Has Man Made Machines or Machines Made Man?

From centuries, we have learnt that man has developed countless inventions at jet speed in the fields of science and technology. Man, who once lived in the forest in the natural state, is now on the cliff of mechanical advancement. The question that arises today is, “Who made whom? Did man make machine or did machine make man?”

Man invented machines to save time and energy, but has become increasingly dependent on them. While inventions like dishwasher, washing machine and vacuum cleaner make our lives easy, they deprive our body of the physical exercise required to keep us fit. We depend on the calculator for simple mathematical calculations that our ancestors easily performed manually, which proves the reduced thinking efforts used by our brain. Today, we cannot imagine life without the cellphone, and forgetting it at home for a day makes us uncomfortable. We have attached our lives to television, computers, gaming and social networking; however alienated ourselves from the real and beautiful world outside.

I think that while we should certainly accept the benefits of machines and technology for faster growth, we should be careful enough to control our dependency upon them. Otherwise, the day is not far when machines and robots will rule the world, and we as human beings will be their slaves.