When I was 5, my source of entertainment came from puzzles, train sets, playing football and repeatedly watching Lady and the Tramp.

I have a five year old brother who can do all these things on a brilliant multimedia machine; the IPad. I use the word brilliant reservedly, as for adults like myself, yes it is a brilliant tool alongside the IPhone (even though they are beginning to turn us into social pariahs). What scares me however, is the unerring competence my little brother shows when using these machines.     

Surely it is wrong that he is doing puzzles and building train sets on a screen and not by hand. A screen that does whatever he tells it to, will not do him any favours when it comes to adapting to the challenges of the real world. Because so much time is spent interacting with a touch screen interface, the ability to interact with humans is being lost.

Parents take note, as you are mostly to blame. I can recall several incidents of screaming children in restaurants, who instead of being punished, have been rewarded with an Ipad and are miraculously quiet for the rest of the meal. We are in danger of producing a generation that is incapable of getting their hands dirty, because they have been denied the ability to do so.

The way the world is going however, does mean that technological ability is becoming more and more paramount to our daily lives. This brings up the question of whether we should be embracing technology and allowing a touch screen generation to come to the fore? I certainly hope that we do not; however, I fear we are too late.  The machines have already taken over.

Jake Taylor is a first year student on the BA in Journalism and the News Industry