I saw a Bruce Willis movie called Surrogate a few weeks ago that was pretty good. It was about a near future where people could buy a “drone” human machine they could control from the comfort of their home. Eventually, almost everyone was at home and all the people in your office, driving on the freeway, etc., were actually these “surrogates”.
But the military part was interesting. A truck full of surrogates would be parked next to the battlefield and the controllers would be somewhere else. A man would control a surrogate into battle and when it was “killed”, they’d give him control of another one in the truck. It would hop out and join the battle until it too was damaged. The same guy would be given a new surrogate, and so on...
This just brings up something I’ve been cognizant of since the 80’s. That is, in 1969 I was amazed that some people that lived in the covered wagon days got to see a man land on the moon. Yet I have seen far more change in my life than any of them did. And what my children are going to see is beyond my comprehension. And so on.
It cannot go on much longer. In the past there was little, if any, non-political change from generation to generation. It has gotten to the point where we see more change in five years than there was in five generations, and it is only accelerating. Human beings cannot handle that sort of environment without cracking, either individually or collectively. We see it all around us and it too is accelerating.
I love technology but believe it is a two edged sword. And more and more it is becoming clear that the wrong edge is the sharp one.
I recall a science fiction story from years ago, "Gottlos", about the use of remotely operated battlefield machines (visualize a tank with arms). The objective was to get behind the enemy's lines to get at the place they had the human operators stashed.