Robots Unplugged: Will We Face a Man-Machine Conflict?

Man makes robots. Now, a robot has killed a man. Though not the first time, the tragic incident that involved an assembly robot reportedly grabbing a young worker at a Volkswagen plant in Germany and crushing him to death between metal recently has been labelled in some quarters as “a man-machine” conflict (as opposed to the age-old man-animal one). In this context, it is pertinent to reflect on the idea of a possible apocalypse that may be unleashed, if all the science fiction stories we read and movies we watch are to come alive some day.