Humans Are Being Turned into Robots

I think the contemporary modernity is turning humans into robots because of the two essential reasons: Firstly, we have to follow the chain of repetitive and emotionless string of actions every single day and this completely contradicts the self-creating and self-directed essence of what it means to be human. Really, we just go through our days without giving any thoughts to what we are doing or being exposed. Not suprisingly, the modern world makes us robots, conditioned and programmed. For example, recently, when I called the bank, I realized that it’s really hard to say whether the one talking on the call-center is robot or human at first. Similarly, the rigid schedules, predetermined and timed tasks make us forget how to feel like a human.

We are under the control of a kind of digital ecosystem. When we undergo any kind of negative transformation or simply unable to do what we are asked to do routinely, the ecosystem turns on us in disgust, indignation and humiliation. For example, my brother, as a worker, does not have to think to perform his task, but rather continues to follow his monotonous motions instructed from his boss. Nobody cares about the his satisfaction, desire or feelings. Once his complaint about his unhappiness to his boss, the boss says: “You don’t have to worry about what to feel, I’ll take care of it. Just continue your work”. I think, we have been spending our days working to make another version of ourselves routinely and unconsciously as there will be no need for robots anymore.

Secondly, we are losing human-to-human contact and communication ability and moving into more robotic communication way. Recently, I saw the Robot Sophia interviewing with a journalist on TV. Its communication ability is limited to the words it is given when it is programmed. We are becoming exactly like this, trying to fit ourselves within 140-characters. What’s worse is that we are losing our freedom to express ourselves in any way we want, for example with autocorrect mode in phones. It pushes us to use most common words or phrases which eradicates the individuality, care or thoughtfulness, the hallmarks of human communication, completely. Similarly, we only aim to reach the result that we want to say within the shortest possible way just like robots that are programmed to follow scripts quickly providing information. We’ve already adapted IFTTT (if this, then that) process that robots use which I learned in my psychology class. Namely, we are automating our expressions and feelings. In my phone, I’ve already added lots of shortcuts for very common phrases like “Fine, what about you?”, “I am so sorry”, not to waste time when talking with my friends on Whatsapp to think about how I should respond them. Do they really reflect how I feel, what I like to say? Not possibly.

Therefore, when we really meet with someone and talk face-to-face, we are not able to grasp deep humanistic feelings like empathy, sympathy, pity or affection that the person trying to show us. No worry, though. There will be no need soon as human communication is devolving and becoming more botified/robotic.