The US is stagnating. If one looks beyond the digital world our Nation is rapidly losing prominence technologically, culturally, and in thought. The optimistic among us believe artificial intelligence (AI) and robots will save the day. Perhaps, if we lived in a society guided by virtuous missions and goals, and more importantly ethical thinking. Instead, I think the result will reflect the current degraded state western civilization.
This week the US Army heralded with great fanfare AI robotic dogs equipped with machine guns. They do look like potential weapons of war, but even more like enforcers of brutal totalitarianism. Combine these with AI drone swarms, hyper digital surveillance and quantum computing, oh buddy, we are heading into something more terrifying than imagined. The potential for domestic use by unscrupulous federal intelligence and police, along with psychotic politics, should terrify everyone. Defining the mission is important when it comes to AI and robots. For instance, in the democrat infrastructure bill there is more than $70 billion set aside for the IRS to develop a system to track all banking transactions above $600, clearly targeting the middle class. An IRS report admits that they target poorer taxpayers. This new federal investment in the IRS will increasingly surveil previously private financial transactions and glean every penny of potential tax revenue from undesirables. The IRS has been caught targeting organizations in the past, and since adopting Modern Monetary Theory in which taxes are used NOT as form of revenue, but as means to penalize undesirable behavior; it is only a matter of time before these technologies go from surveillance and data, to unmerciful instruments of oppression. The plot line is known, you’ve probably have seen it in movies.
I am not sure what the citizens of western civilization are fighting each other for. The inane right/left paradigm, particularly as expressed in our decadent political climate, looks increasingly silly as the screws of totalitarianism resulting in certain tragedy get tighter and tighter everyday.