10 Times Doctor Who Accidentally Predicted Our Future
5. Our Over-Reliance On Computer Systems
The 1967 serial The Ice Warriors was influenced by the spectre of a nuclear winter and the resultant food shortages. While those are still very pressing concerns in the present day, another element of the story sticks out more in retrospect: the base in which the story takes place is incredibly reliant on computers, something which may lead to their downfall.
The base's leader Clent is, like many a social media and streaming service user today, a slave to machine learning. He will not make a decision on anything unless he's consulted the computer first. This horrifies the Doctor, who insists on making his own calculations. It's clearly writer Brian Hayles responding to the massive, imposing computers of the period. However, in today's Twitter-obsessed generation where original thought is a rare commodity, it's easy to concede that he may have had a point.
The Doctor saves the day by convincing Clent to go against the advice of the computer, and use the weather-controlling "ioniser" to defeat the advancing Ice Warriors. The message of the serial's climax is that it's healthy to question the algorithm and take a risk every now and then. Advice worth heeding!