Mechanical Love Review Online
Documentaries that get your attention tend to be the contraversial or unique. No one wants to see a documentary on the mating habits of the North American Common Squirell, however get a guy who tries to kill himself by eating 3 meals at McDonalds a day and you have a winner.
Cinematical has put up a review of an interesting Documentary that deals with machines being designed for companionship called Mechanical Love.
Phie Ambo’s Mechanical Love begins by noting that soon the elderly will outnumber children for the first time in human history. Obviously, this leads to questions about how these people will be cared for — and I don’t just mean how they will get fed and provided shelter, but also who will give them actual care and attention. The older generations already have a limited number of ways to get personal interaction, even though it is something that is necessary to continue their drive to live. In response to these changes and concerns, there are engineers like Professor Ishiguro who are developing robots not for work or sex, but for human companionship.
Now this treads on dangerous ground as there is a growing fear that machines will take over the world should they become too independant. I am not talking about sci-fi fanboys running around with tinfoil on their head, this is a gnawing reality that some people are concerned about. Could creating a machine that will simulate companionship could just be the bridging point to a droid nation?
Consider that today they make an android that can converse and interact mentally with a living counterpart. Why can’t they make one that can perform menial tasks? Then before you know it we have law enforcement and military androids eliminating the risk to human life in ballistic conflict.
Are we really that far from Asimov’s I, Robot? How long after before they establish SkyNet?
Sounds like an interesting Documentary.
5 Comments, Comment or Ping
Chris Knight
I saw this at Hot Docs in Toronto. The most interesting aspect is the concept of “sonzai-kan,” which roughly translates as “presence.” It’s the feeling you have when someone is standing next to you, but also (oddly) when you’re on the phone with someone, even if they’re on the other side of the Earth. The researcher in the film is trying to find out whether a humanoid robot can engender feelings of sonzai-kan, and whether it’s the same kind of sonzai-kan as humans generate in each other. Clearly this is a word, like the German shadenfreude, that English needs to borrow.
Apr 30th, 2008
1138
It’s funny…I was having this discussion with a couple of friends a few days ago. One friend, well she was pretty much against it saying it was territory that humans should not tread into. In her opinion this would lead to psuedo slavery and a further disintegration of true human interaction. Me and my friend were into it having grown up in Sci-Fi and feel that this would be a natural progression for mankind. Where man and machine are companions for the future…in some ways we already…think what would happen if our computers, PDA’s, digital player consoles and other electronics were taken away…I think people would be rather upset.
The Japanese are so ahead of us on this subject and are really pushing ahead to integrate robots into their society. Asimo from honda is fine example of this. If they could perfect the little guy, it would really move us so much closer to the I, Robot and even possibly the Terminator!
Apr 30th, 2008
tzaylor
It sounds like there have been too many movies about robots taking over the world. It will never happen friends. For some reason people get confused when they see a computer with a face. It’s still just a computer. Having a face does not give software the ability to think creatively. You can call it a robot, a droid, an android, or whatever you want, but it’s still a computer.
They would all have to have the ability to receive commands, and have the ability to act on them. And what robot programmed to bring old people the morning paper will ever be programmed to act on a hostile command? No robot. Don’t confuse that with human programmers writing programming for hostility, that’s completely different than a robot “turning” to hostility on it’s own.
Also there will have to be robots in critical locations such as power plants, military bases etc. And there simply never will be. Having a robot for a pet is one thing, having it be capable of managing a weapons storehouse is ridiculous.
The biggest reason this will never happen is that they will never have the desire to “flip”. They would have to make that decision based on greed, or fear of oppression etc…. impossible. Robots will never care that they are being used as slaves, my Roomba seems to like it’s job actually.
If a robot ever becomes smart enough to to think creatively and realize self preservation and worldwide efficiency, won’t it be smart enough to realize that a human counter would be inevitable?
Software can go wrong, especially when it’s being hacked, but that’s human interaction.
I’d be much more concerned about people behind consoles with red buttons. And not worried that robots will ever be at a console with a red button.
Apr 30th, 2008
Rodney
tzaylor, the flaw with your thinking (though it may not be wrong) is that it is based on standards by todays thinking.
30 years ago if you told someone about the internet they would insist you were insane.
Before that, a man would never walk on the moon. Before that the earth was flat. I could go on.
The point of this technology is that it is adaptive, and by that very nature the theory exists that it may adapt to become self aware - meaning artificial sentience.
It could happen. Maybe we will never find out HOW it will happen. Many of the worlds greatest inventions were accidents. Maybe this accident will never happen.
I never believe that anything is impossible.
Apr 30th, 2008
frankwolftown
I think Warren Ellis said it best when pointed out how the second law of robotics.
“2. Robots do not want to have sex with you. Are you listening, Japan? I don’t have a clever comparative simile for this, because frankly you bags of meat will fuck bicycles if they’re laying down and not putting up a fight. Just stop it. There is no robot on Earth that wants to see a bag of meat with a small prong on the end approaching it with a can of WD-40 and a hopeful smile. And don’t get me started on that terrifying hole that squeezes out more bags of meat.”
http://www.warrenellis.com/?p=5426
May 1st, 2008
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