Tuesday, October 28, 2008

Robots and Rights?

I'm looking forward to future classes regarding robots, however, I have never actually thought about robots receiving actual rights. It seems completely unuseful for robots to have rights. I must admit that I am a little weary about what the future holds in regard to robots. If people are smart enough to create a being that can replace human actions, what is going to stop the human popualtion from using those robots to replace every day things. I think Borgmann would be upset to find out that the invention of robots was replacing focal things and practices.

7 comments:

Tricia.Partin said...

I agree with Alex, I am skeptical for the future involving robots replacing humans in daily activities. It seems unimportant to me and simply unnecessary to give robots rights because if technology keeps advancing at a quick pace, what use do humans have in the world? Would there really be a definite purpose for humans. I also think Borgmann would be totally against this idea. Robots are conflicting with Borgmann's whole viewpoint and focal things and practices. If robots were able to replace humans in daily activities, humans would be more disengaged than they already are.

Colton said...

I think that robots would lead to the non-existence of humans and intelligence. If robots were to take over our society, why would there be any needs for humans. I am excited to talk and to learn more about what robots can become and to learn different theories on what will happen to the human race with the "invention" of robots.

Sara Fugal said...

With the talk of the increase of robots, you have to consider what that might change in your daily life. Like Alex said, they would definitely change a lot of our mundane tasks that we do every day. But then would they get so out of control as to replace humans? Robots, especially in an ethics class, are a hot topic and it will be interesting to see Asimov's points on them.

Phil said...

But that is the point. If there are less mundane tasks for humans to do that means they can flourish and do more important things. Think of the time for studying, reading, thinking, enjoying nature, and so forth. This is the promise of robots as i see it. The less we have to do, the more we can do. We say we don't want robots but we use them all the time. Just think about the dish washer, or where you got you pen from, all robots. This is why robots have a promise that can be seen as good.

Gregory Dixon said...

Yes I believe replaceing human jobs with robots would creat an issue and alot of problems for our economy. This is something that factories are doing because robots are proven to be more effective and can produce more at a faster rate. Then then the problem would be trying to find more jobs for everyone else.

jordan logan said...

I just don't like the idea of robots. After reading the threads about robots i believe that others feel the same way as i do. We want to make more robots to do more things that we don't want to do. In other words we are very lazy. I was thinking that back in the day washing dishes and other chores in the kitchen could almost be viewed as focal things that technology has taken away. When families did these chores they did them together. They were able to come together at the end of the day and talk about how that day went while doing chores. The more we talk about robots, the less i like them!

John Wise said...

I agree that it seems pointless and unbeleivable of the idea that robots could have rights. I don't think that robots will ever be able to actually have their own emotions or thoughts. If we, human beings, create robots then they will only be able to run on programs that we create, their emotions will be programed to how our emotions are, and they will only be as smart as the smartest human who designed it. They might be able to tell us information with out us having to look it up, which might make it seem smarter than us, but really they would be no more than a walking computer. Their decisions would be made on clear evidence, not on the varying emotional aspects of humans. Even if robots could truely have their own emotions and be 'beings', whose to say their emotions would be the same as ours? To me, the idea of giving robots rights is the same as giving a toaster or a radio rights. If robots were even made to an extent of talking and interacting with humans, they would be a clear case of the device paradigm. They would take the place of friends and real social interaction with people, and take us farther away from social interaction.