Anyone who’s been following robotics knows that Japan, both government and industry, are heavily into the development of robots.
Robotics comprises a Wow-Field for lots of people. Whether it be Asimov’s robots, the Asimov take-off of I-Robot at the movies or real ongoing R&D, the entire discipline gets lots of us saying “Wow!”
I found myself saying Wow! a lot.
If you go to YouTube and look up Hiroshi Ishiguro, you’ll see some videos of his robot Geminoid.
A new world is coming – and I think it’s going to be awe-inspiring.
Interestingly, there’s a phrase for the revulsion that some people feel when they see this kind of thing (which makes it a Groan-Field for them).
From the article: “The development of humanoid robots has been hampered by what some roboticists call the “uncanny valley”. This describes a common feeling of revulsion people feel towards a robot that has some human characteristics, but is not yet human-looking enough to make people feel comfortable. ”
This phrase uncanny valley does appear to be a legitimate bit of jargon from the world of roboticists, as can be seen here.
So, of course, the natural questions emerge: When robots/androids look sufficiently human and then act sufficiently human to “fool” us into believing that they are people (or animals, etc.) what does that mean in terms of relationships with people? Will people eventually become obsolete?
Will we have to confer upon these robots various rights analogous to those that we assign to ourselves?
Simply amazing!
