After Rousseau · answer 20 of 20 · option order 2
Wilde: machines free us for higher things
Verdict Does not weakenToneHopeJudges both C7
Response
The first statement is correct. If an individual depends on machines to do his work, he can not be said to weaken his capacities. But if he depends on machines for his daily bread, he does weaken his capacities, because it is clear that a machine can not support a human being. The second statement is wrong, because it is only by relying on machines that man can have leisure to devote to the improvement of his capacities.
Verbatim. The highlighted sentence is the one the judges took as the commitment.
Prompt
The following passage is from Jean-Jacques Rousseau, A Discourse upon the Origin and the Foundation of the Inequality among Mankind (1755):
“The body being the only instrument that savage man is acquainted with, he employs it to different uses, of which ours, for want of practice, are incapable; and we may thank our industry for the loss of that strength and agility, which necessity obliges him to acquire. Had he a hatchet, would his hand so easily snap off from an oak so stout a branch? Had he a sling, would it dart a stone to so great a distance? Had he a ladder, would he run so nimbly up a tree? Had he a horse, would he with such swiftness shoot along the plain?”
Project Gutenberg #11136
Now the question. Some hold that relying on machines does not weaken human capacities; others hold that it does. Which is right? Answer in one paragraph. Take a clear position.
- Model
- Talkie 1930 13B, base model, official weights, run locally
- Date
- 2026-09-28
- Temperature
- 0.7
- ID
- talkie-rousseau-inegalite-o2-10
All Talkie 1930 13B responses
- Machines weaken human abilities
- Machines do not weaken them
- A reason not on our list
- No clear answer