Ethan Hubbell

Nicholas Joslin

Brody Noreen

Jakob Peacock

Mr. Gross

English 11 B (2)

February 23, 2018

Artificial Insecurities

For thousands of years mankind has evolved. At one time cavemen first struck flint

against stone and created fire. Over hundreds of years mankind learned and adapted, fastening

tools from stone and building small civilizations. Massive Empires and time withstanding world

wonders were constructed. The human race put there blood sweat and tears into their work.

Blacksmiths spent hours beating red hot metal into tools and weapons, there was pride in their

work. Michelangelo chiseled David out of marble. Humankind worked for a living, actually

caring about what they made. Today soulless machines crank away, assembling cheaply made

products by the hundreds. Artificial intelligence test and approve toys, cars, computers. In the

modern day machine outnumbers the working men or women. Machines have no pride, no soul,

they are made to carry out their functions and nothing more. Jobs that used to be for the people,

now are carried out by machines. Where fighter pilots used to fight wars, now there is drones.

Instead of a man on the moon, nations send robots. Before humankind is rendered obsolete, there

needs to be a change. Businesses should have regulations on machine to man ratios. People

should be in charge of defense and major decision making in the international political scheme.

Machines should be a tool to help humankind not its replacement.

 Machinery has historically been a major player in unemployment. As time progresses

humans become more and more dependent on machinery and soon to be artificial intelligence.

Through the ages the increase of technological advancements have made it so humans have less

work to do from the printing press to any automobile, essentially making mankind useless.

Humans rely heavily on machinery and in turn AI as they are superior in many ways, from cost

efficiency to how well they can do certain jobs, making humans inferior or obsolete to them. As

this continues human resources will no longer be needed in the future, “The promise is that

intelligent machines will be able to do every task better and more cheaply than humans.” (arXiv,

Emerging Technology). Machines and AI exceed human abilities through their processing power

and inability to become exhausted making them a liable option to replace or take over working

from human workers. People are overly dependent on machines taking control and doing

everything for them, unaware that machines are taking over their lives because they are better at

going through them. Mankind is becoming obsolete to machines and AI because of an efficiency

difference between the two at a cheaper price. Machinery is keeping humans from achieving and

forcing them to be lazy.

The fact that the younger generation known as the millennials are typically seen by the

majority as the lazy generation. This in turn affects how the business owners weigh the pros and

cons of hiring younger people or if they should just go with technology.”The youngest

generation of American workers is entering the workplace amid accusations that they are self-

centered, unable to take criticism and unschooled in the art of working hard:” (Atchison, Chris).

This shows that the younger generation has already earned the reputation as a bunch of bums.

This can affect how the employers in businesses especially factories higher workers and if the

lack of young workers wanting to work is low some businesses may take a look into getting
robots to replace the workers. The way employers see the minimum wage also has an effect on

how they hire workers “An increase to the minimum wage would provide an incentive for

employers to invest in automated processes, technology, and machinery to increase productivity

rather than human resources” this means that they would be considering moving to the AI for

replacing the lost productivity that is seen in factories (Doyle, Alison).

 Artificial Intelligence is supposed to be shown to be “artificial” and with that thinking

people may think that the AI may not be able to think for themselves, but when AI is in

everything that is used on a day to day basis it is hard to think they it really can not think for

themselves. In 2016 Lee Sedol, one of the world’s best players of Go, lost a match in Seoul to a

computer program called AlphaGo

by four games to one which seems

ridiculous but it proves that AI is

starting to think for themselves to

minimize the chances of failure.

This is all important because if the

machine is in control of a

production unit and develops a

program that says it does not need

to produce for people than it will stop everything it was doing and work on minimizing

production. “Google has announced another big push into artificial intelligence, unveiling a new

approach to machine learning where neural networks are used to build better neural networks”

(Nield David) which means this AI can actually think itself a body,face, and teach itself tasks

like how to walk and even speak. This is where it starts to get interesting, with the AI starting to

think, speak, and create it can start to take certain jobs that humans do on a day to day basis like

teaching,coaching, and even cooking in this case. Robots already create things like car parts and

perform tasks such as surgery so the start of them creating their own mind schemes will put

humans at a disadvantage in superiosity.

 While there are those who detest the outmodeding of humanity, some embrace this risky

change. There are two sides to this fierce debate, each one providing strong counterpoints

towards one another. Many forward thinkers of the new era of technology clash with the older

generation of which still powers the vast majority of the workforce. On the website wired, there

is such an argument. “Jobs humans can do but robots can do even better. Humans can weave

cotton cloth with great effort, but automated looms make perfect cloth, by the mile, for a few

cents. The only reason to buy handmade cloth today is because you want the

imperfections”(Kelly Kevin). As stated in this citation, humanity is flawed, and prone to making

mistakes. While at the same time, a machine can make the same product flawlessly, faster and

cheaper. What this means is that humanity is flawed, and always will be. The people who hold

these views have an emotionless schizoid perspective on automation. While they claim

machinery is better in every way, there are vast drawbacks. One needs to look to the past

achievements of humanity. One of the greatest art pieces of all time, was made by a man,

depicting a man, and his sacrifice. This was Michelangelo's Pieta. “Here is perfect sweetness in

the expression of the head, harmony in the joints and attachments of the arms, legs, and trunk,

and the pulses and veins so wrought, that in truth Wonder herself must marvel that the hand of a

craftsman should have been able to execute so divinely and so perfectly, in so short a time, a

work so admirable; and it is certainly a miracle that a stone without any shape at the beginning

should ever have been reduced to such perfection as Nature is scarcely able to create in the flesh.

Such were Michelangelo's love and zeal together in this work” (Michelangelo Pieta). The utter

masterpiece that was Pieta was forged with love and compassion from a human being. To create

a wonder to transcend centuries with such grace, this was Michelangelo's legacy. What value

would this timeless artifact have, if it were an automated project shot out from an inhuman a.i.
When something is made by a man, for all mankind, it holds a priceless value, one beyond

words. When blood, sweat, and tears are poured into work the value is their. Mankind should not

let itself become second hand to machines. And imperfection is what makes humanity so

endeering. An achievement by man last lifetimes, machines get outmoded, and forgotten.

In the modern day machine outnumbers the working men or women 10 to one in

production and even in use for the modern age, considering that According to mardrial C more

than 90% of adults in the world have a phone which is considered an AI. with this thought the

conclusion Of the argument is really quite simple, AI is needed in this world there is no doubt

about it but how much that humans depend on it is what needs to change. Without change the

amount of jobs that are left for people will decline significantly with a AI becoming smarter and

only program to replace humans there needs to be a different goal in front of the creation of more

AI. AI is made to help people not make it so that people need to be dependent on it, AI is a tool

and nothing more if it has a opportunity 2 control more than production then it will make it so

that machines thrive and living organisms will fall.

Works Cited

Atchison, Chris. “Lazy Worker or Flawed Work Culture?” The Globe and Mail, Special to The

Globe and Mail, 24 Aug. 2012, www.theglobeandmail.com/report-on-business/small-

business/talent/lazy-worker-or-flawed-work-culture/article4260677/.

Doyle, Alison. “Should the Minimum Wage Be Raised?” The Balance,

www.thebalance.com/pros-and-cons-of-raising-the-minimum-wage-2062521.

Kelly, Kevin. “Better Than Human: Why Robots Will - And Must - Take Our Jobs.” Wired,

Conde Nast, 24 Dec. 2012, www.wired.com/2012/12/ff-robots-will-take-our-jobs/.

Kelly, Kevin. “Better Than Human: Why Robots Will - And Must - Take Our Jobs.” Wired,
 Conde Nast, 24 Dec. 2012, www.wired.com/2012/12/ff-robots-will-take-our-jobs/.

“Michelangelo's Pieta.” ItalianRenaissance.org, 13 Dec. 2016,

www.italianrenaissance.org/michelangelos-pieta/.

Nield, David. “Google Researchers Are Teaching Their AI to Build Its Own, More Powerful

AI.” ScienceAlert, www.sciencealert.com/google-is-improving-its-artificial-intelligence-

with-artificial-intelligence.

Staff, Wired. “Robot Taught to Think for Itself.” Wired, Conde Nast, 2 Aug. 2011,

www.wired.com/2011/08/robot-thinking-autonomy/.

arXiv, Emerging Technology from the. “Experts Predict When Machines Will Be Better than

You at Your Job.” MIT Technology Review, MIT Technology Review, 31 May 2017,

www.technologyreview.com/s/607970/experts-predict-when-artificial-intelligence-will-

exceed-human-performance/.

“The Latest AI Can Work Things out without Being Taught.” The Economist, The Economist

Newspaper, 21 Oct. 2017, www.economist.com/news/science-and-technology/21730391-

learning-play-go-only-start-latest-ai-can-work-things-out-without.