In contrast to Nature in Design [and digressing a little from architecture] I have been reading an article the National Geographic magazine (August 2011) entitled “Us. And them.”. It is about making robots more human. Personally I find the idea of Artificial Intelligence terrifying. We have already seen how humans alone affect the planet in a number of different ways so to add another race of superior intelligence into the mix could be disastrous. Perhaps it would work initially, but if these creatures are able to think and feel for themselves there could be great divides of opinion leading to an uproar of Global proportions. Not to forget this planet's resources are dwindling under the strain of 7 billion people [and counting], without the addition of other 'beings' needing power supplies. There has long been suggestions of domesticated robots who do human chores [think of The Jetsons - a popular cartoon series started in 1963. They had a house cleaning robot called Rosie, – there is a small clip of her here http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GLOBkkvwie8 and of course, Doctor Who – see http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lH-kV5VTuZQ for a clip of Cybermen origins] however after giving robots AI, I can see how they would not stand to do our mundane everyday jobs – the little bits and pieces we hate doing! Civil rebellions of a space age kind... just a thought.
A link to the original National Geographic article: http://ngm.nationalgeographic.com/2011/08/robots/carroll-text
It is certainly an eye opening article about something that is going on right now. People who are determined to push technological, philosophical and ethical boundaries are studying HRI [Human Robot Interaction... yes, there is an acronym for it] i.e. our reactions towards robots and from this gleaning the information they need to make these robots more human.
"If you finally can't tell the difference, does it really matter if you're interacting with a human or machine?" - Hiroshi Ishiguro, ATR Intelligent Robotics and Communication Laboratories in Kyoto Japan.
It is a very valid question to which I think many people, at the moment, would answer that it is still something that has been made and given artificial intelligence over naturally evolved intelligence. However, if we were to live amongst these creatures, would we eventually get used to it and just accept them for another life form?
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