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TheFirstLawOfRobotics 9 - 09 Jul 2012 - Main.KatherineMackey
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| | Today I came across a Forbes article based on a brief phone interview with Eben. The focus was on internet security, specifically in the context of mobile technology. As a huge fan of Asimov, I found it particularly interesting because of Eben’s reference to the First Law of Robotics, and how science fiction has generally predicted the interaction between humans and robots.
The First Law of Robotics states that “a robot may not injure a human being or, through inaction, allow a human being to come to harm.” According to Eben, what our modern day “robots” – our smartphones – do to us on a daily basis is exactly the opposite, and he lists a variety of ways in which this is done. | | | Our cell phones can't move, can't talk, and can't make decisions by themselves. Thus any danger from them is must be generated by ourselves, unlike the concern in the Asimov universe. Even more concerning, unlike the situation where one person purposively programs a robot to harm another, a man vs. man situation, no one has programmed our cell phones to intentionally harm us. Rather we allow them to through our own inaction. We hare ignorantly harming ourselves, a step removed from another person harming us through a robot (which is never really discussed by Asimov) and a second step removed from robots autonomously harming us. So no, I agree with Harry that Eben's mention of the three laws isn't really relevant to our situation as they are treated in Asimov's stories. But what resonated with me was precisely this disconnect and why it exists. Unlike the Asimov universe, we don't need to three laws to protect us from robots, rather we need them to protect us from ourselves.
-- AlexWang - 09 Jul 2012 | |
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> | What about the way they have changed our brains? Eben's article didn't mention this, but we discussed it in class a little bit. I love my iPhone, but since I've had it I've noticed that my attention span has decreased significantly. When I'm waiting somewhere, instead of pulling out a book to read, I pull out my phone, check my email, play Words with Friends, check Facebook, and check the news. I check my email ALL THE TIME but I have no reason to do that. I wish CLS would install cellphone signal blockers in the classrooms, because if I have my phone, I'm going to check it. I recognize that this kind of behavior is bad for me, but I can't stop.
-- KatherineMackey - 08 Jul 2012 |
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