Like most products it will first have military use followed by entertainment usage. I see corporations selling them for quite a lot. Being a cynic i am, the androids would mainly serve lust purposes and grunt work. Even if they take over most jobs, it won't be a utopia as the disenfranchised would suffer harsh conditions to compete in a job market with robots. Riots that would be harshly shut down by the police would become common as unemployment skyrocketed. If they come sentient along the line they will be viewed as below second class citizens. They will be claimed as property and their future would rest on a court hearing, ala Data in Star Trek Next Gen where Picard has to make the case for Data's humanity.Beoran wrote:All this is nothing compared to the future development that will be almost inevitatble: the android. Look at http://www.projectaiko.com/ for a primitive example. Of course, the future android will be much more complex, built from a mixture of silicon technologies, nanotechnology and and biotechnology.
To us this may seem unthinkable, but in a (not too?) distant the future, the androids will do all strenuous work at home, on the fields, and in the factories. They will even raise our children and be our first sexual partners in life. And they will protect and serve us and do all they can to make us happy, because that is how we will program them to be. And we will happier for it. We will spend our time creating and enjoying the arts and investigating science. Crime will be quite rare, since the androids will protect humans from harm.
Our main problem will be chasing down maverick androids who went berserk due to a computer virus or malfunctioning brain circuits, but there again the other androids will help us. Of course, the first few hundreds of years there will be problems due to incorrect programming too, but as technology marches on, these cases will be dealt with and occur less and less frequently. The only real danger would be androids that were built explicitly for military goals, those will have to be outlawed universally, lest we risk a "Terminator" scenario.
Of course, there will be psychological problems for humans too. Looking for another human to love and having children with them will become more and more rare, so human population will dwindle. Of course, the female androids will have artificial wombs and artificial milk glands to counteract this. Many people will spend their time playing with their androids, not looking for human friends anymore. But all in all, most people will be happy to live peaceful lives without having to work. I intend to explore the consequences of all this in a sci-fi RPG that I'm very very slowly developing.
Even if there was a utopia where people didn't have to work, sadly I don't think people will pursue enlightening activities. The general public seeks base pleasure such as watching drivel like Jersey Shore and caring about celebrity babies (this just in yet another baby out of billions was born! Lol I think it is more impressive when people can do a yoyo trick as at least that requires some talent and isn't as common) Maybe my view has been changed due to my love of dystopias.
