(no subject)
I had to get a money order for rent today at 7/11. Bank of America charges more if you have a checking account with actual checks...or at least they did when I set up my account...so it's just easier this way.
I gave the woman $401.
She asked me if I was sure it was all there or would I like her to count it?
I thought it was weird that she wouldn't count it, but I said it was all there and she should do whatever she felt comfortable with.
She said, "The machine will tell me."
She put the dollar bill in the cash drawer. Then she fed the rest of the bills one by one into a machine behind the counter.
"Three-ninety."
I only gave her twenties.
"Three-ninety. The machine doesn't lie. Come look. It says three-ninety."
"But that's impossible. I only gave you twenties."
"The machine doesn't lie."
"They do though. I only gave you twenties, so it couldn't be three-ninety. Did you see any tens in there?"
"The. Machine. Doesn't. Lie."
We went on like this for a little while, until I looked in the envelope again. As it turns out, one of the twenties was still in there. I had given her $380 and she had misread the honest machine. If she had said $380, I would have looked in the envelope immediately, avoiding the argument completely. Human error was to blame, on two counts.
But the thing about it all is, machines do lie. They lie all the time. My phone, right now, says I have one new text message. I don't. It's lying to my face. My computer told me last week that it couldn't open "Help and Support," and that I should open "Help and Support" to fix the problem. A couple days ago I had a painful twenty minute conversation with the Cox automated lady before I was transferred to an actual human. The voice told me she could help me with whatever problem I was having. I could describe the problem in a short phrase and she'd be able to understand and give me the proper solution. She couldn't understand me. She wanted to tell me what my current bill was three times. She thought that she had done a great job, thanked me for calling, and said goodbye. She is a liar. And she is not a she.
We're coming to a weird place in the world now. And, while I love me some sci-fi, my concern is not that machines will develop free will and try to wipe out humanity. Maybe my grandkids will have to worry about robot killers, but I'm not there yet. My fear is how dependent we are becoming on technology. Machines can be more infallible than humans, absolutely. But machines are still designed by humans. So they are subject to human error at some point. And the humans that operate the machines or install them or repair them or read little numbers off of them are also subject to human error. Machines lie. And now we're at a point where we have machine managers. At 7/11, if you need a money order, you answer to the machine. If the machine makes an error, there's no one above it to correct it. It is revered. It doesn't know it's revered. It won't ever purposefully make an error out of spite or because it's trying to keep some extra cash. But it could, at some point, make a mistake. And the people employed at 7/11 may not know to question it. Because all they know is that the machine never lies.
Creepy.
Also creepy? Those commercials for the navy that say they're "working every day to unman the front lines." I get it. It means less deaths for American soldiers. And how can that be a bad thing? But it's like...we build all this fancy technology to go in and destroy the enemy. And pretty soon the enemy is going to catch up and build their own fancy technology to fight our fancy technology. And so we're pouring money into this technology that's designed to destroy other people's technology that other people have poured their own money into. Of course I know it's not that simple, but on a philosophical level it's a bloody waste of resources, and it turns war into even more of a game for the people calling the shots. Push a button, destroy a city. Makes you long for the days when you actually had to be within a few feet of someone to kill them. I don't want our soldiers to die. But I can't deal with the idea of war being something we can all distance ourselves from. That's not an okay mentality, for a person or a government or an entire country, to have.
I don't like it.
I gave the woman $401.
She asked me if I was sure it was all there or would I like her to count it?
I thought it was weird that she wouldn't count it, but I said it was all there and she should do whatever she felt comfortable with.
She said, "The machine will tell me."
She put the dollar bill in the cash drawer. Then she fed the rest of the bills one by one into a machine behind the counter.
"Three-ninety."
I only gave her twenties.
"Three-ninety. The machine doesn't lie. Come look. It says three-ninety."
"But that's impossible. I only gave you twenties."
"The machine doesn't lie."
"They do though. I only gave you twenties, so it couldn't be three-ninety. Did you see any tens in there?"
"The. Machine. Doesn't. Lie."
We went on like this for a little while, until I looked in the envelope again. As it turns out, one of the twenties was still in there. I had given her $380 and she had misread the honest machine. If she had said $380, I would have looked in the envelope immediately, avoiding the argument completely. Human error was to blame, on two counts.
But the thing about it all is, machines do lie. They lie all the time. My phone, right now, says I have one new text message. I don't. It's lying to my face. My computer told me last week that it couldn't open "Help and Support," and that I should open "Help and Support" to fix the problem. A couple days ago I had a painful twenty minute conversation with the Cox automated lady before I was transferred to an actual human. The voice told me she could help me with whatever problem I was having. I could describe the problem in a short phrase and she'd be able to understand and give me the proper solution. She couldn't understand me. She wanted to tell me what my current bill was three times. She thought that she had done a great job, thanked me for calling, and said goodbye. She is a liar. And she is not a she.
We're coming to a weird place in the world now. And, while I love me some sci-fi, my concern is not that machines will develop free will and try to wipe out humanity. Maybe my grandkids will have to worry about robot killers, but I'm not there yet. My fear is how dependent we are becoming on technology. Machines can be more infallible than humans, absolutely. But machines are still designed by humans. So they are subject to human error at some point. And the humans that operate the machines or install them or repair them or read little numbers off of them are also subject to human error. Machines lie. And now we're at a point where we have machine managers. At 7/11, if you need a money order, you answer to the machine. If the machine makes an error, there's no one above it to correct it. It is revered. It doesn't know it's revered. It won't ever purposefully make an error out of spite or because it's trying to keep some extra cash. But it could, at some point, make a mistake. And the people employed at 7/11 may not know to question it. Because all they know is that the machine never lies.
Creepy.
Also creepy? Those commercials for the navy that say they're "working every day to unman the front lines." I get it. It means less deaths for American soldiers. And how can that be a bad thing? But it's like...we build all this fancy technology to go in and destroy the enemy. And pretty soon the enemy is going to catch up and build their own fancy technology to fight our fancy technology. And so we're pouring money into this technology that's designed to destroy other people's technology that other people have poured their own money into. Of course I know it's not that simple, but on a philosophical level it's a bloody waste of resources, and it turns war into even more of a game for the people calling the shots. Push a button, destroy a city. Makes you long for the days when you actually had to be within a few feet of someone to kill them. I don't want our soldiers to die. But I can't deal with the idea of war being something we can all distance ourselves from. That's not an okay mentality, for a person or a government or an entire country, to have.
I don't like it.