By this time the public is well aware that a new age of machines is upon us based on the computing machine ... if we move in the direction of making machines which learn and whose behaviour is modified by experience, we must face the fact that every degree of independence we give the machine is a degree of possible defiance of our wishes. 

The genii in the bottle will not willingly go back in the bottle, nor have we any reason to expect them to be well disposed to us. In short, it is only a humanity which is capable of awe, which will also be capable of controlling the new potentials which we are opening for ourselves. We can be humble and live a good life with the aid of the machines, or we can be arrogant and die. — The Machine Age, by Norbert Wiener, version 3, 1949.

PLB

             ***********************************************
The BEE-L mailing list is powered by L-Soft's renowned
LISTSERV(R) list management software.  For more information, go to:
http://www.lsoft.com/LISTSERV-powered.html