We have to face these questions, because with technological advances, they may become our reality in the future.
1. When self driving cars finally develop and are used more frequently, what set of ethics will we teach them?
If the car has three options, (a) swerve to avoid an oncoming car and run over on old lady, (b) swerve to avoid an oncoming car and run over a little girl, or (c) hit the young male driving the oncoming car, which do we teach the car to do?
2. What will we do when the majority of all jobs, like 80-90%, are performed by machines? How will people make a living?
If society and technology reach a point where most of our jobs are being performed by robots, then how will society function? Will people just turn into giant blobs who do nothing but eat ice cream and watch Netflix? Will we turn into humans similar to those in the kids' movie Wall-E? Or will we find some alternative lifestyle? What about income? If there are few jobs, then where will the income necessary for supporting life even come from?
3. What will we do when advancements in genetic engineering allow parents to choose their ideal child or inject non-human genes into the human genome?
What are the ethical implications of creating new humans that are designed to be a certain way? Are they their own person? Or are they a human that was programmed to be a certain way and therefore the product of parental design? What about injecting non-human or animal genes? Are you truly human if your genes are mixed with a different species?
4. What will happen when you can access the internet in your head with a chip or a piece of technology that has been surgically implanted into the cranium?
What If you could access the internet or access larger quantities of information stored in a chip that has been implanted into one's own brain; if you had this capability, how would this change learning, testing, and professions that require little skill but lots of head knowledge? Would this ultimately produce progression of regression?
5. What will be the economic impact of mining natural resources from asteroids and bringing them into the earth market place?
There are many who believe that some natural resources and elements that are extremely rare and valuable here on earth are in fact plentiful in space, some asteroids potentially containing tons of rare elements that could be sold on earth. How would this impact the global market and how could this affect the advancement of technology?
6. What will happen if heavier regulations and laws surrounding the internet are passed that made most internet users multiple time felons without even knowing it?
If your regular use of the Internet legally caused you to have multiple misdemeanors or felonies, would keep using the Internet? I think most of us would still use it because of our dependence on it and regular use of it, but what kind of power does that give the authorities, the government? Perhaps you hold a belief that is contrary to what is held by the State, of perhaps you are outspoken against a particular administration, it what be convenient if the State could charge you with actually felonies.
7. What will happen if North Korea builds and fires a nuclear weapon at or into the United States?
The ruler of North Korea is a lunatic and he is also looking to get a nuclear weapon - that's not a very good combination. He also has a grudge against the United States - really not good. So how do we react if they succeed and fire the bomb or actually hit us with the bomb? What is the appropriate response or preparation?
8. How will we respond when babies no longer need to grow in the mother's womb, but can grow in an artificial womb in a test tube?
What makes us human? Many things or many factors to be sure, but is one of them being born from our mothers? If it is, than what happens if someone is grown and created in a lab, in a test tube, like a plant, animal, bacteria, or virus, then do we lose that? How should we react if this came to be?
9. With the advancement and further developments in AI, what elements of our daily life will we no longer manage?
For those of us who have seen Iron Man, we have no doubt been fascinated by Tony Stark's AI known as JARVIS. This artificial intelligence can learn and take orders while helping Stark with the Iron Man suit. But what if you had AI in your home, what if many of our daily chores, maintenance, and scheduling were handled by an AI? How would our daily lives change?
The future holds some uncertainty. How will we react to these questions that may possibly happen in our future?
