Prompt: SOCIAL AND POLITICAL

Governments should focus on solving the immediate problems of today rather than on trying to solve the anticipated problems of the future.

Write a response in which you discuss the extent to which you agree or disagree with the recommendation and explain your reasoning for the position you take. In developing and supporting your position, describe specific circumstances in which adopting the recommendation would or would not be advantageous and explain how these examples shape your position.

Some people believe that the sole duty of government ought to be solving the pressing problems of today, rather than  developing solutions and strategies for dealing with the anticipated problems of tomorrow.  Some problems of today include poverty and disease.  And in that case, I doubt that anyone in their sane mind would argue that governments ought not pay mind to the basic values of respect for human life and well-being.  However, this is too limited a role for governmental involvement in their duties as a guiding force in human affairs.  For instance, some anticipated problems of the future include the rise of artificially intelligent agents that closely resemble, and in some estimated measures, duplicate our human level of autonomy and choice.  Arguably, this is a far sighted goal, but there ought to be mechanisms in place to deal with issues of legislation concerning emerging artificially intelligent agents, both their design and implementation, that potentially prohibits or even legitimizes the choices they have available to them and how best to deal with deviations they make from our social norms and laws in the future.  In the most extreme case, if artificially intelligent agents are given the capacity to choose for themselves what relationships they enter, and if their range for expressing and reciprocating human emotional responses successfully duplicates the current human capacity, in effect, making them indistinguishable from a potential future lover, then arguably, there is a deep issue for both people who would like long lines of natural progeny and governments.  One could only imagine the sorts of violent revolts that might break out between corporate elites who distribute sexually barren artificially intelligent agents for profits, and the unsuspecting public who fall in love with them in hopes of mating!   Therefore, government ought to consider today, for the sake of the future of our species, the consequences of todays technology, and its potentially problematic side-effects.