It's a lethal, remote-controlled airplane. Dumb now. Maybe smart later.

It's a lethal, portable, drone from AeroVironment. Not exactly a robot, but I don't see why you couldn't program some intelligence into what right now is really just a guided missile launched from a tube.

Robots will look like us and be Apple customers

All humans aspire to the condition of being Apple iPhone users. Apparently, so will robots. Does make you wonder about some kind of machine-intelligence hierarchy, with androids at the top and mere consumer applications in a sort of vast robotic underclass. Also make me think about whether robots would be satisfied with the same technology forms as humans. I'm not sure that R2-D2 would have much use for a cell phone.

Considering Robot Welfare

I'm just following up on the post I wrote a little while ago about the "Will robots steal my job?" conference in Washington, DC. I was disturbed then that the proposed discussion seemed to be preoccupied with the economic problem of robots, rather than the ethics of having far more machine intelligence woven into our society.

It turns out that Robin Hanson was also bothered by this. He's actually read through the transcripts of the event and summarized his qualms:

My main complaint is that Tyler [Cowen] seems to completely ignore the experiences and welfare of the robots themselves (as do the other three panelists). Somewhat like Europeans in 1700 discussing the wisdom of their colonizing the world, but considering only on its effects on Europeans. I doubt this is because Tyler agrees with Bryan Caplan that robots can’t possibly be conscious. What then? Does Tyler simply not care about non-humans?

It's possible that robot welfare isn't really on Cowen's economist-radar. Frankly, I don't think it's on the radar of many people. But the more we discuss the future of artificial intelligence, the more our humanity is going to compel us to explore these issues. And where the robots are concerned, do the right thing.