11. Trust Sentient Machines
The development of artificial intelligence into a format that truly resembles sentience remains a long way off, but inumerable sci-fi and horror movies have taught us that self-aware technology is something to be wary of. From the retro spaceship computer HAL (2001: A Space Odyssey) to the treacherous androids Ash and David (Alien and Prometheus), the murderous replicants of Blade Runner and the intellegent machines of The Matrix, scare-mongering futuristic narratives commonly portray sentient machines as evil, manipulative or untrustworthy. Perhaps the most dangerous of these is Skynet, an artificial intelligence system that gains self-awareness and, in a fit of self-preservative paranoia, attempts to wipe out humanity. With the internet compounding the ability of sentient machines to establish networks of technological control, an armageddon caused by Skynet-esque machinery is surely looking like a more and more likely outcome.