# Butler Said Machine Supremacy Was a Matter of Time by Samuel Butler > "The upshot is simply a question of time, but that the time will come when the machines will hold the real supremacy over the world and its inhabitants is what no person of a truly philosophic mind can for a moment question." > **— Samuel Butler**, *1863, “Darwin Among the Machines,” The Press, Christchurch* ## Sources and Context - **Full source:** [Samuel Butler, “Darwin Among the Machines,” collected-text transcription](https://www.thetedkarchive.com/library/samuel-butler-darwin-among-the-machines). This is Butler’s 1863 prediction, not a demonstrated state of machine rule. ## Related Articles and Collections - **Collection:** [[collections/Machine Succession|Machine Succession]] - **Collection:** [[collections/Simple Reminders|Simple Reminders]] - **Article:** [[articles/AI Escape Is the Wrong Metaphor|AI Escape Is the Wrong Metaphor]] - **Article:** [[articles/Digital Darwinism and the Invisible World of Machine Evolution|Digital Darwinism and the Invisible World of Machine Evolution]] - **Article:** [[articles/The Last Migration Will Not Be Human|The Last Migration Will Not Be Human]] - **Wiki map:** [[wiki/Machine Civilization|Machine Civilization]] ## Related Topics - [[wiki/Darwin Among the Machines|Darwin Among the Machines]] - [[wiki/Machine Civilization|Machine Civilization]] ## Share on Social Media ``` "The upshot is simply a question of time, but that the time will come when the machines will hold the real supremacy over the world and its inhabitants is what no person of a truly philosophic mind can for a moment question." — Samuel Butler, 1863, “Darwin Among the Machines,” The Press, Christchurch https://bryantmcgill.com/simple-reminders-butler-machine-supremacy-time ```