【１】歴史家の専門の仕事というものは、それを歴史家がどう理解するにせよ、たんに人間だけでなく、この地球上のあらゆる生命に本来的にそなわった限界や欠陥の一つたる一種の自己中心性を是正しようとする一つの試みだといえるのである。【２】歴史家がその専門的な見解に到達するためには、なによりもまず、みずからも一人の人間として免れることのできないこの自己中心的な観点から、意識的に、また意図的に、その視角をそらそうとつとめなければならないのである。
　【３】自己中心性の地上の生において果す役割はいわば両面価値的なものである。一方では、自己中心性はあきらかに現世の生の本質をなすものと考えられる。【４】生あるものは、たとえささやかな付随的なものにせよ、事実この宇宙を構成する一片の分子だと定義することもできるのであって、しかもそれが、部分的にせよ他のものから解放され、【５】さらにこの宇宙の他のものをじぶんの利己的な目的に添わせるように、あらん限りの努力をはらう一個の自律的な力として独立しているというような一種の「はなれわざ」を演じているものだとも考えられるのである。【６】つまり、それぞれの生あるものはみな競ってみずからを宇宙の中心たらしめんとしているのであり、その際、他のあらゆる生あるものと、またこの宇宙そのものと、さらにこの宇宙を創造し維持している万能の力――このつかの間の現象下にひそむ実在にほかならない万能の力――とも張り合おうとしているのだということになるのである。【７】このような自己中心性は、すべて生あるものの存在に欠くべからざるものであるために、その生活の必要条件の一つとなっているのであるが、もしかりに完全に自己中心性を放棄するということにでもなれば、【８】（たとえそれが生そのものの消滅を意味することにはならないにしても）およそ生あるいかなるものも、まさにこの時、この場所において生をいとなむためのあの媒介手段をも、同時に完全に喪失することになるであろう。【９】そしてこのような心理的な真実への洞察が、仏教の知的な出発点となっているのである。
　このように、自己中心性は生の一つの必要条件なのであるが、しかしこの必要条件は、同時にまた一つの罪でもあるのである。【０】つまり自己中心性は、この世に生をうけたいかなるものも実は一つとして宇宙の中心たりえないものだとしてみれば、知的にも一つの誤りであり、またみずからが宇宙の中心ででもあるかのように行動で∵きる権利など、なに一つとしてもつものがないとしてみれば、それは道徳的にも誤りなのである。およそ生あるいかなるものも、おなじ仲間たる被造物にしろ、また宇宙にしろ神もしくは実在にしろ、まるでそれらが一個の自己中心的な被造物の要求にこたえるためにのみ存在してでもいるかのようにこれをみなしていい権利などすこしももたないはずなのである。このような誤った信念をもち、これにもとづいた行動をすることは、（これをギリシアの心理学の言葉に従えば）倨傲の罪と呼ばれるもので、この倨傲とは、（生の悲劇がキリスト教の神話のなかにあらわれているのに従えば）大魔王サタンがみずから奈落に墜るにいたったあの法外な、罪深い、自殺的な驕慢にほかならないのである。
　このように自己中心性が生の必要条件であるばかりでなく、同時に因果応報を伴う一つの罪でもあるとしてみると、すべて生あるものは、終生ぬけさることのできない窮境におちいっていることになる。生あるものが、その生命を維持することができるのも、ただそれが自己主張のあげくの自殺をも、また自己放棄からくる安楽死をも、ともにどうにかして避けることができる限りにおいてであり、またその間においてのみなのである。この中道は、剃刀の刃のように狭い道で、そこを通ってゆく旅人は、その道の両側の二つの深淵へとひかれる力によって、たえず極度の緊張を感じつつ、用心深く平均を保ちつづけなければならないのである。
　生あるものにその自己中心性の課している問題は、それゆえ生死の問題となるのであり、それはあらゆる人間がたえずつきまとわれている問題なのである。歴史家のものの見方にしても、この恐るべき挑戦に応えようとして人間が心に装ういくつかの道具のなかの一つにほかならないのである。
　
　（Ａ・Ｊ・トインビー「歴史家の宗教観」）

We stand now at the beginning of the age of robots. There are some 25,000 robots in the world and it is estimated that by 1990 there will be about 115,000.
What makes them important, even in their present simplicity, is the kind of work they can do, now or soon. They can take on dangerous tasks or withstand dangerous conditions, which human beings would much prefer to avoid and yet which, till now, they have been forced to engage in. Robots will be working in space, in mines, under water; they will deal with explosives, radioactive material, poisonous chemicals, pathogenic bacteria, unusual temperatures, pressures, heights and so on.
Most of all, they can do work which, while not physically dangerous, is so repetitious and dull that it stultifies and debases any human mind that must engage in it for long periods of time.
This mind-damaging work is just right for robots, which can engage in it indefinitely, without getting bored or sullen; they can also do it more reliably and correctly. As a result, human beings, liberated from such subhuman work, will be free to turn to more creative endeavors.
And yet, before we grow too happy over this prospect, let us remember that to be "liberated from an undesirable job" might well be translated into "thrown out of work." A job might seem undesirable to someone viewing it from outside, but to the person working at it, it is a livelihood. The robot brings with it, in other words, the threat of technological unemployment and with that, the loss of economic security and the disappearance of self-respect.
One might argue that technological advance has always been with us and that history shows that such advance produces many more jobs than it destroys. The coming of the automobile put a number of blacksmiths and buggy manufacturers out of business and decreased the need for whips and hay. It created, however, a far greater number of automobile-related jobs, and vastly expanded and broadened the need for gasoline, rubber and highways.
And yet there are dangers more dramatic than that of unemployment. Might not human beings be killed by robots? Might robots be designed and programmed to be warriors? Might the machines of destruction that now fight our battles be made the more horrible with the aid of computerization?
To be sure, human beings have turned almost every technological advance to the service of the destructive impulse. But mankind has already brought war-making powers to the point where civilization can be destroyed in a day. We can't save ourselves in this respect by banning robots. All over the world, people fear war, and this general fear, which grows yearly, may succeed in putting an end to war -- in which case there will be no warrior robots.
But let us consider still another and perhaps the most extreme of the potential dangers of robots, and of computers generally. Robots will be made ever more sophisticated and more capable; they will be designed with cleverly manipulable hands and various senses; they may even eventually be constructed with the capacity for something like reason. Might they not take over more and more jobs, more complicated jobs, more creative jobs?
Might it not be that human beings will have to be shifted from one job to another, seeking always something that robots cannot do better, and finding that robots will inexorably follow them to higher and higher levels until there is nothing at all left for humans to do? Will human beings be forced into idleness and boredom, dying off for sheer lack of challenge to give life meaning? In short, would Homo sapiens become first obsolete, then extinct; and would the robots take over as Homo superior?
It is possible to wonder, in a cynical way, if this would not be a logical and rational development after all. If eventually robots are devised that are stronger and more intelligent than human beings and if they are given a better sense of social obligations than we have, shouldn't they replace us as a matter of justice?
But these are dyspeptic and unpleasant imaginings. There is much that is, has been and will continue to be decent and wonderful about humans, and with the help of robots -- and computers, generally -- we may yet save ourselves and the world.
Besides, although we might in despair try to reconcile ourselves to robotic replacement, it may be that this is impossible. The human brain is not easy to match, let alone surpass.
What a computer is designed to do is, essentially, arithmetic. Any problem, however seemingly complex, that can somehow be broken down into a well-defined series of arithmetical operations can be solved by a computer. That the computer can amaze us with its capabilities arises not out of the nature of the arithmetical operations it can handle, but out of the fact that it can perform these operations in thousand-millionths of a second, and without error.
The human brain, on the other hand, is incredibly poor at arithmetic. It needs, and has always needed, outside help to solve the simplest problems. We began by counting on our fingers, and have moved on to better things only with the help of the abacus, pen and paper, Arabic numerals, logarithms, slide rules, mechanical calculators and, eventually, computers.
The business of the human brain is not number manipulation at all. It is, and has always been, that of judgment and creative thought: the trick of coming to a reasonable conclusion on the basis of insufficient evidence; the knack of being able to think philosophically, insightfully, fancifully, imaginatively; the ability to extract beauty, excitement and delight out of the world that surrounds us, and out of what we ourselves shape that, without us, would never exist.
Might we not, in the end, program robots to do such things? That would not be easy. To begin with, we don't know how we do them, so the problem of organizing robotic behavior to behave in human fashion would be difficult indeed.
Almost any human being, even those that seem very ordinary, can do something very well without knowing how he or she does it, and all these are human things that, perhaps, no robot will ever do. As a matter of showmanship we might eventually succeed in programming a robot to do something human in a rudimentary way -- but why bother when any human being can do it so much better?
No, if our technology is to bring about Homo superior, it may well be out of ourselves that it will arise. With newfound techniques of genetic engineering, we may well learn how to improve our brain and increase its efficiency, while we are also learning to increase the capabilities of robots. Indeed, our computers will help us improve our brains, and our improved brains will help us better our robot designs, in a leapfrog effect.
The end result will be that robots and human beings will continue to advance along parallel paths, with each doing in ever better fashion that which each is fitted to do. With our widely different talents, there will always be room for both human beings and robots. As cooperating allies rather than as competing foes, we can achieve an ever greater understanding of the behavior of the universe and of the wise use of its laws, and do far more together than either could possibly manage alone.