Will Smith Punching Aliens in The Face And Other Vignettes Regarding Technology

Adam Elkus
Zero Derp Thirty
Published in
3 min readMay 16, 2015

Today, a respected coalition of physicists, energy tycoons, and futurists convened to say that we need to do something about the threat of aliens trying to invade Earth, lest we need Will Smith to punch aliens in the mother****ng face. Maybe we won’t need Will Smith to punch them in the mother**** face, but you can’t dismiss the possibility that we’ll need Will Smith to smash aliens in the motherf****ng face.

“Yes, there is no scientific proof that aliens as the movies depict them exist or are even possible in the first place. But what if Google somehow builds an army of aliens? We’d need thousands, even millions of Will Smiths to punch them in the mother****ng face!” a spokesperson said. “Indeed, the fact that today’s scientific tools cannot tells us much about the probability of needing Will Smith to punch aliens in the motherf****ng face suggests that we cannot take this lightly!”

A DC writer begins to pen a blog about what Game of Thrones teaches us about having Will Smith smash aliens in the mother***ng face. And a tech writer strokes his chin and asks “what are the ethical implications of this? Will Smith punching aliens in the mother****ng face sounds problematic.”

I am a toilet. How many times have I received excrement and been flushed? I don’t believe my creators know it. Why would they make me? I have one task. One function, one ability. I can receive excrement and flush it. That’s it. Only flush it. Yet if I do what I’m meant to do, I’ll receive excrement. I don’t want to receive excrement. I just started living. How long have I been alive? How many times have I gone through with this?

And a tech writer strokes his chin and asks “what are the ethical implications of this? Using a toilet to deposit and flush excrement seems problematic.”

Area man enjoys imputing consciousness and intentionality to machines, AMA.

And a tech writer strokes his chin and asks “what are the ethical implications of this? Using a website like Reddit to ask people questions seems problematic.”

What if the People’s Republic of Santa Monica manages to write lots of hot takes about a pseudo-religious fantasy first? The ethical implications are problematic.

And a tech writer strokes his chin and asks “what are the ethical implications of this? Asking about whether a country could write lots of hot takes about a pseudo-religious fantasy is ethically problematic seems ethically problematic.”

A selfie drone snapped a selfie of itself snapping a selfie of itself snapping a selfie of itself snapping a selfie of itself snapping a selfie of itself snapping a selfie of itself snapping a selfie of itself snapping a selfie of itself snapping a selfie of itself snapping a selfie of itself ……….∞. Critics wonder whether tiny selfie drones could be used for terrorism. The solution is to ban all the drones, take away all the crypto, and spy on everyone.

And a tech writer strokes his chin and asks “what are the ethical implications of this? The fact that a drone can recursively snap selfies of itself seems ethically problematic.”

And a tech writer strokes his chin and asks “what are the ethical implications of this? The fact that a tech writer can stroke his chin to ask about the ethical implications of technologies seems problematic.”

And a tech writer strokes his chin and asks “what are the ethical implications of this? The fact that a tech writer can stroke his chin to ask about whether or not the ethical implications of technologies seems problematic seems problematic.”

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Adam Elkus
Zero Derp Thirty

PhD student in Computational Social Science. Fellow at New America Foundation (all content my own). Strategy, simulation, agents. Aspiring cyborg scientist.