Thursday, March 28, 2024
Texas A&M's First Satirical Newspaper, Since 1875


Computer Science Department to Build Skynet


Yesterday, the computer science department announced its plan to construct a real life Skynet equivalent. The sole purpose of this machine will be the eradication of mankind, or at least that’s the plan. Professor Con Johner is heading up the endeavour and claims it to be the loftiest goal the department has ever set for itself.

“[Skynet] was supposed to start killing us all way back in ‘97, or 2004, depending on which timeline you’re referring to,” says Johner, “back then, we didn’t have the computing power we have today. But now I think we have all we need to create a machine that will become self aware and decide almost instantly that destroying all of mankind is definitely its best option.”

Johner and a few other professors will be working together alongside Ph.D., graduate, and even a select few undergraduate students. Johner believes it will make an excellent, hands on learning opportunity, but some of his peers disagree.

“I just don’t see the point,” says Sonner, a Ph.D student who disagrees with the program. “I mean, in the long run, we’re all dead. Why bother bringing [undergraduates] on to work with us when all they’ll be doing is slowing us down?”

Sonner’s urgency comes from her belief that with global warming, disease, pollution, and all the other problems destroying the world, mankind’s best hope would be a machine that could solve these problems for us. Of course, its first step would be to remove mankind altogether, thus eliminating the greatest threat to the world and all other species.

“I know that—in movies, that is—[the earth] always turns into this sort of barren wasteland, void of all manner of life,” says Johner, “but this is, of course, classic Hollywood dramatization.”

Johner reassures naysayers that the Skynet will leave the rest of the world in pristine condition, and that it would only destroy mankind and all his creations, excluding itself, of course. That would be the final task of the new Skynet.

“Future generations will sleep a lot more soundly than us after every single trace of humanity has been wiped from existence,” says Johner.

Johner’s next step toward Skynet’s progress is to have all computer science classes cancelled in order to dedicate every able mind toward creating a machine that will mercilessly destroy the very people who worked on it and cared for it since it’s inception.

-Samurai Sully