Our Worst-Best Friends

I never believed that it was possible for all of those Syfy movies to come true, the ones where robots begin to take over the world.  However, the first few chapters of Alone Together definitely started to freak me out.  I never realized or put into perspective how intimate our interactions with robot-like objects are.  From a young age, we have been conditioned to believe that it is okay to actually interact with robotic toys.  The book mentions Tamagotchis, Furbys, AIBO dogs, etc to prove that our generation has been around these robots for longer than we realized.  I remember being so confused as a kid when I played with my electronic 20 Questions game.  I never understood how a little computer object could guess exactly what was on my mind, even when I thought I was being tricky.  But that's the whole point Sherry Turkle is trying to make, right?  I tried outsmarting a robot toy, actually believing that it was playing mind games with me.  This point the author has made frightens me a little.  What is next in our world?  Robotic friends, adopted family member robots, robotic teachers, or even robot doctors?  The very idea of it seems absurd, but I am almost positive that some of these topics are already being worked on.  My mind can't help but wander to the negative effects of this on our society.  Children can start developing social disorders, and not know how to interact with their peers or adults around them.  Adults will become reliant on these robots to watch the children, and our entire social system will begin depending on these objects that have no feelings or actual intellect/experience.  But scientists will pay no mind to this, because everyone is after the newest and craziest technologies.  Why cut supply when demand is up?  Well I'll tell you why: because our world should never be taken over by robots.