soulless electronic microchips means they have no appreciation of music, art, literature or poetry<\/p>\n

Religious Right:<\/b> Responsible for “Left Behind” novels, “Christian rock” and paintings featuring Jesus welcoming Robert E. Lee into Heaven<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Leadership<\/i><\/p>\n

Robots:<\/b> Will force us to bow to the Robot King, His Excellency Computing Unit XR-23 (powered by Windows XP for Robot Tyrants)<\/p>\n

Religious Right:<\/b> Will force us to bow to President Ralph Reed (powered by good old-fashioned greed)<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

How Will They Deal with Spam?<\/i><\/p>\n

Robots:<\/b> Sophisticated brains and high-tech circuitry may finally figure out a way to stop Russian spammers who keep trying to convince you that your PayPal account has been suspended.<\/p>\n

Religious Right:<\/b> New laws mandate no porn, hence no internet, hence no spam, hence no problem<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Operational Creation Myth that Influences All Decisions<\/i><\/p>\n

Robots:<\/b> Implausible story about a legendary “lost data file” buried on the hard drive of a Radio Shack IBM PC clone, circa 1988<\/p>\n

Religious Right:<\/b> Implausible story about a mercurial God who gave humans free will then punished them for using it<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

New National Beverage<\/i><\/p>\n

Robots:<\/b> WD-40<\/p>\n

Religious Right:<\/b> Welch’s grape juice — just like Jesus drank!<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

A Nice Thing They Might Do for You<\/i><\/p>\n

Robots:<\/b> Implement “Matrix”-like pseudo-universe that at least provides the illusion<\/em> of happiness<\/p>\n

Religious Right:<\/b> Let you skip out early during mandatory viewing of movies starring Kirk Cameron<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

I can only speak for myself, but the robots are looking better all of the time.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Guest Post by Morbo Federal Appeals Court Judge Richard A. Posner has penned a new book titled Catastrophe: Risk and Response, which examines various disasters that could befall humankind. Posner discusses the usual eco-threats — global warming, pandemics, massive earthquakes and so on — but I found his discussion of man-made disasters more interesting, specifically, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[617],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3986","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-general"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3986","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3986"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3986\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3986"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3986"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3986"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}