Máquinas filosóficas

For some decades now, the development of cybernetic machines has brought with it the elimination of millions of jobs in the areas of production and services, to the point that many economists estimate that there will never be a return to a full-employment society. without a drastic reduction in working hours. It is often remembered that some philosophers, such as Karl Marx or Bertrand Russell, had foreseen this situation, but it is forgotten that something quite similar had been raised by Aristotle, Descartes and even Nietzsche himself. In the fourth century before Christ, the first had assured that if the machines could work alone and obey the orders of the lords, these would no longer need to use as "animated instruments" neither the slaves nor the workers. When the division between those who command and those who obey disappeared, a city of free and equal citizens could be founded. Two thousand years later, Descartes would not propose something different. Scientific and technological progress would allow, in his opinion, the advent of a society of gentlemen devoted to study and creation. But this promise began to be put in crisis when other philosophers raised an obvious objection: if automata can replace us, is it not because we are also obedient automatons? Is there a part of us that will never be replaced by automatic devices? From its very origins, philosophy linked the problem of freedom and equality with the question of machines, and this conceptual legacy continues to have consequences today.