When Did We Become Afraid Of Intelligence?

I watched the boxset of "Westworld" recently. In it robots eventually reach consciousness and have to prove it by ... killing everyone. When did it become clever to kill?

When did we become so fucked up?

When did we become afraid of the very things we need to survive and prsoper?

We fear intelligence and we fear change.

We fear intelligence. This is the real reason why we fear artifical intelligence. We're worried that if robots ever became intelligent, they will want to kill us.

When has the destruction of one species by another ever been the intelligent answer?

We didn't kill and eat the Neanderthals because we were more intelligent than them. We ate them because we were more brutal and nastier than they were. Time and again, human civilisations have grown and honoured intelligence - only to be swept out of existence by ignorant savages. How much knowledge has been lost because of the book burners?

When Pol Pot came to power, his first order was to kill all of the intellectuals. Wearing glasses was sufficient evidence of intelligence and a death sentence. He wasn't the first. Lenin did the same. But aren't these the very people you need to re-build society after a war? That probably explains why Cambodia is still on the poverty line as a country.

So why do we fear intelligence?

Why do we blame it for all of our shortcomings?

Credit: The header image is available as wallpaper from wall.alphacoders.com