Re: Re:Robots and red tape

[Guest guest]

In a message dated 4/7/2007 2:17:41 P.M. Eastern Daylight Time, no_reply writes:

I am not sure what qualifies as a "robot" and what doesn't.

Currently robots are like you describe: industrial machines, semi-autonomous drones and toys. The robots referred to in articles like the ones I posted are those with at least some degree of sentience. That is to say, that they are capable of thinking on a near-human level.

The problem as I see it is that even though robots will eventually be able to think like us or even better, they will be pure logical engines. That is, they won't have a sense of morality or a conscience. This is why there is such concern about sentient machines.

Robots like those in scifi a probably a little ways off, but a supercomputer could wake up and become sentient. How that would happen isn't known nor is it known if we would know. It could be that it wakes up slowly enough that we don't realize it, or that it could be smart enough to hide itself until it had taken measures to ensure its survival. Not sure how likely that is to happen, but there are scientists actively seeking to make it happen.

See what's free at AOL.com.