Human survival depends on paranoia. We just know there's some malicious creature out there ready to fight us for the helm of Spaceship Earth. But Alien vs. Predator has been done already, so I'm fretting over the latest terrestrial threats instead: I-Robot, I-Pod, and I-Monkey.

As a species, we're just smart enough to realize we're stupid...stupid enough to create robots and computers that want to kill us, ala The Matrix and I-Robot. Suprisingly, even Apple's cutesy I-Pod just recently achieved consciousness (I-pod Therefore I am), and apples have been a problem for humankind since the Genesis days, so we must take the little devil-gizmo seriously. Finally, we have the recent news about a monkey walking Planet-of-the-Apes upright: I-Monkey. Its one thing for Disney to anthropomorphize animals, it's quite another for animals to anthropomorphize themselves. If a monkey walking around bolt-upright doesn't make you sit bolt-upright in the middle of the night screaming "Get your filthy paws off me you damn dirty ape," nothing will.

But of these latest competitors to the human race, which is the most likely to replace us?

Let's consider the I-Pod first. I say it's got no chance against humans simply because it's already too philosophical...'I-Pod Therefore I Am.' When's the last time you met a philosopher that could fight? Plato could barely whip the shadow puppets on his cave wall. If the two-day old I-Pod is already spouting this kind of crap, imagine what it's going to be like after a few years of Moore's Law evolution? It'll convince itself that life doesn't matter anyway-- we're all just energy patterns on some existential plane of purity. All we have to do is put hemlock within arms reach, sit back, and wait. Either that or let the RIAA continue its fratricide on all music recording devices--either way, I-Pod is out of the picture.

So that leaves I-Robot and I-Monkey. Ruthless as they are, both of these enemies have a code they live by. For robots it's the infamous three laws:

1. A robot may not injure a human being, or, through
   inaction allow a human being to come to harm.


2. A robot must obey the orders given it by human beings
   except where such orders would conflict with the first law.


3. A robot must protect its own existence as long as such
   protection does not conflict with the First or Second Law.

Apes have only one law:

1. Ape shall not kill ape.