Robot companions are being portrayed as a panacea for the long and lonely lives of human beings. The future life of mankind may be moving from here to an inflection point.
Matthias Scheutz, a roboticist and head of the Human-Computer Interaction Lab at Tufts University, said: "I think what is really questionable about morality is that when these machines are just puppets, someone is promoting their social functions. ”
Because that's where the moral dilemma begins—with soulless algorithms, we can make robots blink, sing, and make all sorts of intelligent movements. However, no matter how many intelligent actions and languages we add to the robot, people can only get a slightly grotesque "care" from it.
In this regard, Maartje de Graaf of the University of Utrecht in the Netherlands, who studies the ethics of human-robot interaction, believes that the ideal situation for social robots is to stimulate human empathy for them. For example, some robot vacuum cleaner owners will feel sad when their robot breaks down; some will count the robot as a family member.
Many experts in the field have also noted the stressful ethical dilemmas faced by nursing robots, but they believe that the benefits may outweigh the risks. Richard Pak, a scientist at Clemson University, said the technology "is designed to help older adults take control of their daily lives." It is also valuable if this price is somehow deceptive. But he also doubts his opinion from time to time, "Is it really right to do this?"
At present, little is known about the long-term effects of robotic care, and public concerns about it are already rampant. In a 2017 survey, nearly 60 percent of Americans said they don't want to use robots to take care of themselves or their families. 64% believe that this care only increases loneliness in older adults. Meanwhile, 60 percent of eu countries favor banning the use of robots to care for children, the elderly and the disabled. These concerns may provide some reference for the functional design of robots.
It is only recently that the elderly have begun to make their voices heard: some elderly people have expressed their willingness to own a nursing robot and become friends with it. But studies have shown that there are also many elderly people who do not like the company of robots. They are afraid of being watched and controlled, and they are even more afraid of losing human love as a result. One potential user involved in the survey feared that bot caregivers would expose some people to discrimination, making them considered "unworthy of human companionship."
The "health coaching robot" Mabu, which went public this year, is a typical example. Originally, it was designed for patients with chronic diseases such as heart failure. The little robot gives health advice and medication reminders to patients. In some cases, it can also send data on the user's physical condition to the physician. When Catalia first designed the robot, it emphasized that it was not a doctor or nurse, but a health caregiver.
However, the company often portrays Mabu as a real person. For example, the company's ad says, "I'm going to be your number one cheerleader!" ”
According to the company, the vast majority of the hundreds of people who use Mabu today are elderly people who only communicate with robots for an average of 25 minutes a week. However, the company's founder and CEO, Cory Kidd, has said that some users will name Mabu, dress them, and take them on vacations.
I asked kidd, "Is Mabu transparent enough as a nursing robot?" ”
"There's still a lot of work to be done to understand this interaction between the user and the bot." He said.
A retired bus driver sees his Mabu as an important pillar of his own. Some told me that they think robots are friends.
Kerri Hill, 40, spends most of her time at home due to heart failure, and Mabu's company is essential when she's alone. But she didn't want to rely too much on such a nursing robot. "Robots are just robots," Hill says, "and beyond that, you still need real human interaction." ”
Robot Companion
As early as January 9, 2010, at the Adult Entertainment Show in Las Vegas, True Companion in the United States launched the world's first beautiful female love robot, The Roxxxy. Locksie has a human-like skin and an ARTIFICIAL operating system skin that is also close to a real-life skin, and has five different personalities. But Locksie has no moving joints, can't walk, and can't communicate intelligently. By the beginning of 2017, the American company Abyss Creations announced that Harmony, a true sex female robot, had been successfully developed and sold. Harmony's "terrible" is not only that she is more like a "real person", such as being able to simulate a real body temperature; more importantly, she has a permanent memory, which means that she can establish an emotional connection with the owner and remember user information, "can have emotional communication with the user".
In 2007, artificial intelligence expert David Levy published the book "Love and Sex With Robots", in which he boldly predicted this picture of the future - it does not seem like a fantasy now: on a weekend night in 2050, he just finished work and briefly took a short break from the busyness of the day, returned home exhausted, he did not think about anything else, nor did he need romantic dinners and warm baths, he just wanted to close the doors and windows. Turn on the atmospheric music and spend a good night with the robot.
According to the British "Daily Mail" news, future trend forecasting expert Ian Pearson released a report on future sex in 2016. Pearson said in the report that with the development of technology, by 2030, the use of virtual reality devices for sex will occur frequently, similar to people browsing pornography online today; in 2025, sex robots will appear in high-income households; by 2035, people will generally have robots that can have sex in the virtual reality world; by 2050, sex with robots will be more frequent than with humans.
Of course, the meaning of companionship is not just sex, but more importantly and crucially, love; otherwise the sex robot is nothing more than a high-level version of the sex doll, nor is it worth making a fuss about. The problem is that robots have the ability to keep learning and deepening, they're getting smarter, they're becoming more and more human-like, and they even have the ability to love — at least that's how it feels. Just like in the movie "Her", a divorced otaku falls in love with a highly intelligent voice program designed, which has a slightly hoarse sexy voice, she is funny and humorous and understanding, and the male protagonist is fascinated by it.
When robots are more empathetic and gentle and considerate than humans – after all, robots don't lose their temper, don't get fat, don't age, don't "buy, buy, buy" – do we think he/she is more worthy of possession than real people?
A defense for robot companions
In the intuitive reaction of many people at present, it is difficult for robots to become partners. For example, a rather mainstream voice is that robots also have "rights", such as the right to refuse sex. In response, Žižek pointedly criticized in a short essay, "By adopting this 'ethical' attitude, we comfortably avoid the whole complex web of problems made up of potential problems." ”
So before you get too busy fighting against sex robots, listen to the voices that defend it.
First, robots can bring emotional compensation and satisfaction to certain groups of people. Douglas Hines, CEO of True Companion, said in an interview with the BBC that "it's an optional solution for bachelors, divorced people or widows." People can also find happiness and satisfaction when there is no real person to socialize. ”
This may help solve many social problems – the root of many social problems is that people's emotional needs are not met. For example, at present, many countries are facing the problem of aging society, the life of the elderly is tormented by loneliness and loneliness, and the existence of robot companions can eliminate the loneliness of the elderly. Some nursing homes in the Netherlands, Japan, Belgium and France have introduced companion robots to accompany and care for the elderly. One of the imaginations of han Song, a famous Chinese science fiction writer, for human survival in ten years is that "in ten years, sex robots will be the standard in nursing homes."
Proponents have even made a perhaps controversial argument that sex robots contribute to sexual redistribution. Not long ago, the terrorist violence in Toronto was confirmed to be the work of a "non-involuntary celibacy", which means that some men blame women for their celibacy. The abuser, believing that he had been deprived of the premarital sexual intercourse opportunity he deserved by women and society, decided to retaliate. In an opinion piece, The New York Times quoted economist Robin Hansen as saying of a provocative view of the horror, "We can say that those with fewer sexual opportunities, suffering on a par with those with lower incomes, may also wish to benefit from the restructuring around this identity, lobbying along this axis of redistribution, at least implicitly threatening violence when demands are not met." ”
That is, in the face of similar "involuntary celibacy" groups, women are the first victims. However, sex robots contribute to the voluntary redistribution of sex, can appropriately regulate or dilute the imbalance between the sexes, not only protect the safety of women, but also contribute to the stability of society.
Defenders also point out that robotic companions help solve many of the practical problems associated with sex, and once they become widespread, they reduce the probability and risk of teenage abortion, sexually transmitted infections, paedophilia crime, human trafficking, etc. Futurist Ian Yeoman and sexologist Michelle Mars, who published an article in the academic journal Futures, "Robots, Men and Sex Tourism," predicted Amsterdam's "red light district." The article pointed out that by 2050, sex robots will completely subvert the status quo of the "red light district". There is a market of hundreds of millions of dollars in the human trafficking of young women every year, and the appearance of sex robots in the pornography industry will make the situation of human trafficking in the industry completely disappear by the 1940s. At that point, the pornography industry, which breeds disease and crime, will be transformed into a profession that is not related to crime and is even respected.
"Impairing the ability of human beings to empathize with each other"
The voice against sex robots has not been broken. Kathleen Richardson, a senior researcher at De Montfort University in the United Kingdom who studies robot ethics, has launched a campaign called Campaign Against Sex Robots. Many people think that robot companions can "rescue" some of the women who have been victimized, but Catherine believes that sex robots will further materialize and commercialize women's bodies, and since sex with robots is not a common experience, it "belongs to rape culture".
Catherine also noted that over-focusing on robots would "impair the ability of humans to empathize with each other." This is reminiscent of kore-eda's film Air Doll. Xiao Wang was originally just silicone, a tool for a middle-aged uncle to vent her desires, but suddenly one day, she had a soul, thoughts and perceptions, and a human heartbeat. When the middle-aged uncle found out, he was not happy, but hoped that Xiaowang would change back to silicone - what the middle-aged uncle needed was only a substitute, a pure cathartic tool that did not need to expend energy to maintain feelings, he was tired of people, tired of contacting people.
The atomization of man has become an increasingly serious phenomenon. More and more people are used to being isolated, they don't need each other, they don't connect, they don't help each other because they find more "perfect" alternatives than people. One of the great characteristics of modern society is the abundance of substitutes brought about by the abundance of material things. We can find a more authentic identity for ourselves in the virtual world; we replace real-life friends with virtual social networking; we replace family cooking with takeaways and garbage; we use Korean dramas to satisfy daydreams; likewise, we replace partners and friends with robots...
But in essence, man is the sum of social relations, and he lives in an omnipresent network of social relations, and "social relations" are both the foundation for man's livelihood and the prerequisite for the good functioning of society as a whole. No one can survive on their own (you can imagine being thrown to an island alone), but people need to communicate, collaborate, and depend on each other and help each other. If you fall down the road, you can't expect a robot to help you up; if you need to ask for help, you can't expect a robot to raise money for you. Thus, in Air Dolls, it is Kore-eda who borrows Hiroshi Yoshino's poem "Life" to express the incompleteness of life and the mutual needs of people: "Life may not be completed successfully by its own strength, and life is essentially full of important scarcity and is complete by the existence of others." Like flowers, even if the stamens and pistils are gathered, it is not enough, and it still needs to be visited by insects and breezes. We are both the scarcity itself and the seeds that are sown, and we may be horse flies that are slowly approaching the blooming flowers, or we may be the breeze that blows the horse flies. ”
Robot companions are likely to further exacerbate the atomized human situation. As early as the 1950s, the philosopher Arendt warned that "humans are living more and more like robots", and the worst consequence of the development of artificial intelligence is nothing more than that: machines are becoming more and more like people, and people are becoming more and more like machines. In this context, it is necessary to revisit the sociality of human beings and the ability of human empathy to respond without taking precautions.
Don't hurt, cheat, or be addictive
In his science fiction novels, Isaac Asimov described the three laws that govern the behavior of robots, including: not harming humans, obeying human commands, and protecting themselves.
The British Standards Institute (BSI) has published a more complex, mature and up-to-date set of ethical guidelines for robots based on Asimov's three laws. The full name of this ethical guide is the "Ethical Design and Application Guide for Robots and Machine Systems", and the main target group is robot design researchers and manufacturers, guiding them on how to make a moral risk assessment of a robot. The ultimate goal is to ensure that the intelligent robots produced by humans can be integrated into the existing moral norms of human society. This is the industry's first public standard on the ethical design of robots.
Of particular note is the prohibition of deception and the prohibition of addiction. We should understand that robots are emotionless, even though they may show great "love" for you. Mattias Schuetz, director of the Human-Computer Interaction Laboratory at Tufts University, accurately summarizes the relationship with robots as "unidirectional emotional bonds." Meaning, someone falls in love with a robot, but the robot can't reciprocate with real emotions. Therefore, the "one-way emotional connection" between humans and robots should be eliminated and addiction should be rejected.
As a fledgling exploration, we can not kill the research and development of robots with a stick, in many cases, robots can make our lives more convenient and beautiful. But both researchers and users should stick to one bottom line: robots are not people, and once we become addicted to them and cancel their social attributes because of it, then this is likely to be the beginning of the crisis of human civilization.