Written by: Tamiselvi Jayavelu and Valentina Ramírez
Robots are incredibly “smart” creatures that process information much faster than any human being, they don’t get tired, they don’t get overwhelmed when they have to do the same operation over and over again. They don’t judge their office partners for their beliefs and sexual preferences, they don’t question the universe for their destiny, they don’t have existential crises. They are awesome!
But wait a minute, why humans are still relevance (At least for now), why robots have not taken the control over the world yet?
But wait a minute, why humans are still relevance (At least for now), why robots have not taken the control over the world yet?
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| Imagine: MIT Technology Review |
The answer to that resides in the differences between the human way of thinking and the robots way of thinking.
Let’s start by putting some key concepts on the table:
Emotions: Complex state of feeling that influence thoughts and behavior, that results in psychological and physical changes. Emotions are not built in, they are just built. (1)
Thinking: A cognitive process that happens mentally, in which, we process information, from the context, from existing knowledge, from our learned experiences and our emotions. (2)
Creativity: Thinking process that leads to original, valuable, and even beautiful outcomes.(3)
We hope you are not bored yet, at least a robot wouldn't. Because this is the point when this becomes interesting and a bit philosophical!
In case you are bored, here is a little present from us.
Let’s start by putting some key concepts on the table:
Emotions: Complex state of feeling that influence thoughts and behavior, that results in psychological and physical changes. Emotions are not built in, they are just built. (1)
Thinking: A cognitive process that happens mentally, in which, we process information, from the context, from existing knowledge, from our learned experiences and our emotions. (2)
Creativity: Thinking process that leads to original, valuable, and even beautiful outcomes.(3)
We hope you are not bored yet, at least a robot wouldn't. Because this is the point when this becomes interesting and a bit philosophical!
In case you are bored, here is a little present from us.
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| Gif from: runtheinternet.com/09150 |
Gil Weinberg, asked, does creativity require intention and awareness of what is being created?
Interesting right? in the same line, The theoretical physicist Michio Kaku explains that robots can see many times better than we can, but they don’t understand what they see. (4) According to him, the difference between humans and robots or even Artifical Intelligence is the self-awareness, the consciousness or who you are.
Interesting right? in the same line, The theoretical physicist Michio Kaku explains that robots can see many times better than we can, but they don’t understand what they see. (4) According to him, the difference between humans and robots or even Artifical Intelligence is the self-awareness, the consciousness or who you are.
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| Image: TheVerge.com |
Let’s make this clear with a great example, many of you have heard of the amazing milestone that AlphaGo, deepMind’s computer program did in 2016 when the Go- playing AI AlphaGo has beaten world-class player Lee Se-dol for the fourth time to win the five-game series 4-1 overall. (5)
The problem here is that AlphaGo, didn’t know what was the meaning of that, “the program is totally unaware that is made scientific history, in fact, the machine is totally unaware that it is a machine." (4)
Until here, we are calm. We still have a sense of power, but in 2017 the world was surprised by Sophia the most advanced robot, “an evolving genius machine”,(6) the first robot who has ever received the citizenship of a country and responsible goal.” (6)
The problem here is that AlphaGo, didn’t know what was the meaning of that, “the program is totally unaware that is made scientific history, in fact, the machine is totally unaware that it is a machine." (4)
Until here, we are calm. We still have a sense of power, but in 2017 the world was surprised by Sophia the most advanced robot, “an evolving genius machine”,(6) the first robot who has ever received the citizenship of a country and responsible goal.” (6)
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| Foto: Sophia Robot / Reuters |
The creator of Sophia, “David Hanson believes that three distinctively human traits must be integrated into the artificial intelligence: Creativity, empathy, and compassion. Sophia personifies this bold. Sophia was the very beginning in the path of robots getting closer to humans but he speed of technological evolution is all the time faster.
In Las Vegas, Jan 2018, the robot Forpheus (Ping pong playing robot) was introduced to showcase the technology which would understand your mood and your playing ability and predict about your next shot of table tennis as said by Keith Kersten of Japan - Based Omron Automation.
In Las Vegas, Jan 2018, the robot Forpheus (Ping pong playing robot) was introduced to showcase the technology which would understand your mood and your playing ability and predict about your next shot of table tennis as said by Keith Kersten of Japan - Based Omron Automation.
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Image: New Indian Express |
Forpheus is one of the robots which highlight how robots can become more human-like by acquiring "emotional intelligence" and empathy.
Forpheus represents OMRON's attitude of bringing out human creativity and possibility. OMRON has developed this robot by keeping three stages in mind: Replacement, collaboration and harmony with respect to human-machine relationship. FORPHEUS keeps evolving with the state-of-the-art technologies as a symbol of a relationship between mankind and machines in the future. (7)
Now we say to you, let’s get emotional because this is huge, we are in a moment when the history of humankind is split in two, the rise of AI and robots could be even more significant than the apparition of electricity in our lives.
During the history, we have proof that our emotions are guilty of many bad decisions that have had global consequences, then the question we will like to let to you is:
Are humans better than robots?
1) Psychology professor Lisa Feldman Barrett https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wPK2SWC0kx0
2) Ahtinen Aino, Psychology of Pervasive computing course, Tampere University of technology.
3) Gil Weinberg https://ed.ted.com/lessons/can-robots-be-creative-gil-weinberg
4) Kaku, Michio. Physics of the Future: How Science Will Shape Human Destiny and Our Daily Lives by the Year 2100. Anchor Books, 2012.
(5) https://www.theverge.com/2016/3/15/11213518/alphago-deepmind-go-match-5-result
(6) http://www.hansonrobotics.com/robot/sophia/
(7) https://www.omron.com/innovation/forpheus
Now we say to you, let’s get emotional because this is huge, we are in a moment when the history of humankind is split in two, the rise of AI and robots could be even more significant than the apparition of electricity in our lives.
During the history, we have proof that our emotions are guilty of many bad decisions that have had global consequences, then the question we will like to let to you is:
Are humans better than robots?
1) Psychology professor Lisa Feldman Barrett https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wPK2SWC0kx0
2) Ahtinen Aino, Psychology of Pervasive computing course, Tampere University of technology.
3) Gil Weinberg https://ed.ted.com/lessons/can-robots-be-creative-gil-weinberg
4) Kaku, Michio. Physics of the Future: How Science Will Shape Human Destiny and Our Daily Lives by the Year 2100. Anchor Books, 2012.
(5) https://www.theverge.com/2016/3/15/11213518/alphago-deepmind-go-match-5-result
(6) http://www.hansonrobotics.com/robot/sophia/
(7) https://www.omron.com/innovation/forpheus
The subject was very interesting! You also wrote the blog post in a very captivating manner but I hoped for more in-depth analysis of the subject at hand. It was fascinating to get to know the different modern robots but I didn't feel like you discussed them keeping the concepts you introduced earlier in mind. I think that robots have become a lot lore advanced with the growth of AI but I still haven't heard of robots being able to be creative and I would have liked to hear more about that.
ReplyDeleteI think robots’ inability to understand emotions is only matter of computational power. Reading human emotions may be based on multiple factors starting from context awareness to subtle face movements. To make a robot to understand them, it needs to be taught so enormous amount of information that there isn’t yet enough resources for that.
ReplyDeleteAnd why should we limit robots with our limitations? Many mammals use smells to detect different emotions. If we will teach robots how to sense sweat, hormones and other physiological reactions which are connected to emotions, maybe they will be even better in reading our feelings than us?
I do agree with the comment of Sini: it was really fun to read your blog post and you ask a lot of interesting questions but I kind of miss your own opinion on these subjects.
ReplyDeleteA response on your statement that emotions are the cause of many bad decisions: it's true that emotions sometimes result in (bad) decisions that are not really rational. But I think that emotions also make sure that we can have empathy and have a feeling on what is good and bad - which is missing in robots. Also I don't think it should be the goal to make robots as humanlike as possible - the goal could be to increase understanding and easy human-robot interaction which can be done by implementing some human characteristics. It is probably very difficult to decide which characteristics/abilities the robot should have in which contexts - especially if the robot is going to act in a wide range of social situations and is going to be involved in decision-making.
Anyway, interesting blog!
I am actually a little afraid of too human like robots(maybe because of some movies) and hope they don't come too popular. And I think that I am not the only one to think like that. For me it would be a little intimidating if the human robot would know my feelings. And the idea that the robot would know my weaknesses and would be more powerful than me is terrifying. Also to answer the question you ask in the begining(Why haven't the robots taken over the world?) I think it's because we as humans don't trust the robots. Even if they could recognize emotions some people will always think it's not the same as human response.
ReplyDeleteAnu
Nice article, interesting topic and an interesting style of writing.
ReplyDeleteI believe that robots in the future will be capable of so much more than we can, especially with what we are developing now, who knows what the world or robotics will be like in even the next 50 years.
I'm unsure about robots developing feelings, as its always said, robots are just parts and coding, will they truly be able to develop feelings and emotions? Who knows.
I do find robots of decent intelligence intriguing and also a little but terrifying because I'm not exposed to them and what they can do inst in my understanding. At least with a human, we can communicate, understand and be aware of what they are capable off.
I'm still looking forward to a world of robots, I just hope we can do it right.
Matthew Heath