Wednesday, March 7, 2007

Crack That Whip

In the future, people will not be allowed to abuse robots and robots will not be allowed to abuse people if the people drafting the Robot Ethics Charter have their way. Apparently robots will still be allowed to abuse other robots and people will still be allowed to abuse other people, at least in South Korea, where it will cost about 15,000 Won, depending on exactly what you ask for and how well you bargain.

7 comments:

Jenny Jenny Flannery said...

"A recent government report forecast that robots would routinely carry out surgery by 2018."

Fuck that! I've seen The Terminator...

Johnny Yen said...

So what consitutes a robot? I mean, what if I kick a computerized vending machine that's stolen my change? Will this violate the robot/human ethics pact?

How far does this go? They're replacing all of Chicago's parking meters with the computerized ones. If I cheat the meter, am I abusing it, or does it just have some hurt feelings?

These things keep me up nights. No wonder I drink.

deadspot said...

Ha! That's a trick question, Brian. If the parking meters are robots, that makes them city employees, and everyone knows that bureaucrats have no feelings.

Johnny Yen said...

Damn-- I hate it when you catch these things...

deadspot said...

Well, that was an easy one. Once they have their souls removed, their capacity for human emotion and feeling is pretty much shot.

Johnny Yen said...

Sort of like conservatives.

Anonymous said...

what-- Asimov's 3 Laws of Robotics wasn't good enuff???

Flannery: don't even worry about it. Remember how in the 50's we were supposed to have flying cars by now??