Robotic machines are now a common part of our lives. Things such as computers, cars and even baseball softball pitching machines are utilized to help us in our everyday life. It’s quite simple to stand inside a batting cage and face a round of balls that appear to be identical to those pitched by a real human. What kind of moral questions do such possibilities bring out? Is it okay to be so reliant on machines? My concern is not with robots taking over our lives in any horror movie sense, I don’t predict batting cages to come to life and try to destroy us all, but our dependence on machines to do the work that was done by humans less than a hundred years ago marks a massive change in the way we live our lives. This behavior is worth pondering.

Obviously, with the creation of the internet, our whole way of thinking has been altered. It’s hard to consider what it would have been like for Native Americans, for example, or even Europeans who lived in a country setting. These people would have seen around only a few hundred people in their lifetime, while we may talk with that many humans within the course of just a year, and the number of faces we see can barely be counted.

While the differences may seem insignificant, it has to be admitted that such a way of living will have effects on our brains themselves. It’s been discovered that the brain is physically changed by the sensations and experiences it receives, so to say what we perceive changes our brain is in no way an exaggeration.

Has the growing use of machines had a positive impact on our lives? If we consider this in terms of convenience and surface happiness, there’s no doubt that it has. It has never been easier to have food and entertainment delivered to our door within minutes of our desire to have them. But this, of course, is only true for those in wealthy situations living in developed countries. In order to exist like this, there are others in non-developed countries who must do the work of making the shoes, connecting the machines and building the boxes. It goes without saying that the majority of these workers will be unfairly paid for their labor, as those in the developed areas would be unwilling to pay a higher price for things which we feel are deserved.

Along with the violation of other humans is the violation of non-human life. The way we treat nature appears to be a near abusive relationship, with man simply taking what they can view around them and claiming it to be his own.

Undoubtedly, such a negative relationship with the world surrounding us has begun to have largely damaging effects on the way we’re able to live our own lives of comfort. When the natural world and machine come into conflict, it is nature that humans will need more in order to go on living. One would hope we are able to see this reality before it’s too late.