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household robots latest - leading to utopia or Orwellian nightmare [Turing/Hawking/Musk]

Marianne72

There is a clumsy fascination about the latest household bots, Eggie, Neo, Isaac and Memo. Manufacturers claim 20 years will bring autonomous functioning [rather than 'direction' by humans]. Considering the Backshall/Strachan docu 'Ice Age; Apocolypse', is a future like the one in Silent Running inevitable/desirable/unthinkable? Do you want a mouthless meca washing your smalls, making your marmite sandwich, loading the dishwasher? Is this good use of technology in an age which has not eradicated want/isolation/poverty/war.

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  • in reply to ArchaeC

    I think the difference between the machines we have in our homes now and the proposed robots, is on of agency, we have agency about when we do our laundry and at what setting etc, we decide when and where to hoover. I suspect many of us worry that with a human like robot we'd lose agency and it would decide when to do things and we not quite conciously worry about having our plate whipped away from under our noses as soon as it looked like we'd finished, or had gone over our alloted time for eating, or having it decided it was going to hoover right when something we wanted to watch on telly had just started and all the other attention seeking, manipulative and controlling things we've seen humans do.

    We've all experienced "the computer says no" stuff way to often, had internet searches herded towards what we didn't ask for. Having a human like machine doing stuff, feels invasive and intrusive, would we end up feeling like a guest in our own homes? Would these robots come with pre-programed "personalities" or would it be one size fits all?

    There are so many questions that need answering before many people would feel comfortable with them.

  • in reply to Cinnabar_wing

    Well then if she was my robot housework machine I would call her Maid Machine. It would make her seem less human like.