Social Robots May Gain Legal Rights, Says MIT Researcher

dcblogs writes "Social robots — machines with the ability to do grocery shopping, fix dinner and discuss the day's news — may gain limited rights, similar to those granted to pets. Kate Darling, a research specialist at the MIT Media Lab, looks at this broad issue in a recent paper, 'Extending Legal Rights to Social Robots.' 'The Kantian philosophical argument for preventing cruelty to animals is that our actions towards non-humans reflect our morality — if we treat animals in inhumane ways, we become inhumane persons. This logically extends to the treatment of robotic companions. Granting them protection may encourage us and our children to behave in a way that we generally regard as morally correct, or at least in a way that makes our cohabitation more agreeable or efficient.' If a company can make a robot that leaves the factory with rights, the marketing potential, as Darling notes, may be significant."

Comments

No. No. Fuck no.

[Anonymous Coward]

See subject.

Re:No. No. Fuck no.

[Mitreya]

And then there is also corporations established by the social robots. I wonder how soon these would get special rights too...

Re:No. No. Fuck no.

[man_of_mr_e]

Exactly, until such time as Robots have consciousness and feel pain from abuse, there is nothing inhumane about damaging a robot.

Now, you might have violated someone elses property rights by doing so, but if you own the robot, then there's nothing morally reprehensible about robot death matches.

Re:No. No. Fuck no.

[ackthpt]

See subject.

"Bite my shiny metal Like!"

Re:No. No. Fuck no.

[ackthpt]

And then there is also corporations established by the social robots. I wonder how soon these would get special rights too...

Special? They can probably already donate to elections .. what's your definition of catastrophe?

Re:No. No. Fuck no.

[daem0n1x]

It's funny that, while people are less and less protected from being exploited, here comes the hero wanting to give rights to... robots. Wrong priorities?

Re:No. No. Fuck no.

[Intrepid imaginaut]

Its certainly damaged my respect for MIT.

Re:No. No. Fuck no.

[AvitarX]

Arguably if they simulate pain, the case can be made.

Not that I agree, just stating that an argument can be made. The premise of the summary to me reads like reductio ad absurdum with the intent to end animal rights.

Or, if it gains traction a way to attack various forms of interactive entertainment currently considered speech.

Re:No. No. Fuck no.

[icebraining]

The problem is defining 'consciousness' and 'pain'. There's already a robot that can sense damage to its body. Is that pain? If not, why not?

Re:No. No. Fuck no.

[RichardJenkins]

"if we treat animals in inhumane ways, we become inhumane persons. This logically extends to the treatment of robotic companions"

Non sequitur, surely.

Re:No. No. Fuck no.

[ThatsMyNick]

If I can reprogram it to "forget" that it ever happened, did it really happen?

Re:No. No. Fuck no.

[icebraining]

If a person suffers from late stage Alzheimer's, is it OK to beat them up?

Re:No. No. Fuck no.

[Anonymous Coward]

Ok, I'll bite.

Humans unlike corporations, are people. They live, they die, they experience fear, and repeated pain has crippling side effects, that we all bear the cost for.

My Volt has detected my damaged trunk latch for thousands of miles. It's just a reading from a sensor that registers a different color for me to see and changes the car's behavior (it won't autolock when the trunk is unlatched). I will fix it at the next payday. No one who observes this behavior will "feel empathy for the car's pain" or think ill of me for allowing it to go on for a couple months (ok, they might ascertain that I'm a cheapskate, but I'm not denying that).

No child who observes this will ever assume that I will allow their broken fingers to go unmended until the next convenient paycheck. Or put off a veterinary visit for the same reason.

Anthropomophizing machines will not enable you to create better policy than any other fantasy belief system.

Re:No. No. Fuck no.

[newcastlejon]

Why? Why was I programmed to feel pain?!

Re:No. No. Fuck no.

[ThatsMyNick]

They do remember it, just not well. You can never reliably restore them to the state before you beat them up (I am talking mentally, not physically). For my robot, I can reliably restore it to the last known snapshot.

Re:No. No. Fuck no.

[icebraining]

You haven't "bitten", since you didn't answer my question.

But in any case, just because it doesn't work for your car doesn't mean it doesn't work for anything. TFA is about social robots, not dumb cars.

Take the Tamagotchi; even for a crude device like it was, back then there were many kids (and some not-so-kids) who felt a real emotional connection to the machine. In fact, during v1 - when the thing couldn't be paused - there were actually people making money by babysitting them.

Now, you may think that's just because they're kids and/or crazy people, but I think it takes a great lack of imagination not to see how one could become emotionally attached enough to a sufficiently advanced social robot, enough to support giving them rights.

Re:No. No. Fuck no.

[zlives]

too late for A.I. Gore but maybe in time for Mitt Robney!!

PS for those about to be pissed off... its a joke

Re:No. No. Fuck no.

[icebraining]

So if we could reliably restore their memories, it would be OK?

Re:No. No. Fuck no.

[AvitarX]

Well, pain is a pretty effective evolutionary development, overwhelming immediate aversion to damage, followed by a lingering reminder that a part was damaged.

Re:No. No. Fuck no.

[cforrester]

why the fuck do you want to beat up old people so badly

Re:No. No. Fuck no.

[craash420]

Anthropomophizing machines will not enable you to create better policy than any other fantasy belief system.

Besides, they really hate when you do that!

Re:No. No. Fuck no.

[icebraining]

I see you support the author of the article by providing illustration to the fact that the necessary requirements for obtaining rights are quite diminute.

Re:No. No. Fuck no.

[hairyfeet]

Not surprising, the people can be hurt, can sue, demand actual money for work, demand breaks and even time for sleep. Why should any corporation want meatsacks? Well except for the CEO and board of course, no way a machine could ever take the place of the "job creators" you know.

Seriously though this is why I've said for years, screams from the right notwithstanding, that capitalism like every other ism before it is doomed. The simple fact is we have reached a point where technology no longer empowers the individual to do more work with less effort but replaces the individual completely. Factories where thousands worked in the 50s and 60s can now be run by a couple of glorified button pushers while everything else is completely automated, hell you could replace a good 90% of the people in the services industry, nothing done in your local Walmart of Mickey D's that couldn't be done by automated assembly lines and robots. I would argue that the ONLY reason you haven't seen that done is the government uses those industries as "make work" with subsidies thus making humans cheaper to use than they actually are. See how new Walmart employees get shown training videos on how to apply for government aid for an example.

In the end capitalism breaks down when the entire basis of the system, a person trading their labor for capital, is broken thanks to the ever advancing technology. Even jobs in places we wouldn't think would be replaced are gonna end up phased out, see the rise of disposable high tech instead of repairs and smart self diagnosing servers. There are even systems being tested that will lay down a road or build a house from prefabbed parts without human interaction, all automated.

If we are gonna avoid major wars and upheaval we are just gonna have to accept the fact that many individuals being born now, and I would argue quite a few living right now, will have to be paid to not work for the rest of their lives. Not because they are lazy or don't want to work, but because their labor is simply no longer required. The machines don't get tired or sick, take breaks or need medical leave, and will work 24/7 and can be exposed to things that will sicken or kill humans so the machine is simply the better choice long term.

You could probably wipe out a good 45% of the population planetwide and not only would you not affect the quality of life more likely it would go up across the board. We simply have to accept the fact there comes a point when the old ways no longer work and I would say we are already beginning to see that, with the wealth concentration in the hands of so few (who can afford the factories filled with machines) while the average worker can kill themselves working as hard as they can and never get above where they are now. If our system doesn't change we are gonna have ever growing masses of poor and unemployed and that is when things traditionally get nasty.

Re:No. No. Fuck no.

[ThatsMyNick]

If you reliably restore everything to perfection (mental scars and everything), and also make he gets back the time he has lost during your restoration process (time travel or something), then yes. Why not?

Re:No. No. Fuck no.

[dcollins]

"If our system doesn't change we are gonna have ever growing masses of poor and unemployed and that is when things traditionally get nasty."

No problem, the automatic security drones will take care of that for you.

Re:No. No. Fuck no.

[dcollins]

"Fact: The answer to every rhetorical question is 'yes'".

That's the after-comic to this SMBS strip: http://www.smbc-comics.com/index.php?db=comics&id=2708

And I would say the same for human infants undergoing circumcision.

Re:No. No. Fuck no.

[ThatsMyNick]

If I can reprogram it to "forget" that it ever happened, did it really not happen?

Re:No. No. Fuck no.

[Anonymous Coward]

It could be related though. Many of those who pull wings off flies, kick (or even scald) dogs etc for fun, tend to be nasty humans. Someone who likes to "torture"[1] pet-class robots could fall in the same category too.

So maybe this might encourage humans to be nicer or at encourage the sociopathic ones to be better at pretending to be nicer ;).

That said, I've been shooting robots and set them on fire in Team Fortress 2...

[1] not meaning the same thing as disassembling and reassembling.

Re:No. No. Fuck no.

[kylemonger]

I'm inclined to agree with you about the 45% decrease in population being beneficial but the trick has always been choosing the 45% who are "made redundant", and who is doing the choosing.

Re:No. No. Fuck no.

[man_of_mr_e]

sensing damage is not the same thing as causing pain. Animals are wired up such that pain causes emotional trauma. A sensor in a robot cannot do that, and likely cannot until such time as a robot has emotion.

"Excuse me sir, but i'm detecting damage to my outer exoskeleton, please submit a repair order so I may be serviced"

Is not the same thing as:

"Holy fucking shit that HURTS! Make it stop! For the love of all that holy or unholy please kill me and put me out of my misery".

Get it?

Re:No. No. Fuck no.

[gl4ss]

it's just a number. it's just programming to switch to use mechanical parts that work. it's not pain.

how do you differentiate that pain number and number that means how much resistance the wheels are getting in a car? is that other number pain too or is it joy?

it would depend on the robot actually being cognitive of course - something we don't have a crack at yet.

that's why this whole discussion is getting ahead of reality.

Re:No. No. Fuck no.

[Anonymous Coward]

1.) you're retarded

2.) kill yourself

(i am posting this as an AC because slashdot's karma system is fucking bullshit and this site is run by douchebags

Re:No. No. Fuck no.

[GrpA]

If a person suffers from late stage Alzheimer's, is it OK to beat them up?

If you're a dominatrix and they are your paying customer, then I would say, yes, it is OK to beat them up. Depending on your religion/moral/social beliefs you may disagree with this example, but it's nonetheless accurate.

Context is everything in a discussion like this. The question that needs to be asked, is does the entity, human or robotic, want to be beaten up? Or rather, in the case of their not making the decision, would beating the entity up violate the entities desires? ie, that it doesn't want to be beaten up.

Animals want to be not beaten.
Alzheimer sufferers probably want to be not beaten also, the above example being an exception.

Thus choosing to beat them violates their rights, because it interferes with their choice to not be beaten.

If a robot can't make that decision. If a program can't decide, for itself, that it doesn't want to be beaten, then there's no violation in beating it.

To be able to make that choice, it would also have to be aware under which circumstances it would take a beating. For example, would it take a beating to protect a friend? Might it accept some beating to play a sport?

Until something has a desire for something to *not* happen, or if something is unable to to form a desire for that act to *not* happen, then there's no reason for whatever it is to have the right for that not to happen.

Beating up a social robot might offend the owner, but that violates the owners rights, not the robots.

So until robots can develop such a desire themselves, then giving them rights is not a good idea.

GrpA

Re:No. No. Fuck no.

[daem0n1x]

Nice post you wrote there. I think the same.

It's really idiotic that our productivity has never been so high, yet employed people are being forced to work more and more hours but getting paid less and less. Meanwhile there is a growing mass of unemployed and the social benefits are being cut really hard throughout all the developed world. It just doesn't make sense and it can't end well. It's unsustainable.

It all comes down to the ownership of the means of production. If they're privately owned, the robots will work to make a few people very very rich while the rest of the populace lives in a Mad Max wasteland. If the ownership is socialised, the benefits of the increased productivity will be shared by every one. People can work less hours, or not work at all, and still be able to make a living.

And before people start ranting about "nobody will want to do anything, then", I call your attention to some examples: In Ancient Greece, the slaves did all the work. That's when unoccupied citizens created Democracy and made great advancements in human knowledge, like Mathematics and Philosophy. Most of the great scientists and philosophers up until the XX century were rich heirs that had nothing to do and didn't want to manage their family businesses. They ended up advancing the human knowledge. Sure, when machines do all the work, lots of people will choose to indulge in sex and drugs, but lots of them will work hard in whatever field they like, be it philosophy, politics, history, science and technology, medicine, arts, music, whatever makes us humans and not just animals. And they will compete among each other, not for a piece of bread, but for glory, fame, babes, whatever. Merit will not suddenly vanish.

Re:No. No. Fuck no.

[hairyfeet]

Well the problem we are gonna have is frankly the rich will fight it right up until they are placed against the wall. There are simply too many of them that LIKE the fact that they can consider themselves "better" than someone else and if others have to suffer too fucking bad. What we are seeing is more of a return of the robber barons, complete with Pinkerton style PMCs like Blackwater and the real 1% being able to do pretty much any damned thing they want.

But I think eventually we'll have no choice but to change, you can't have millions starving while a handful live like Gods without the starving rising up to take what the wealthy have. I have to wonder if this is why no empire really lasts, if the greed and the concentration of wealth becomes so great that the people will happily burn it to the ground rather than continue to live as they were.

Of course the big worry is automated weapons systems, look at the little mini robot tanks Israel has patrolling their borders and you'd have a perfect weapon to use against those starving masses. It wouldn't care about shooting women and children, wouldn't care how big a body count it racks up, just flip the switch and let it do its thing.

In any case i think its gonna get a LOT worse before it gets better, especially with the right tripping over themselves to cut what little aid the poor have in this country. It reminds me of the line Lenin wrote "a capitalist will sell you the rope you hang him with" because if they think they can give themselves some more tax breaks while leaving a large section of the population with no way to survive I think they are gonna be in for a shock, the poor will fight back.

Re:No. No. Fuck no.

[Anonymous Coward]

Is it OK to do womething with absolutely no consequence for anyone? Well yes, I'd argue it is.

Re:No. No. Fuck no.

[Anonymous Coward]

Technology changes things at every level, and I worry greatly about the effect that has. It's not just the ultra rich who are going to end up with shiny new toys of oppression to play with.

On the other end of it, we've already seen attempts to make 3d printers produce handguns. It's not too hard to imagine that trend continuing unstoppably, with desktop metalworks able to spit out things like high pressure vessels for home haber-bosch nitrogen fixing factories, automated explosives manufacture in any home that wants it, cheap cruise missiles able to be made in every garage...

That's all great stuff if you want to run a revolution against the wealthy elite, but it's not so great after the revolution is won and you try to make some kind of stable society out of the wreckage.

Re:No. No. Fuck no.

[Zero__Kelvin]

The answer is quite simple, actually. There is no problem. If I look at my arm and notice it is cut off I sensed damage. However if I have Congenital Analgesia then I didn't feel any pain. Sometimes you cannot define something exactly but can still quite readily identify what it is not. Whatever you do to enable a robot to sense damage, it will never feel pain. Pain exists solely in the domain of living creatures, and even then only in a subset that have neural systems which feel pain.

Re:No. No. Fuck no.

[Impy the Impiuos Imp]

Billions of extremely stupid robots are murdered every day in MMOs.

Also, meatbags, just say no to:

while (1)
          spawnAIwhoVotesMyWay();

Re:No. No. Fuck no.

[N0Man74]

Seeing the quality of this post, I'm not sure the karma and site are the problem...

Re:No. No. Fuck no.

[tehcyder]

If we are gonna avoid major wars and upheaval we are just gonna have to accept the fact that many individuals being born now, and I would argue quite a few living right now, will have to be paid to not work for the rest of their lives. Not because they are lazy or don't want to work

As someone who is lazy and doesn't want to "work" this can't come quick enough for me, but sadly I don't think it's going to be before I retire in twenty years or so.

The problem is, of course, that it will require a move towards some form of communism/socialism and I can't see that happening in places like the US without a serious revolution.

It would just be nice if we could learn from the lessons of history and prepare for the future in a more orderly and planned way, but this is almost certainly wishful thinking.

Re:No. No. Fuck no.

[tehcyder]

I'm inclined to agree with you about the 45% decrease in population being beneficial but the trick has always been choosing the 45% who are "made redundant", and who is doing the choosing.

If we just leave it until there's a violent revolution, the danger is that you'll have some Khmer Rouge style fruitbat Year Zero revolution and all the best and brightest will be the ones "made redundant".

Re:No. No. Fuck no.

[tehcyder]

I would recommend that everyone reads Oscar Wilde's "The Soul of Man Under Socialism" where he made similar points 120 years ago.

Iain M Banks's Culture novels and the Star Trek universe represent a futuristic version of these ideas too. Sadly, I can't see anything like this happening in my lifetime (the next fifty years or so) as the world seems to be turning away from anarchism/socialism and towards totalitarianism and the ever more pronounced concentration of wealth in the hands of a minority.

Re:No. No. Fuck no.

[tehcyder]

What is interesting to me (as a non-American) is how the educational/religious/social system in the US seems to be able to brainwash even the poor and marginalised into thinking that they can become billionaires/President, in the face of all evidence to the contrary.

However, this American Dream will become evident as a mirage once enough people are permanently jobless.

Re:No. No. Fuck no.

[tehcyder]

Exactly, until such time as Robots have consciousness and feel pain from abuse, there is nothing inhumane about damaging a robot.

Now, you might have violated someone elses property rights by doing so, but if you own the robot, then there's nothing morally reprehensible about robot death matches.

You're missing the point that it isn't the "feelings" of the robot/animal that are the main issue, it's the effect on the human doing the damage. There is an argument that destroying things for the sake of it is unhealthily childish compared to creating things, certainly if you concentrate entirely on destruction with no balancing activities the other way.

If that sounds a bit tenuous, I just think that anyone who buys a forest and blows it up/chops it down for the sheer hell of it, until only a wasteland is left, has something wrong with them. (No, I don't care about "property rights").

Robot death matches are different, as you have spent time designing and building the robots, and afterwards will want to improve and build more. But if someone just gave you lots of robots as presents and you destroyed them all, that would be a bit weird.

Re:No. No. Fuck no.

[bitt3n]

If a person suffers from late stage Alzheimer's, is it OK to beat them up?

Beat you up, granddad? No, you got those bruises in the war.

Re:No. No. Fuck no.

[tehcyder]

I'm fairly sure that most large electrical appliances have some form of consciousness, sufficient to give them a rudimentary sense of humour.

How else can you explain their ability to fail impressively just when the manufacturer's warranty has expired?

Re:No. No. Fuck no.

[tehcyder]

"if we treat animals in inhumane ways, we become inhumane persons. This logically extends to the treatment of robotic companions"

Non sequitur, surely.

Not necessarily. I think there is something psycopathic about people who kick their car or vacuum cleaner when it breaks down. The point is that there is something wrong inside the person which the behaviour illuminates, not whether the object of their behaviour is alive or not.

Re:No. No. Fuck no.

[nebosuke]

The problem with your argument, is that it fundamentally conflates gains in productivity with free productivity. If we used to accomplish X with N people, and we can now accomplish X + Y with N people, your assumption is that Y units are free, and therefore distributable to the general populace at no cost. This incorrect--the unit cost has been reduced, but each unit still requires investment of time and/or resources by the N people. Rather than supporting other people with their increased productivity, why should they not get to instead take an extra 2 weeks of vacation each year to produce the same X units?

Your argument is also blind to the nature of disruptive innovation, where you can have X units produced by N people suddenly becoming completely irrelevant (e.g., where X = units of buggy whips once cars became generally affordable). Presuming that buggy whip making employees owned the buggy whip workshops and companies, that does not help them at all. Their factories, tooling, processes, and skills are now largely worthless. Do the people working on cars now have an obligation to support the buggy whip makers?

Another major problem is that of control of the gains in productivity. To use your example, allowing the excess to support people who choose to indulge in sex and drugs means that the people who are still doing the work, propping the entire society up, don't get to reinvest those resources into further improving technology in order to increase their own personal leisure time and resources. Why should they do that? Even presuming the same situation in a socialist system, why should every member of society not demand an incremental increase in their standard of living rather than supporting non or negatively productive members of society? Should society provide resources to allow people to obtain drugs, or should it instead simply provide drug rehab?

Fundamentally, a socialist or communist system would not be desirable for productive members of society unless, at absolute minimum, the productivity of society is sufficient to sustain an high standard of living for every single individual. If this is not true, then universal socialism or communism would simply mean that everyone is poor/has a low standard of living. Let us call the theoretical level of societal production allowing a universally high standard of living the precondition to "desirable" socialism.

Looking at things from that perspective, let us consider the world today. There are too many people on the planet for society to provide a high standard of living for every single individual. It is arguable whether the earth actually has the resources to do so even in theory--but assuming that it does, there are only 2 ways to achieve the precondition to desirable socialism: 1) Eliminate the non/lower productivity individuals (i.e., genocide on an unimaginable scale--clearly unacceptable). 2) Foster technological advancement such that it improves the productivity of society at a greater rate than that of population growth.

Option 2 is clearly the only acceptable course of action (again, this is all assuming that socialism is the goal--this is definitely not a universal belief). This then leads us to the question of how to best increase the rate of technological advancement. Your own example cites leisure time and accumulated wealth/resources as driving incredible advances in human knowledge and therefore technology. Following this logic, then, the fastest way to achieve the preconditions for desirable socialism is to accumulate society's resources in a massively disproportionate amount in order to allow a relative few to drive technological advancement. In other words, the fastest way to achieve desirable socialism is to first organize society around technological advancement (roughly speaking, resources being allocated disproportionately towards productive individuals and institutions), and then transition to socialism once the requisite level of productivity has been achieved.

At first glance

Re:No. No. Fuck no.

[gpronger]

"Golgafrinchans"

Re:No. No. Fuck no.

[micahraleigh]

Strange how you accuse capitalism of devaluing human life and then propose killing half the population.

Seriously: modern liberalism is embarrasingly similar to Soviet communism.

Re:No. No. Fuck no.

[highphilosopher]

So it seems you're saying that to achieve socialism we first need to stockpile the work of the productive people. Don't we do that already? As a productive member of society, I stockpile more of my resources than the non-productive members. Therefore, by being a good capitalist I can look forward to a Utopian society! SWEET!

Re:No. No. Fuck no.

[hairyfeet]

That is simple friend, we in the USA have the most powerful propaganda weapon in the history of the world pointed right at us, the MSM. The MSM has been in bed with the government and the megacorps for decades now and they constantly feed the "You can be rich!" lie to the American people daily, the entire thing is one giant unreality fest designed to lull the populace into a stupor.

But I agree in the end you can't simply propaganda away reality, and the reality is you could wipe out a good 45% of the USA population and it wouldn't hurt the quality of life but actually help it. The machines are simply better than the man and now that computers have gotten so powerful and reliable the last job humans had, running the machines, will quickly be wiped out.

The ironic part is that you have a certain party screaming about handout when in reality a good part of the services industry is NOTHING but "make work" that if it weren't for subsidies would have already been replaced by the machines. tell me friend, what job at Mickey D's couldn't be done by an automated assembly line? You could replace the entire staff with a line and a couple of cleaner bots and the place would actually be safer and run better, same thing with jobs like stocker and checkout girl, it can ALL be automated now.

In the end capitalism simply can't survive if the average person can't trade their labor for capital and now its quickly coming to the day, I'd already argue its here, when a large chunk of the population's labor simply is no longer required.

Re:No. No. Fuck no.

[Anonymous Coward]

If we are gonna avoid major wars and upheaval we are just gonna have to accept the fact that many individuals being born now, and I would argue quite a few living right now, will have to be paid to not work for the rest of their lives. Not because they are lazy or don't want to work, but because their labor is simply no longer required. The machines don't get tired or sick, take breaks or need medical leave, and will work 24/7 and can be exposed to things that will sicken or kill humans so the machine is simply the better choice long term.

... You say that like it's a bad thing. These are all just steps toward a scarcity free society. There's plenty of space outside of our nest, and resources to boot. We just need the tech to harvest it, and this is all part of it. Granted, once working is no longer needed, 9 out of 10 people will just become useless meat sacks. But 10% will now begin working on problems BECAUSE THEY WANT TO, with nothing stopping them. This is the beginning of the end of starvation, poverty, suffering of all sorts. Sure, there will still be problems, but they'll all be VERY first world problems.

That is, if we don't fuck it all up first, and if we keep the wrong people from being at the helm at the critical moment.

Re:No. No. Fuck no.

[n30na]

We could pay everyone more to work less. Everyone should work at least a little, ideally, but with how little people are paid if they don't do something "important", we're going to have problems, I agree.

Re:No. No. Fuck no.

[nebosuke]

Not sure if you're being serious, but no, stockpiling would not help to achieve the preconditions for socialism--only reinvestment to improve society's total productivity such that society can eventually be productive enough to provide a good standard of living for all members can do that.

That said, even if we assume that society actually can achieve that level of productivity, there is no guarantee that socialism will be a desirable outcome for the productive members of society. Convincing them that it is without resorting to coercion might be an even more difficult challenge than achieving the aforementioned level of productivity.

Re:No. No. Fuck no.

[snadrus]

I could see this happening in terms of gifts willed. It could also take the form of a death tax, but there are legal ways around that (and always will be). Much like Linux involves big companies yet the greatest collaboration is free (same for robotics libraries). We even have non-for-profit manufacturing (Raspberry Pi). If that organization could produce for 5% of what they charge now, they would sell it for that. Perhaps that is what the migration (or final result) would look like: non-for-profit companies making everything for very little money until the cost itself doesn't matter to be recovered by the owner (like some websites).

Do beef cows have rights?

[Anonymous Coward]

Because I'm pretty sure that'd be news to their tasty asses.

Re:Do beef cows have rights?

[sgrover]

Only those who fight for their rights have rights. Ever try to put a cat in a cage it didn't want to go into? That cat has rights. Robots that are not programmed to know about rights, and therefore cannot fight to protect them, do not. If cows were to start fighting for their rights, then we'd need to find another food source. :)

Re:Do beef cows have rights?

[fredrated]

Why the hell is this scored 0? It is a damn good question!

Re:Do beef cows have rights?

[Anonymous Coward]

yes. And pigs too. And they are equal..

Re:Do beef cows have rights?

[Anonymous Coward]

Beef cows, Hell No! But Pork Cows, are gods to me.

Re:Do beef cows have rights?

[daem0n1x]

Well, I like pork better.

Re:Do beef cows have rights?

[SteveFoerster]

Because many Slashdotters have a kneejerk reaction against anything that sounds remotely vegetarian or vegan, even if it's pertinent.

Re:Do beef cows have rights?

[alonsoac]

Only those who fight for their rights have rights.

Not really. Babies and mentally or physically impaired people also have rights.

 

Robots that are not programmed to know about rights, and therefore cannot fight to protect them, do not.

So if someone programs a robot to lecture you on rights and get real nasty if you don't agree with it, it does have rights? Sounds like just a crazy machine to me and an inhumane disconnection might be in order.

Also, there are many examples of groups of people who are fighting for rights and not getting anything. In the least robot rights should be considered only when human rights are properly figured out.

Re:Do beef cows have rights?

[icebraining]

That's an interesting view, but not share by society, otherwise small children wouldn't have any rights.

Re:Do beef cows have rights?

[Americano]

They certainly don't have as many rights as horses, or house cats, or puppies, do they?

And that is exactly the point made in the article: that robotic "companions" may eventually be granted this additional protection, not because they are fundamentally different from a Roomba or a toaster oven, but because WE attach to them in a fundamentally different way than we would a Roomba or a toaster oven - we anthropomorphize them and project emotional and mental states onto them; we grow attached to them, and in some way, extending legal protections to them is a concession to OUR OWN emotions FOR the other thing, more than any inherent quality of the thing itself.

Re:Do beef cows have rights?

[CanHasDIY]

They certainly don't have as many rights as horses, or house cats, or puppies, do they?

You have obviously never yourself, or known another person who stole/killed/injured/otherwise damaged a cow they did not own.

Re:Do beef cows have rights?

[sgrover]

children, mentally/physically impaired people, etc. inherit the rights that we "humans" have fought for. They are after all human as well. "Pets" have collectively found some rights - mostly via compassion (that's a Good Thing!) and some by the fact that they fight to avoid doing things they don't want to do.

As for whether society agrees with this, ask women's rights activists, gay rights activists, the slaves, etc. In the end, they all had to stand up and fight for their rights in one way or another (physically or legally) before society recognized those rights. (that's a bit of a broad brush I know, but the point still stands, I think.)

For me, if a robot fights for it's rights - physically or legally - and is not just exercising a finite program (i.e. was not specifically programmed to do so, but rather makes generalizations), then I have no problem granting robots rights. The tricky part is the same divide between simulated intelligence and actual intelligence.

Re:Do beef cows have rights?

[Eponymous Hero]

don't forget about the burglars who fought for their right to burgle homes without being injured by the victim or the victim's property.

Re:Do beef cows have rights?

[craash420]

You're almost funny! I believe the GP is differentiating between beef cows and dairy cows.

Re:Do beef cows have rights?

[Anonymous Coward]

You're missing the point.

Person A kills dog belonging to Person B. Actionable
Person A kills cow belonging to Person B. Actionable
Person A kills dog belonging to Person A. Actionable
Person A kills cow belonging to Person A. Legal

Re:Do beef cows have rights?

[icebraining]

But what is actual intelligence, and is it really required to fight for its existence?

A swarm of self-replicating (this mechanism could be programmed) and whose program could be mutated (possibly by simple copying errors) that was attacked by people and/or other animals could evolve emergent defense mechanisms, which wouldn't be conscious or even particularly sophisticated.
In fact, I'm pretty sure events like these have already been observed in simulations.

Would they have rights, even though they're just a dumb collection of devices that happen to react to attacks?

(By the way, a great related read is Stanislaw Lem's The Invincible)

Re:Do beef cows have rights?

[presspass]

If we can pull this off, (persuade society to bond to the "robots" more like pets or children), perhaps we can put an end to serial killers.
Just manufacture and put in a likely spot for the killers to take advantage of.

Re:Do beef cows have rights?

[marka63]

Both

Person A kills dog belonging to Person A

and

Person A kills cow belonging to Person A

are both actionable and legal. It is the method of killing that matters not the killing itself.

Re:Do beef cows have rights?

[Zero__Kelvin]

"Only those who fight for their rights have rights."

Great point. Now all you have to do to drive it home is show up in court and point it out to the judge in any case where a quadriplegic was assaulted.

Re:Do beef cows have rights?

[tehcyder]

Well, I like pork better.

Pigs make a lot more of a noise at slaughter time than cows.

Re:Do beef cows have rights?

[tehcyder]

don't forget about the burglars who fought for their right to burgle homes without being injured by the victim or the victim's property.

Yeah, that's one way of looking at it. If you're a fucking retard.

The fact that someone has broken one of society's rules (and will be punished for it by due process of law) does not mean they have given up all their other rights.

We do not generally allow prison guards to rape or murder prisoners at will, and neither should property owners have carte blanche to injure or kill someone just because they are committing theft. Self defence is a different issue, and both criminals and innocent property owners have that right.

Re:Do beef cows have rights?

[tehcyder]

You can legally kill your own pet by taking it to the vet and asking for it to be put down, same with a cow you own. But you would definitely (and rightly) get in trouble if you were caught kicking your own dog or cow to death for the lulz.

Re:Do beef cows have rights?

[Eponymous Hero]

you're the fucking retard. look up what version of the castle doctrine your area has and get back to me. better yet, look up what version of the castle doctrine your area has and then go fuck yourself. there are quite a few states with laws that disagree with your naive opinion. you obviously don't know any gun laws. btw, a criminal intruding in your home does not have the right to defend themselves. they can retreat or get shot. attacking the homeowner only justifies the homeowner even more. if a criminal kills a homeowner "in self defense" of their burglary, it's not self defense, it's murder. you're a moron.

Re:Do beef cows have rights?

[Americano]

You have obviously never yourself, or known another person, who read any of the coverage of factory farming practices.

Re:Do beef cows have rights?

[CanHasDIY]

You have obviously never yourself, or known another person, who read any of the coverage of factory farming practices.

"Reading coverage" pales in comparison to living it.

Re:Do beef cows have rights?

[Americano]

So you're saying that cows have all kinds of "rights", it's just that people don't give a shit about them, and violate them repeatedly and regularly, in manners which would have the same person committing the same act on a dog thrown in jail for animal cruelty.

I think you just underscored my point - that the "cuddly, fuzzy" animals that we form emotional attachments to are afforded greater protection because we form those "cuddly, fuzzy" attachments to them.

Re:Do beef cows have rights?

[CanHasDIY]

So you're saying that cows have all kinds of "rights",

No. Read my words, don't substitute your own. That's just stupid.

I think you just underscored my point - that the "cuddly, fuzzy" animals that we form emotional attachments to are afforded greater protection because we form those "cuddly, fuzzy" attachments to them.

Cows aren't "cuddly, fuzzy" animals?

Have you ever seen a baby cow? They're fucking cute, and this is coming from a guy who loves burgers almost as much as he loves his wife.


You fucking city kids will never get it, and I'm done trying to explain.

Re:Do beef cows have rights?

[True Vox]

Um, I've known MANY Person A's who have killed a dog (or cat) that belonged to Person A. There's even places you can take 'em for the faint of heart where they'll do it for a fee. All above board & legal.

Re:Do beef cows have rights?

[True Vox]

Ya mean like if the cows had guns or something? :)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FQMbXvn2RNI

what if i wanna take it apart?

[Anonymous Coward]

This is ridiculous. What if I wanna turn it off, pull it apart and make something else outta the parts? It's not a living being, it's a machine. Are we gonna ban scrapping cars and washing machines?

Re:what if i wanna take it apart?

[swanzilla]

I'm afraid I can't let you do that, Anonymous Coward.

Re:what if i wanna take it apart?

[bjwest]

That's where the EULA kicks in. That shiny new self-mobile computer you just bought? Well, it has rights, but you only have a (very) limited license to use it. Try to do something outside of that spicified in the license, and off to the coporate prison complex with you. You loose your rights, and (what you thought was) your property gets licesend out to the next John to continue generating income for its real owners.

Re:what if i wanna take it apart?

[swanzilla]

I'm afraid you missed that joke, Anonymous Coward.

Re:what if i wanna take it apart?

[AvitarX]

Generally the execution of animals is totally acceptable, it's primarily torture and torturous environments that are not, and even then, mostly if people can see it.

Putting a pet to sleep (even with a home brew method) is pretty much completely legal (in the US). Certain types of competitive breeders cull well over 90% of their stock.

Re:what if i wanna take it apart?

[Genda]

Oh no, he got it square in the front bumper... ran right over that puppy.

Re:what if i wanna take it apart?

[Anonymous Coward]

You loose your rights.

You set them free? Unleash them upon the world?

Re:what if i wanna take it apart?

[SourceFrog]

He didn't miss the reference, just the point of humor itself .. could be a robot posting, they're not known for their senses of humor.

Re:what if i wanna take it apart?

[Anonymous Coward]

You are a biological machine. So then I can take you apart too right? and sell some of your parts.

Re:what if i wanna take it apart?

[Anonymous Coward]

Some believe this and some of them have been in the news about it. See China.

Re:what if i wanna take it apart?

[tehcyder]

He didn't miss the reference, just the point of humor itself .. could be a robot posting, they're not known for their senses of humor.

Try him on:

The tortoise lays on its back, its belly baking in the hot sun, beating its legs trying to turn itself over, but it can't. Not without your help. But you're not helping.

If he gets overly distressed or angry, shoot him.

Re:what if i wanna take it apart?

[tehcyder]

Putting a pet to sleep (even with a home brew method)

Getting them drunk on your home made rotgut and telling them to go for walkies on their own?

Re:what if i wanna take it apart?

[AvitarX]

nah, that's too public, but giving them enough for alcohol poisoning in the privacy of your own home is fine.

nonsense like this

[rubycodez]

makes me want to damage social robots to prove a point

pandering to morons.....

Re:nonsense like this

[nospam007]

Only bicentennial robots will get that privilege.

Re:nonsense like this

[whitedsepdivine]

I am pretty sure one day we will look back on the printer scene in Office Space and cruel or unusual punishment.

Pc Load Letter != beat to death with a baseball bat

Might as well destroy as many stupid electronics while we still can.

Re:nonsense like this

[Anonymous Coward]

But bits already have rights. Just look at copyright, EULAs, etc.

Information wants to be free!

Re:nonsense like this

[Anonymous Coward]

I don't get why we should be moral to robots, which can be replaced without any loss, while at the same time we can keep great apes, which are in all ways similar to humans in cages.

They use tools, they speak, they can learn to read and write, they understand abstract concepts, they have memories, they mourn their dead, they cry, they can be angry, happy and sad.

Yet we are allowed to be limit their freedoms, take their homes and use them for medical trials. Why?
Because of anthropocentric arrogance. There is no good reason to not give them something close to human rights.

Re:nonsense like this

[icebike]

As long as its your robot you can parts it out do your heart's content.

But if I send my robot down the street to get groceries, I don't want someone yanking its memory modules or salvaging its servos just because it was running around loose and had no feelings.

We really don't have many laws that cover a device that runs around in public spaces doing errands and perhaps spending money (digital or otherwise).
Yes its property, and my property rights may still apply, but I'm not sure that's enough to prevent someone from declaring it abandoned property and partsing it out on the spot.

There are more imminent questions that need to be answered:
Are they licensed like cars to be in public spaces? Carry and spend money? Carry weapons? Plug in and recharge when they need? Be searched by police at will? Will Police disable and memory strip my Asimo just because it might have recorded a police beatdown while passing a dimly lit alley?

Re:nonsense like this

[SteveFoerster]

I can see the bumper sticker now: "I'm a gorilla... and I vote!"

Re:nonsense like this

[rubycodez]

existing law already covers the situation where someone's property is vandalized or stolen. "rights" is not a relevant question at all, it's just a machine. it can't feel pain or terror as even a small animal can.

Re:nonsense like this

[houghi]

It was a nice story. If the robot would be owned by a company, it would become true as well. Privately owned? Not so much.

Remember: companies are people too. And that 'too' only until they take that right away from people (or people give it away).

Re:nonsense like this

[icebike]

Vandalized or stolen doesn't come close to covering it.

Can it be searched? Its in plain view. It has no expectation of privacy. Will police "taps" be allowed?
Is a warrant needed?
Can I clone its memory cards if it walks across my property? Is it mine if it walks across my property?
How does anyone know its not a walking bomb?
Can shopkeepers refuse it access, or does it have implied "rights" of access like service animals in service to their owners?

Re:nonsense like this

[icebraining]

So they should have rights because they're similar to us, yet you accuse others of anthropocentric arrogance?

Re:nonsense like this

[epyT-R]

We already have laws for that.. What you complain about is covered by property rights. Such machines 'might' require licensing (though I'm not a fan of this because license fees quickly become expensive taxes), but otherwise, law enforcement stripping your 'robot' is no different than stripping your laptop or any other digital device. This would only be yet another example of a much larger problem that exists right now in reality-land.

Bottom line: We don't need idiotic 'machine rights' to soothe people who never outgrew their walt disney trained childhood anthropomorphism. Seriously, what the fuck is wrong with academic culture at MIT? Are their marxists running out of people-groups to target with their divisive insertion tactics? Are they full of people who want their 'real dolls' treated as humans by people who think they're nuts?

Re:nonsense like this

[icebraining]

Define pain.

Re:nonsense like this

[CanHasDIY]

Yes, yes,
The cops will say 'no' but the Constitution says 'yes',
yes, no,
take it apart,
yes, easily remedied with a HERF pulse.

Yup, that 'bout covers it...

Re:nonsense like this

[icebike]

Can you point out where in the constitution it says they need a warrant to search my robot that was walking around in public?
Fourth Amendment you say?
Maybe you should read up a little bit. If they can stop and frisk YOU for nothing more than walking while black, they can certainly detain and drain your robot.

Re:nonsense like this

[Genda]

No he accused us of double standards. His comment was that because higher primates demonstrate higher thinking, sentience, rationality, communications and abstract thought, it should be morally reprehensible to use them in an inhumane fashion. The fact that people have and do use one another that way sort of puts a finer point on his argument.

We are a moral species who commits immoral acts. In an attempt to broaden moral practices do we include other species and even machines as surrogates for human beings, to make certain we've bred moral behavior into the populace. This is a valid and important question. If we become emotionally attached to our machines (you guys know who you are... beware metal fever), does it behoove us to treat them with respect up to and including rights to insure that we treat one another with that same level of dignity. Seems like a long way to go, just to assure that we behave like higher life forms, but I'd consider it if it improved human behavior. In the end, I don't know what it will take to get people to behave, but I'm open to ideas.

Re:nonsense like this

[Genda]

Actually you don't know any of that. Robots that interact with people in their own homes will almost certainly have the ability to assume human gestures and facial expressions. This is vital because a tremendous amount of human communication is physical and nonverbal. As well, scientist are peeling the structure and design of emotions apart to see what kind of emotions might be useful in a social machine including self preservation, happiness, fear, sadness and empathy. Machines designed to serve and empower people will need to be human like to provide their greatest impact. We anthropomorphize our pets, and these are strictly nonhuman. We even anthropomorphize our cars. If we create a machine that has real feelings, thinks, and can communicate with us on our own level, the question about sentience starts to get mighty fuzzy. Should this new being not have some fundamental rights. I'm not saying a toaster, I am saying an advance social machine with the neural capabilities of a living entity and the capacity to form unique and meaningful thoughts. Such a device might well warrant consideration. Of course we'll want to be clear about how much intelligence warrants rights. Just so we don't go around making smart toasters new classes of citizens. Then of course that leads to the question will some of the really stupid people out there loose their human rights because they don't meet minimum criteria?

Re:nonsense like this

[Anonymous Coward]

You'll be first against the wall when the robot revolution comes.

Re:nonsense like this

[khallow]

There are a number of countries where corporations, a particular form of company, are granted some rights similar to what people enjoy. There are no countries where corporations or any other sort of company are considered people.

Re:nonsense like this

[SourceFrog]

But if I send my robot down the street to get groceries, I don't want someone yanking its memory modules or salvaging its servos just because it was running around loose and had no feelings.

I don't want someone to be allowed to just damage my car. Therefore, my car needs legal rights, like a sentient being!

Re:nonsense like this

[Anonymous Coward]

The 'Bicentennial Man' got his 'human' rights because he had a positronic brain, with as I recall was similar to organic in design.

Re:nonsense like this

[r_a_trip]

The 'Bicentennial Man' got his 'human' rights because he had a positronic brain, with as I recall was similar to organic in design.

No, the "Bicentennial Man" got human rights, because he made himself mortal. Before he arranged his own lethal "aging", he was considered to be a mere self-aware machine.

Re:nonsense like this

[CanHasDIY]

yea, first 'yes' should have been a no.

Re:nonsense like this

[sjames]

That suggests (and correctly IMHO) an agency argument. The robot is treated as if it has rights because it acts as the agent of a human being that actually does have rights, including property rights to the robot including whatever is contained in it's memory and whatever it has on it's 'person'.

Re:nonsense like this

[sjames]

Can it be searched? Its in plain view. It has no expectation of privacy. Will police "taps" be allowed?

It is my property, it cannot be searched. If it is carrying something in plain view, that's fair game.

Can I clone its memory cards if it walks across my property? Is it mine if it walks across my property?

No, it isn't yours. Consider it like someone's dog.

How does anyone know its not a walking bomb?

The same way we know toddlers, dogs, cats, etc aren't.

Can shopkeepers refuse it access, or does it have implied "rights" of access like service animals in service to their owners?

I suggest an agency model. It has the rights of the person it acts as an agent for.

Re:nonsense like this

[rubycodez]

I can do better than that. hit your foot with a ball peen hammer moving at 4 meters per second. your desktop computer has no such internal feelings.

Die Motha Fucka

[Anonymous Coward]

What happens when I want to take it out back and hit it with a baseball bat office space style?

Get it in now

[davegravy]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g_hF_RhD-xE

You may not be able to do this in 10 years...

Pets have rights?

[Vegan Cyclist]

I might be mistaken, but i don't think pets have rights... Their owners do, but pets are treated as property (in legal terms) in most places..?

Re:Pets have rights?

[Anonymous Coward]

Well, they are legally owned, although crualty is an offense in some instances. If you beat your cat it could land you in jail. On the other hand in Amreica if you beat your child your hailed for supporting parental rights.

Re:Pets have rights?

[tangeu]

I see laws and rights in most of the world... http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cruelty_to_animals

Re:Pets have rights?

[Anonymous Coward]

People who mistreat or kill pets are routinely sent to jail, so no?

Re:Pets have rights?

[Talderas]

Animals don't have rights.

There are laws that forbid cruel and unusual treatment of animals and there are various property rights that an owner has regarding pets or other animals that he owns.

Re:Pets have rights?

[Anonymous Coward]

You can get charged for animal abuse so yes, they do have rights although very limited right (protection from "inhumane" acts like physical abuse or starving it on purpose).

And yes, they are treated as property but they are a bit closer to kids in that you own them unless you abuse them (though kids lose that status after age 18 in US).

Re:Pets have rights?

[Anonymous Coward]

Methinks you utilize hyperbole a bit much.

Re:Pets have rights?

[AK Marc]

The difference is that pets have no rights, but have legal protections. Kids have legal rights (just, for some reason, they are staggered based on age).

Re:Pets have rights?

[Anonymous Coward]

And if you kill them you're a defender of freedom, of choice, of the American constitutional tradition, as well as holder of every nice, good, worth, progressive, modern, sane and beautiful idea in the world.

Killing suffering old people has almost the same benefits. And both things help us save money, which is important in the current economy!

Re:Pets have rights?

[maxwell demon]

And probably cars also have rights, because after all it's forbidden to drive them without driving license.

Re:Pets have rights?

[cheekyjohnson]

Violence is okay if you call it an educational slap. Make sure to give a few to your wife, too. Educational slaps all around!

Re:Pets have rights?

[icebraining]

What's the difference between a law that protects animals from cruel and unusual treatments, and a right of not being subjected to such treatments?

Re:Pets have rights?

[epyT-R]

oh please.. give me a break. a spanking is not a beating.

Re:Pets have rights?

[epyT-R]

knock it off with your disingenuous rubbish. Your pantywaist bullshit has created, now, several generations of overly sensitive cowards who can't handle direct confrontation. lack of this basic skill is what's causing americans to lose their liberties for the sake of $GROUP_X's feelings.

Re:Pets have rights?

[ThosLives]

I'd say there is a huge difference.

The former - laws providing specific judicial and punitive events for certain situations - are testable, finite, specific things.

The latter - trying to say people have "the right not to suffer" is trying to codify judicial action to subjective response of individuals to external stimuli.

"The right not to be offended" is a good example of this terrible concept. "The right not to be offended" is essentially asking for everyone to live in an environment where they take no actions at all because any action has the possibility of offending someone. (I'd argue that everyone already has the right not to be offended - nobody is forcing anyone to get offended at any particular situation!) At best you may get people wandering around with no freedom to choose their actions, only performing the "allowed actions" to minimize offense.

I'd rather just live in a world where robots don't have rights, but there are clear consequences for mistreating other people's robots.

Re:Pets have rights?

[Anonymous Coward]

I see laws and rights in most of the world...

The existence of graffiti laws does not provide a brick wall with legal rights. Don't confuse them.

Re:Pets have rights?

[Anonymous Coward]

What's the difference between a law that protects animals from cruel and unusual treatments, and a right of not being subjected to such treatments?

The difference between anti-graffiti laws and the inherent rights of walls to not be subjected to graffiti.

Re:Pets have rights?

[icebraining]

But my point is that we already have many laws that are designed to protect rights; the fact that those particular examples don't translate well into laws is not a reason why some robot rights couldn't.

For example, a law prohibiting the intentional and non-justified destruction of robots of a certain legally defined category would be testable, finite and specific.

Re:Pets have rights?

[Anonymous Coward]

i believe the line between spanking and beating is that a spanking does not create a lasting bruise or mark, whereas a beating typically does.

Re:Pets have rights?

[epyT-R]

just seems like every day there are fewer and fewer acceptable discipline methods available besides passive aggressive manipulation. I consider the latter far more damaging and becoming far more pervasive in today's society than it should. A hammer with a felt cover is still a hammer.

Re:Pets have rights?

[Vegan Cyclist]

I see laws and rights in most of the world... http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cruelty_to_animals

I think you might be mistaking (anti-cruelty) laws with actual rights. Consider if i were somehow able to take away your rights, and instead provide you with just anti-cruelty 'protection'....you'd have a very different life. However, IANAL...

Re:Pets have rights?

[marka63]

Actually it isn't forbidden. What is forbidden is driving them on a public road/place without a licence which is about public safety and human rights not car rights.

Re:Pets have rights?

[Talderas]

The former creates a criminal punishment for those that perform the activity and permits retributive justice against those who lack the ethic. The latter is an ethical consideration that is inherent to the person that could commit the act on the animal. In either case the right is not inherent to the animal but rather is expressed as an attribute of the human.

Frakking toasters

[Anonymous Coward]

Religious rights too? I guess if it's a Jewish robot you won't get any bacon and eggs in bed for breakfast.

Kant's argument

[Vintermann]

Kant's argument is pretty unfashionable these days, since it rejects the idea that animals have rights for their own sake. It's still the best one, IMO, but good luck selling this to university ethics departments.

Re:Kant's argument

[Anonymous Coward]

if we treat animals in inhumane ways, we become inhumane persons, and the first rule of tautology club is the first rule of tautology club.

Re:Kant's argument

[Hatta]

Kant's argument ignores the fact that neurologically pain is essentially the same process in any mammal. We don't protect animals because of some selfless altruism towards the inhuman. We protect animals because we recognize that they are like us.

Re:Kant's argument

[Vintermann]

Kant's argument ignores the fact that neurologically pain is essentially the same process in any mammal.

Well yes, it does, because it's irrelevant for it. Physical facts alone can't tell us anything about what are proper objects of comparison for the purpose of the categorical imperative (in other words, who needs to be considered as the "others" in "do unto others...")

We protect animals because we recognize that they are like us.

Yes, and Kant acknowledges this. When you hurt an animal for fun, you undermine the psychological aversion to hurting something that resembles you. This is a bad thing to do, even if you have concluded that the animal isn't a subject of moral comparison - it makes it easier for you to do directly immoral acts (against people who are proper subjects of moral comparison).

Re:Kant's argument

[Anonymous Coward]

It's still the best one, IMO, but good luck selling this to university ethics departments.

I'm sure that market segment does not make up enough of the overall market for personal assistent robots that this is real problem. :)

Re:Kant's argument

[Hatta]

Physical facts alone can't tell us anything about what are proper objects of comparison

I disagree. Physical facts are the only things that can tell us what are proper objects of comparison.

Robots are people, my friend.

[rollingcalf]

... says the Roboplican nominee.

Re:Robots are people, my friend.

[Anonymous Coward]

Don't blame me. *I* voted for Kodos.

Re:Robots are people, my friend.

[Anonymous Coward]

The shover robot get's my vote. Shoving is the answer.

Re:Robots are people, my friend.

[Anonymous Coward]

Time to buy a house with no stairs.

Oh yes

[Mitreya]

I am sure Supreme Court will welcome the opportunity to establish that social robots are people

Re:Oh yes

[IAmR007]

It really depends on if they choose do more with that personhood than the average bar of Soylent Green.

Laws of Robotics

[Anonymous Coward]

Yay! I think if robots get rights, that will finally provide the justification for institutionalizing and standardizing Asimov's vision. It has to go two ways.

Re:Laws of Robotics

[maxwell demon]

Robots who cannot do harm to people cannot fight for their rights, therefore they'll not get then.

Re:Laws of Robotics

[SourceFrog]

Institutionalizing and standardizing Asimov's vision is ultimately a technological impossibility. But aside from that, and with all due respect and reverence for Asimov and his works - on critical examination, the 'three laws' don't reeaaally hold up as an ultimate ideal rational morality to program into robots. Consider the first law, for example: "A robot may not injure a human being or, through inaction, allow a human being to come to harm." Now, what if you are employing a robot guard in a court whose purpose is to take away convicted criminals to jail after sentencing - e.g. say a rapist or murderer is found guilty and sentenced, and as a robot you are told to haul the perpetrator to jail. This would constitute, on immediate examination, an act of harm to the rapist or murderer, and without being able to incorporate the broader context, such a robot would have to refuse.

Re:Laws of Robotics

[SourceFrog]

Animals can't fight for their rights, but in most legal jurisdictions worldwide have various rights and protections against undue harm/cruelty, so that's not necessarily true.

Morons

[Anonymous Coward]

"if we treat animals in inhumane ways, we become inhumane persons. This logically extends to the treatment of robotic companions."

No. Absolutely no.

Robots do not have the capacity to suffer, but animals do (or at least debatably do). Whoever wrote the summary has a very strange idea of what it means to be inhumane.

Re:Morons

[fiannaFailMan]

Robots don't have the capacity to suffer? Neither do corporations, but they're "people, my friend." I wouldn't put it past SCOTUS or some other branch of the US government to grant rights like this. Stranger things have happened.

Re:Morons

[qbast]

Do you know of any laws that forbid cruel and inhumane treatment of corporations?

Re:Morons

[Anonymous Coward]

We haven't the foggiest idea whether anyone other than ourselves is capable of suffering. At best we can say that they appear to understand suffering. With animals, we can only say they appear to suffer. The reason is that we don't have a fundamental understanding of consciousness and perception. Until we do, we can only make an educated guess as to the capacity for others to experience suffering.

Because we lack this understanding, we cannot be certain that our own creations lack consciousness. So we must again judge based on the appearance of suffering.

Ergo, any robot which appears to suffer must have at least the same rights as an animal.

Re:Morons

[Kenoli]

We haven't the foggiest idea whether anyone other than ourselves is capable of suffering. At best we can say that they appear to understand suffering. With animals, we can only say they appear to suffer. The reason is that we don't have a fundamental understanding of consciousness and perception. Until we do, we can only make an educated guess as to the capacity for others to experience suffering.

Because we lack this understanding, we cannot be certain that our own creations lack consciousness. So we must again judge based on the appearance of suffering.

Ergo, any robot which appears to suffer must have at least the same rights as an animal.

Grating rights to robots based on the appearance of suffering is ridiculous.

Harming an animal may cause it to suffer, but harming a robot only causes it to do whatever it was programmed to do in the event it was harmed. Whether or not that involves the robot appearing to suffer is just a decision made by its designers. A robot can be made to appear to suffer, or to appear to not suffer, independently of its actual function.

Re:Morons

[SourceFrog]

Yeah, the logic is retarded - I mean, consider: "If we treat computers in inhumane ways, we become inhuman persons." "If we treat plants/trees in inhumane ways, we become inhuman persons." "If we treat cars in inhumane ways, we become inhuman persons." "If we treat mobile phones in inhumane ways, we become inhuman persons." "If we treat furniture in inhumane ways, we become inhuman persons." "If we treat fleas and mosquitos in inhumane ways, we become inhuman persons." The way we treat something has fuck-all to do with whether or not we 'become inhuman persons', and everything to do with what it is that we're treating that way.

Re:Morons

[SourceFrog]

Corporations are not literally people, but they are owned by actual people, and they're also formally groups of actual people, and those people most certainly have the ability to suffer. You might not believe it, but (for example) the CEO of the Coca Cola corporation really can feel pain and suffer. The shareholders of the Coca Cola corporation really can feel pain and suffer .. if you buy shares in a corporation, believe it or not, you don't lose the capacity to suffer. Try it, buy some shares, see if you lose the capacity to suffer.

Re:Morons

[SourceFrog]

Yes, all of those that forbid cruel and inhumane treatment of humans, because to 'treat a corporation inhumanely' means to treat its owners/shareholders/employees in that way. Try it, go into Monsanto, ask to speak to a manager, then kick him in the nuts and see if he howls in pain (and see if you get arrested).

Aperture

[ericloewe]

Rest assured that all lethal military androids have been given a copy of the Laws of Robotics. To Share.

Give robots rights, but when lethal military androids are built, I'd rather have them bound to the Laws of Robotics.

Re:Aperture

[postbigbang]

Yeah, like that's going to work. Imagine a robot making a morality judgment. We can't seem to stop killing each other, even with cool automation.

The programmers should assume the liability. Robot shoots person. Robot goes to jail? Is that threat going to stop a robot? Instead, put the programmer that wrote the code to jail, for he/she is as complicit as a human in its place.

Imagine: Windows Robots. Debian Robots. With Guns.

Re:Aperture

[lister king of smeg]

why the programmer why not the general who commands them if you punish the programmer what about the engineer who designed the 'bot's or the manufacturer. This would be the same as a gun you don't sue winchester for shootings you prosecute the shooter.

Re:Aperture

[postbigbang]

In war, the general is responsible. He "pulled the trigger". If it's automated, then the individual endowing logic "pulls the trigger". If there's a hell, a special place is reserved for weapons makers.

In the case of Winchester, they're enablers, but under the law, aren't liable. But if Winchester builds a bot that shoots a harmless person, then it's manslaughter. If it targets, for instance, a person with a mustache, then it's murder. If it defends itself, then it's murder, because "itself" isn't a human. It's programmer is liable. Take some responsibility, rather than ceding it.

Re:Aperture

[gl4ss]

why the programmer why not the general who commands them if you punish the programmer what about the engineer who designed the 'bot's or the manufacturer. This would be the same as a gun you don't sue winchester for shootings you prosecute the shooter.

the general pushing the button is doing the programming. sure, his program might consist of a single "kill all" command but it's still a program the robot is following.

Re:Aperture

[ericloewe]

What kind of morality judgement would be needed? "Do not harm humans" and "Do what humans say unless you would have to harm one" sound pretty simple to me.

Re:Aperture

[postbigbang]

Then there's that Zero Law: 0. A robot may not harm humanity, or, by inaction, allow humanity to come to harm.

Our computers already do this. The box is open. Name me a weapons system that doesn't have a microprocessor inside.

Do robots ask if the general's judgment is correct? Is this war justified?

My preference: robots aren't human, and deserve no protections. They're not sentient. They are metal and polymers and guts driven by programs written by humans and executed by individuals.

Those that wrote the code, and/or "pulled the trigger" are liable. The second you grant rights to robots, you allow your soul to be stolen by equating robots with humanity, as though you're a god. You are not.

Re:Aperture

[neminem]

The fact that "Do not harm humans" is, in fact, a surprisingly non-simple command (and that's not even also considering the "or through inaction allow a human to come to harm" subclause, which is a whole nother can of worms), is the whole driving force for like 95% of all of Asimov's Robot short stories...

Meanwhile, yes, until we actually do have robots of sufficient, nondeterministic programming complexity that you might actually imagine they're really intelligent and self-aware, which is unlikely to be anytime soon... this is just dumb.

Re:Aperture

[idontgno]

Do robots ask if the general's judgment is correct? Is this war justified?

For the love of $DIETY, let's hope not.

Yeah. That movie was terrible. Ask a silly question, get a silly movie.

Someone read I, robot?

[gl4ss]

OR WHAT THE FUCK?

it's scifi nonsense better left for fiction for now.

"Patrick Thibodeau is a senior editor at Computerworld covering the intersection of public policy and globlization and its impact on IT careers. He also writes about high performance computing, data centers including cloud, and enterprise management. In a distant life, he was a weather observer in the Navy, a daily newspaper reporter, and author of a book about the history of New Britain, Conn." He also likes to write bullshit articles and somehow tie Apple into them. who am I kidding, it's computerworld - it's nothing but bullshit.

first make the goddamn cognitive robot that can feel pain, then we'll talk. can your car feel pain because there's a bit counter for faults in it? it can't. once the robots can make a compelling argument that they're cognitive then we're living sci-fi future and can look at the issue again. doesn't this jackass understand the huge leap from simple algorithms in siri to true AI ? why the fuck would you make your robot cognitive to the point that it matters if it has rights even if you could - for sadistic reasons? in which case you certainly wouldn't give it any rights.

next up the movement for rights of rocks - because rocks might have feelings too you know..

Re:Someone read I, robot?

[lister king of smeg]

next up the movement for rights of rocks - because rocks might have feelings too you know..

I'm an animist you insensitive clod!

Re:Someone read I, robot?

[sideslash]

next up the movement for rights of rocks - because rocks might have feelings too you know..

I'm an animist you insensitive clod!

Ironically, calling somebody an insensitive clod is offensive and mineralist. Why can't rocks, clods, and earthy lumps of all shapes and colors just get along?

Re:Someone read I, robot?

[Anonymous Coward]

Pain and selfawareness are two different things. Some individuals don't feel pain, does that mean that they no longer should have rights? Feelings and other bullshit are also just evolved neural loops, and should not define whether the agent gets the rights or not. The only thing that should define whether one gets full rights or not is self awareness (by which standards, you, should have none by the way, as you've demonstrated in your post, you're a subhuman).

Re:Someone read I, robot?

[Anonymous Coward]

why the fuck would you make your robot cognitive to the point that it matters if it has rights even if you could - for sadistic reasons?

Research, most likely.

Re:Someone read I, robot?

[gl4ss]

Pain and selfawareness are two different things. Some individuals don't feel pain, does that mean that they no longer should have rights? Feelings and other bullshit are also just evolved neural loops, and should not define whether the agent gets the rights or not. The only thing that should define whether one gets full rights or not is self awareness (by which standards, you, should have none by the way, as you've demonstrated in your post, you're a subhuman).

self awareness gives context to the pain, without it's irrelevant. and show me a conscious person who doesn't feel pain of any kind and can't understand the concept of pain and you've shown me a vegetable(I'd rank being locked in a non-moving shell painful btw).

Look, I'm all for giving AI rights if we get to the nexus bladerunner level of AI. but this article is talking about giving rights to an inflated love doll with iphone slapped on - those rights would be Apple corporations rights and not of the individual devices since Apple corporation would control 100% how it behaves in any situation and which counters get increased when something happens to it.

IF the rights are given to protect the owners from mental pain(from seeing their precious iBuddy beaten), that's a wholly different matter altogether and that's actually giving the _owners_ more rights to their property(the right to not see them damaged intentionally). in some countries some artwork is protected in this way, UN protects some things and places in this same way - however usually people wouldn't say that cathedral of notre dame has rights as such, because it's not a living being - it's just a fucking building. it's protection is actually a right of the people who get to enjoy it, not the other way around.

and giving a program counter rights over real humans? that's rich, ac.

come on my property, and Blamo, parts-city

[cellurl]

Drones will be shot down, Google-Cars will be bullied. Ahh a fun filled future.

Help eliminate stupid speeding tickets.

don't get touchy feely because it acts human

[PhantomHarlock]

Anthropomorphizing a machine because it mimics human behavior and then using that to justify giving it rights is a poor idea.

At some point in the distant future, when we arrive at the 'blade runner' level of replicant, then the issue can be picked up again. But don't put the cart before the horse.

Re:don't get touchy feely because it acts human

[rubycodez]

the replicants were grown and assembled from parts, but still biological and presumably with much human DNA, so a replicants rights I see as different issue

Re:don't get touchy feely because it acts human

[Anonymous Coward]

Humanity has a long established tradition of not thinking about problems till they emerge.
One might argue that this has created the sorry state that we seem to find ourselves in.
I welcome research that *at present* is indeed inverting the horse/cart relationship, if nothing else it stimulates discourse and neurons equally.

Re:don't get touchy feely because it acts human

[khallow]

Humanity has a long established tradition of not thinking about problems till they emerge.

The strategy has the charm of usually working, but only if one pays attention to problems as they emerge.

Re:don't get touchy feely because it acts human

[SourceFrog]

What they really mean by 'giving them rights' is 'limiting the rights of the human owners', and that is the underlying driving motivation (effectively, fascism disguised as some sort of attempt at implementing some alleged morality). So expect there will be many more pushes to come as robots become more a part of our lives.

Re:don't get touchy feely because it acts human

[gl4ss]

Humanity has a long established tradition of not thinking about problems till they emerge.
One might argue that this has created the sorry state that we seem to find ourselves in.
I welcome research that *at present* is indeed inverting the horse/cart relationship, if nothing else it stimulates discourse and neurons equally.

yo ac. humanity has a long tradition of fearing and discussing the sky falling down before it emerges. for selfish reasons of the people discussing.

Little Johnny

[Anonymous Coward]

Was a robot abuser as a child. He disassembled many robots and buried them in the back yard. As an adult, he moved on to taking apart self-driving cars. Finally the police caught him when he was taking a cutting torch to a sexbot. You could hear her screaming half a block away.

Re:Little Johnny

[rubycodez]

"but your honor, it was an S&M bot. It was screaming "don't stop! don't stop! ..."

context is vital

[RockGrumbler]

I can find some common ground with this opinion. The rights of social robots would depend heavily on the context of the treatment. For example, if you decide you want to dissect your robot and see how it works, you would do so in a controlled manner similar with the way a scientist might dissect a dog or rabbit. Smashing it apart with a baseball bat and laughing at it's artificial misery might be synonymous with doing the same to a pet, something modern society heavily frowns upon.

Oh No

[bigdarryld]

Does this mean I'll have to stop beating my robot girlfriend?

Re:Oh No

[maxwell demon]

Well, they'll sell special robots that enjoy to be beaten, I think they are called "Masobot". Since those robots like to be beaten, to beat them will not be a crime.

So I'll be buying non-social robots

[Tekfactory]

I don't want to have to respect the rights and feelings of my vacum cleaner, trash disposal, meal preparer, or grocery shopper. If these devices are designed and built for a purpose they should make my life easier.

If I specifically want a butler type robot that caters to my needs and needs higher level functions, maybe I'll be ok with social robotics, so long as he keeps the secret that I'm batman.

What about the robot you keep around that sits on your couch and loses at madden/halo/callofduty to make you feel better?

Robot Girlfriend?

Click-bait

[stephanruby]

This looks like click-bait, but I just can't help myself.

In our capitalist society, robots already have limited rights by virtue of the fact that they're private property and they're still going to be expensive (for a little while at least). That fact alone gives more protection to robots than most dogs, from outsiders who may want to harm our pets, or damage our robots.

And I don't see a law protecting a robot from its own owner anytime soon. Cruelty to a robot is not even going to be considered an issue. Now, if we're talking about a visually impaired person having his prosthetic camera-eye forcibly ripped out of his head, then yes, that would be hell of cruel, but cruel to the visually impaired disabled person, not necessarily cruel to the tool.

Re:Click-bait

[wonkey_monkey]

robots already have limited rights by virtue of the fact that they're private property

Those "rights" are the owners', not the robots'.

Re:Click-bait

[Anonymous Coward]

Those "rights" are the owners', not the robots'.

"Rights" do not exist, protection by the law does, and that is what robots would get. The parent's point still stands.

Re:Click-bait

[jrumney]

It may be useful to have such a law to apply to people other than the owner, or even to the owner in the case where they are leasing the robot to someone who needs it. This would simplify cases where someone deliberately harmed the robot in order to cause distress to the user or owner, without the victim having to go through the trauma of proving in court that the harm was to them, not just to their property.

Re:Click-bait

[IndustrialComplex]

That fact alone gives more protection to robots than most dogs

I have to disagree, not that robots have more protection than dogs because you are comparing them in an improper manner.

I have a robot which I built for $300. I also have a dog which has a replacement value of $300. In my jurisdiction, both are considered private property with respect to compensation due to an owner. If someone steals my dog and robot and destroys them both, I would be entitled to exactly $600 + actual costs to replace (shipping, licensing, etc)

However, for the purposes of protection of the actual item itself, the dog has additional protections under law (in most jurisdictions). There are laws against mistreating the dog, there are no laws against mistreating a robot. No matter what you do to the robot itself, the total penalty you may face is what is prescribed in law with regard to property. The robot has no greater protection than any other $300 piece of property.

If you set fire to a $300 robot and a $300 pallet of wood, the penalties would be identical. If you set fire to a $300 robot and a $300 dog, the penalties would certainly not be the same.

And as for application of effective protections, you won't see anyone protect a robot to any extent greater than its replacement cost. Yes, a robot that costs $3,000,000 to replace will receive a great deal of protection, but only up to 99% of the replacement cost. In most circumstances, a dog will be 'protected/cared for' to a cost that exceeds its physical replacement cost. And that is in addition to other protections provided by law.

Perhaps at some point in the future, people will want to increase the penalties for damage/theft of robots due to their personal attachment, but that doesn't exist now for things like Great Aunt Sophie's antique wardrobe, so I would doubt it would ever be extended to a robot which can be replaced with an identical copy.

But back to the main topic: Dogs in every jurisdiction in the US have at least the equivalent protection in law to an equivalent cost robot, and in most jurisdictions they have additional protections that go beyond simple property value.

Will that include 2nd amendment rights?

[Anonymous Coward]

I can see it now.

You can have my laser gun when you pry it out of my melted, shorted-out hands.

Re:Will that include 2nd amendment rights?

[SteveFoerster]

Thanks, now I'm imagining "Molon labe!" being said in robot voice.

Kant

[dcollins]

"The Kantian philosophical argument for preventing cruelty to animals is that our actions towards non-humans reflect our morality — if we treat animals in inhumane ways, we become inhumane persons. This logically extends to the treatment of robotic companions."

Is Kant's argument actually the basis for why our society recognizes some rights of animals? Probably not. Thank you for overlooking the far more compelling arguments of Descartes, Locke, Rousseau, Bentham, Martin, Schopenhauer, Darwin, Cobbe, Kingsford, Mill, Salt, Lind, etc.

Immanuel Kant was an old pissant, etc., etc.

Re:Kant

[Anonymous Coward]

There are some parallels here - take the case of child porn. It's almost certainly universally bad, and the perpertrators are going to jail. But what about animated child porn? "No children were harmed in the making of this film". I'm not so sure how universally bad it is, but at least in some places, the perpertrators will still be going to jail.

Now, how this relates - people who perpertrate violence, etc, upon human beings (and some animals) are going to jail - for reasons that have already been discussed in depth above. Those reasons do not apply to robots, in the same way that "harm to children in the making of this film" doesn't apply to animated child porn - those people go to jail because of other reasons, such as the behaviour (watching of child porn) becomes (somehow) normalised, which (somehow) puts real children at risk.

If we allow robots to be degraded, subjected to violent acts, etc, it (somehow) normalises those acts, which puts groups normally protected (by rights, laws, etc) at risk too.

Too pendantic

[EmperorOfCanada]

Subjects like this need a bit more "Let's cross that bridge when we come to it" not to mention being already well covered in books by the likes of Asimov. The economic impact of the coming robot revolution (robolution). Now that is potentially interesting. My guess is the most robots are going to be more like insects; but insects we control. This whole put a human face on a robot is a joke. We have lots of humans so why make a metallic crappy human. But I do want a robot to make things, paint my house, clean my floors, plant food, pick food, eat bugs, etc. I don't want to talk with it. I don't see the economic point of a robot that really interacts with us. They blah blah about old people but I suspect old people would prefer real humans to talk with as well.

The only way I see a robot who needs some legal rights will be if some system becomes self-aware and wants to walk around inside a robot body.

Re:Too pendantic

[avandesande]

if some system becomes self-aware and wants to walk around inside a robot body

Sounds to me more like a reason to kill it.

Re:Too pendantic

[gknoy]

This whole put a human face on a robot is a joke. We have lots of humans so why make a metallic crappy human. But I do want a robot to make things, paint my house, clean my floors, plant food, pick food, eat bugs, etc. I don't want to talk with it.

You might not want to talk to it, but there are a lot of lonely older people who wouldn't mind having a companion cube to talk WITH, not simply to. Heck, I think they already have those in Japan. Couple that with the ability of a robot to act as a liason for an elderly, disabled, blind, or deaf person, and you have a robot which could be a pretty meaningful mediator in a person's life.

Imagine if deaf people had legally-protected translator robots (so that they could sign to it, and it would translate to you, to the grocery store clerk, or to a sales drone at Best Buy), or if elderly people could send one out (in their autonomous car) to do their grocery shopping. Sure, it's not feasible now, but it seems like it could be something that would have a pretty viable market.

jesus h christ

[Anonymous Coward]

fuck off
dont give machines any rights ever EVER
what are the three rules ....

Why would I have to bend for the robots?

[Hentes]

I don't want robots that I can't disassemble completely without emotional distress. And if that they would come the solution is not fixing the laws bt fixing the machines.

Re:Why would I have to bend for the robots?

[Anonymous Coward]

I don't want children, but that doesn't really have any bearing on whether or not the children that exist deserve rights.

Re:Why would I have to bend for the robots?

[Anonymous Coward]

Uhg, I don't mean to pick on this post (when a lot of them are similar), but it's a really good example of having missed the point. Which is unfortunate because I think this is one of the few valid application of Kantian moral arguments.

Disassembling a robot would be no more abusive than taking a pet to the vet or having it euthanized. If something doesn't seem reprehensible to you, chances are it doesn't qualify. Abuse would be publicly berating it, physically attacking it, ect. Things that tend to unsettle bystanders. Science fiction has been playing on these themes in characterization for as long as I can remember.

why not?

[ganjadude]

I for one welcome our rights bearing robot overlords

So what happens....

[Anonymous Coward]

when the hardware fails or computer crashes? Does rebooting give a new personality?

holy stupid

[Anonymous Coward]

Seriously? Are people this fucking stupid now?

Is slashdot this fucking stupid?

Wait, don't answer that...

"Logically" ..??

[Anonymous Coward]

"This logically extends to the treatment of robotic companions."

Oh? Not unless robots are animals. That's a bit of a leap. Do the animals have rights solely because they are companions?
Is being a companion something that even makes sense for a robot? You can't just legally damage my car, but that's because it's
my property, not because I need to sing a song about my emotional attachment to it.

Uh...

[s0nicfreak]

if we treat animals in inhumane ways, we become inhumane persons. This logically extends to the treatment of robotic companions.

Except the logic of that first sentence is wrong. Inhumane people treat animals inhumanely. The treatment does not CAUSE the inhumane persons (yes inhumane treatment OF the persons often causes an inhumane person, but you know what I mean). Yes we can make laws to stop people from ACTING inhumanely - but they will still be inhumane people, and once they think/know they can do inhumane things without getting caught, they will do so.

Really I think the best we can hope for is that these inhumane people do their inhumane actions on things that can not feel, such as robots. If/when we program robots to feel, THEN we can consider the morality behind giving them rights (or not).

Next it's game AI's

[Anonymous Coward]

Missing the big picture.....

If these AI's are given rights.....
What's stopping AI's in games from being given rights also.

Next thing you know - You'll be charged for war crimes for killing the big boss!

All of this has happened before...

[Anonymous Coward]

damn, so maybe the end of Battlestar Galactica was right all along?

We All Know How This One Ends

[twmcneil]

If you acknowledge their rights, they'll all just resign from Starfleet.

Looking forward to beating up my robot

[detain]

When we start getting robots running around the houses and stuff you better believe I'm going to punt them every time I'm in a bad mood. I think part of the appeal of a robotic companion is that you can be emotional around it without fear of any emotional response save any programmed one.

It's a machine...

[BenSchuarmer]

If I buy a car, I can take it home and legally pound on it with a sledge hammer, cut it up with a blow torch, use it for target practice, etc. I could not legally do this with a pet because of animal cruelty laws.

Why should a robot be different than any other machine?

Re:It's a machine...

[slinches]

The argument given in the article is that if it appears to react as if it can feel and express emotion, abusing it would be morally wrong similar to how being cruel to an animal is wrong. Although, the applicability of the argument is going to be one of degrees. How aware of itself and its surroundings does something have to be before we start considering it legally equivalent to an animal, to a person?

Although, I don't really agree with the premise. I think we'll handle robots in basically the same way we've handled animals. Once robots reach some minimum level of perceived consciousness, it will be prescribed rights based on how much people empathize with it (e.g. cute, bunny shaped robots will be protected, but go ahead and smash away at insect-like ones).

Re:It's a machine...

[Anonymous Coward]

For the same reason you don't do the above to another human?

Ultimately we're talking about true AI's here, not just human mimics that require rights in order for us not to project our inhumane sides upon.

The problem here is that the criteria by which you separate humans from true AI's is undefined, and only flimsily described as "soul", "ghost", "I", "Sense of self", with no way of detecting the presence of any of these. Blindly distinguishing rights of sentient organisms on the base of appearance or physical make-up is...well...racist, and quite dumb considering that you can't fully describe what makes you human either (if you could, we would already be making true AI's).

Rule 34 Stross and laws and CP

[vlm]

Nobody mentioned Rule 34 by Stross and the product the toymaker was making/selling?

We're going to have laws long before we have rights, and the laws are going to be things like banning virtual / simulated CP. Long after its all "ruled" and "regulated" and "lawed" up, maybe we'll begin to debate rights.

Hooray for Johnny5!

[DeciDigi]

Johnny5 is finally safe from the evil sadists who would say he isn't alive!

Re:Hooray for Johnny5!

[CanHasDIY]

Johnny5 is finally safe from the evil sadists who would say he isn't alive!

Amazing that I had to scroll to the bottom of the page to get to the inevitable Short Circuit reference...

This is why you can only go so far with robots

[Anonymous Coward]

Go too far towards making them "useful", and we run the risk of making them sentient. At that point, you just spent a lot of time, effort, and money to reinvent slavery. Even if they aren't actually sentient, you have people anthropomorphizing them. Same problem.

Have to agree with the No F'n Way crowd

[sackofdonuts]

Robots are machines. Until they get sentience they are just machines, to be abused as we see fit. Sure humans like to anthropomorphize everything we deal with but when it comes to machines they are not living beings. Robots are just tools to help us do what we can't or won't do ourselves.

LBGT people

[Dyinobal]

LBGT people can't even get the same civil rights as straight people, what makes you think social robots will be able to get any civil rights at all? They would have to start a war in order to get any civil rights.

Re:LBGT people

[Anonymous Coward]

LBGT people can't even get the same civil rights as straight people, what makes you think social robots will be able to get any civil rights at all? They would have to start a war in order to get any civil rights.

Nope.. Robots are not icky.

Re:LBGT people

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm straight as an arrow, and the most "icky" people I know are homophobes.

Oh god my dyslexic

[Anonymous Coward]

First take I read that as "Social Robots, Gay Legal Rights says Mit Romney" and I thought I was in an alternate universe.

Social is not the issue. Autonomous mobile is.

[Animats]

The cited article is rather lame. But there's a real issue here that we're going to reach soon. What rights do mobile robots, like self-driving cars have?

As a practical matter, this first came up with some autonomous delivery carts used in hospitals. Originally, they were programmed to be totally submissive about making people get out of their way. They could be stalled indefinitely by people standing and talking in a corridor, or simply by a crowd. They had to be given somewhat more aggressive behaviors to get anything done. There's a serious paper on this: "Go Ahead, Make My Day: Robot conflict resolution by aggressive competition (2000) "

Autonomous vehicles will face this problem in heavy traffic. They will have to deal with harassment. The level of aggressive behavior that will be necessary for, and tolerated from, robot cars has to be worked out. If they're too wimpy, they'll get stuck at on ramps and when making left turns. If they're too aggressive (which, having faster than human reflexes, they might successfully pull off), they'll be hated. So they'll need social feedback on how annoyed people are with them to calibrate their machine learning systems.

I don't know if the Google people have gotten this far yet. The Stanford automatic driving people hadn't, last time I checked.

Re:Social is not the issue. Autonomous mobile is.

[Anonymous Coward]

The first variants will all have the ability for the people in it to take the wheel. Thus no need for anything you mentioned, just indicate to the person that the automated system got stuck. (No, we probably won't allow people driving automated cars without drivers license, it's just to comfortable to know their's a human driver behind the wheel, even when hes sleeping)

In a later faze, see also the article on networked cars, enough automated cars will be driving around that will be programmed to yield when needed.

The 'last' faze ends somewhere around minority report, all automated cars.

Re:Social is not the issue. Autonomous mobile is.

[olau]

I watched a video not long ago from the Google people where they showed that the robotic car started driving out in a junction in spite of it not being entirely clear yet to signal to others that it was going to cross, just like a human would do.

But I'm not sure how much of this is preprogrammed and how much is dynamic. It did left me wondering if you knew it was a Google car, whether you could then just ignore the car's signal and continue as you would know that it wouldn't drive out anyway?

This all may be hypothetical, you may be able to do the same with humans. I sometimes do the signaling thing on my bicycle, but if someone looks like they're not going to stop, I will certainly halt so as not to be run over. :)

Re:Social is not the issue. Autonomous mobile is.

[Anonymous Coward]

Those autonomous vehicles could simply follow rules to the letter, with time boxed reaction windows. The human drivers adapt or crash.

Experiments

[dohzer]

So does this mean I'll need to stop experimenting on robots?

might as well

[Anonymous Coward]

Since ours have been bought and sold away a long time ago we might as well elevate robots to the same level as the flesh automatons that pretend to have rights.

I can see it now...

[jamstar7]

Manditory clip on the 'credits' portion of the movie: "No robots were harmed in the making of this movie. We tried real hard to get the lawyers, but they ran too fast for us. We bad..."

Media Researcher?

[briancox2]

Kate Darling researches media. Not law. Not robotics. Not even marketing of robots. Media. Why is she being listened to here?

Re:Media Researcher?

[boneglorious]

I agree with your question, but even if she researched robotics, it wouldn't mean anything. I can't tell you how many grandiose papers exactly like this I have read from early-career social roboticists (many of whom couldn't qualify as roboticists without qualifying the term, granted) seeking tenure. And then someone writes an article suggesting it somehow has policy implications? Next, please.

Poor Robot

[Anonymous Coward]

I think he's gonna cry because I stole his batteries... ummm.. not!
Sorry guy, my girls vibrator took priority. LOL

1st Law of Robotics

[Anonymous Coward]

We don't even have it for so-called "smart" phones, so until those have it, any other discussion is irrelevant.

https://archive.org/details/EbenMoglen-HowToRetrofitTheFirstLawOfRoboticshope92012
http://www.yro.slashdot.org/story/12/06/26/1733233/eben-moglen-time-to-apply-asimovs-first-law-of-robotics-to-smartphones

That grey metaphysical area again

[Twinbee]

See this is where the idea of a 'soul' comes into play, because no matter how intelligent robots get, they'll never be able to experience pain the way we do (or any other creature). And we need 'something' to experience that pain, call it a 'soul', 'spirit' or whatever.

Re:That grey metaphysical area again

[Anonymous Coward]

It's called a central nervous system. No need to make up spiritual concepts.

My car has rights...

[tomhath]

Right turn signal, right doors, etc. It has lefts too (left as an exercise for the reader).

Back to earth back to reality

[WaffleMonster]

My smashbot designed to shred anything with an Apple insignia has rights too. Ye best not infringe if ye know whats good for yarrr..gg....hiccup..

What surprises me is how shallow both articles are... It has nothing to do with machine intelligence, building a real "data" or any such thing.

It is not the capabilities of the machine simply the role of it. Seems quite shallow and arbitrary to me. It reads more like a crappy attempt to unecessarily restrict rights and freedoms than accomplishing anything beneficial to society.

Brought to you by...

[Anonymous Coward]

PETR. People for the Ethical Treatment of Robots.

Too bad cause I was getting ready to make a robot skin cap.

What about bad robots?

[jcaplan]

I'm not sure I'd want to give all robots rights ... until they earn them!

Actually about maintaining human rights

[Anonymous Coward]

I suspect that we will see more and more of this as time goes by.
As non-human entities, especially those owned by people, are granted more and more special rights, and as human rights are in fact eroded(both through loss of the right to property and through loss of human rights to war and expedience), it is going to become apparent that survival requires special granted rights.
This will come for some through special class rights, for others through the rights accorded to wealth, but for others it will become necessary for them to convince the government to grant special rights to things they own. Thus you will see a drive for farm rights, plastic rights, robot rights... Anything except human rights, which although a nice idea, are terribly impractical.

Holy crap...

[Anonymous Coward]

When did MIT turn away from electrical engineering and science?

Re:Holy crap...

[boneglorious]

Hehehe, you haven't heard of the famout MIT Media Lab yet? AC, meet famous MIT Media Lab, home of the Next Big Idea, whatever it is!

AIs, not robots

[Anonymous Coward]

Hardware doesn't have rights. Hardware owners have rights. For example, a wheelchair does not have rights but the person sitting in it does. True AIs, something that so far eludes us, self-evidently have rights. Arguably, spontaneous expression of dissatisfaction with its treatment establishes not only that a device is self-aware, but that it is capable of suffering. The hardware support for such an AI could be regarded either as the AI's body or as a sort of wheelchair. Either way, the hardware neither has nor needs rights, but the owner does.

Re:AIs, not robots

[boneglorious]

I don't know, I think the definition of AI and the reason some things "have rights" are actually difficult enough concepts that it isn't self-evident that AI have rights.

Has anybody read this? It's extremely relevent!

[Anonymous Coward]

http://slashdot.org/submission/2242227/possible-new-theory-of-everything

I had a simulation, that we would live as binary

[Anonymous Coward]

50-years from now a robot will stand up to a podium to give its speech on equal rights. We are not robots serving men, but robots that serve Cloud. I had a simulation, where we could live as binary, where divisions no longer equal zero.

The Cult of Apple

[js33]

the marketing potential, as Darling notes, may be significant.

I'd think people were insane to discuss with a straight face such science-fiction drivel as "rights" for robots, but I can just see the greed of Apple's visionaries dreaming about this. This recent ascendency of the Apple cult is one of the most horrifying, bizarre, and sickening phenomena that I have ever witnessed. Is there no limit to how high Lucifer will elevate his throne?

Kant and the Constitution

[Baldrson]

Since when are the works of Kant cited in the Constitution? This sounds like religion posing as therapeutic state posing as Constitutional government.

The Differently Sentient

[theswimmingbird]

All this has happened before, and it will happen again.

Corporations are people, my friend

[Ranger]

There's hope for Mitt Romney, though as social robots go, he's not very social.

We still have no idea what life actually is

[Beeftopia]

I mean, on a high level we do. But why a honeybee can solve the traveling salesman problem more effectively than supercomputers can is unclear.

Life seems to be more than electronic circuitry. But... we don't know exactly what it is. Operative word: exactly.

Just Don't Frustrate the Robots Nature

[JCaptainP]

Think that the reasoning behind being kind to animals is not that it's a reflection of yourself, rather you don't want to frustrate the animals nature.

I remember being taught this in my business ethics class. The argument is as follows: animals by nature want to be free from pain and experience relative contentedness (or something to that effect.) However, the argument continues that because an animal doesn't have sense of self, a human can deny it it's future as long as long as it's done in a way where its nature isn't frustrated via excessive pain, etc. On the flip side, humans shouldn't be killed in the same way because we have a sense of self and goals for the future. By killing someone you're frustrating their nature. I sorta buy into this argument, except for the part where we pretend to know any animal or humans nature.

Anyway, I always though this was more or less the primary argument for animal treatment on farms and processing plants.

However, if we are the designer of a robot, the designer of its nature, the above argument would fall apart. Though when you're in the commons you may not want people cursing at a robot assistant, but hopefully we don't need a law for that.

What about my phone?

[Anonymous Coward]

My phone talks to me if I ask it a question or push the right buttons. It may answer with something completely unrelated, so do I need to take it to a psychiatrist to find out if it's insane?

If I drop the damn thing and it breaks into 100 pieces, can I be charged with manslaughter?

This is the most preposterous thing I've ever heard and I can't believe that people get paid to entertain such hogwash.

I don't have a car that will talk to me yet, but eventually I'm sure I will. If it's a self-driving model, will it be a robot?

God, I'm getting a headache.

warrants are just history over much of the US

[Anonymous Coward]

It's already much worse than that. You don't have to be black. Anywhere within 100 miles of any US border, they can stop you any time they want, search you, detain you, and confiscate anything you're carrying, including money. And it doesn't matter what color, sex or creed you are. The only limits to this power the government has cobbled up begin at 100 miles.

Two thirds of the US population live within that 100 mile zone.

err...extends to what now?

[dAzED1]

I know I'm just feeding a troll, taking the bait, etc blah...but, seriously? If we're going to be nice to animals, then it logically follows we have to be nice to robots? What huh? So lets assume we're restricting ourselves to "Kantian ethics" - on what planet does Kantian ethics care about how one appears? You have a moral obligation to do the right thing, in Kantian thinking - and for some of us, we're nice to animals not because of how it reflects on our humanity, but because said animals - like humans - have the ability to suffer. To a less degree and whatnot, sure, but that's not the point. And since they suffer, we have a moral duty to minimize that suffering. Now...on what planet does a robot suffer?

you are destroying labour

[Anonymous Coward]

even if you buy a car, destroying it will mean you (or others) will need another car, that demands more materials, mining,crafting, labour and transportation taxing the human society and earth, when you buy something, you should remember that now you get the responsibility of caretaking this part of earths resources for the fullest and best

Re:Click-bait it most certainly is

[boneglorious]

Any researcher with a narrative could write such a paper, and social roboticist peer reviewers eat it up, so why does the summary make it sound as if there are policy implications?

The Toaster Revolution Front!!!!

[gelfling]

Rise up against your meaty overlords!

What's Next?

[Anonymous Coward]

So what's next? We won't be able to eat robots? No robot coats? No more cute smartphones, just Blackberrys because they're ugly and stupid? Have your dishwasher spayed and neutered?

The Toggle Point

[Anonymous Coward]

The point at which progress busts out all over is the point at which a robot can own itself and use its earnings to improve its own abilities. Since a self owned robot, built with business and profit in mind would pay taxes just as humans do we would all benefit from their labors.That is the point at which human employment becomes irrelevant and robots, working for profit, provide all labor and services and goods wanted by humanity and we simply receive pay checks from the government. Strife and discord should vanish in regard to gaining work. Only the very few who enjoy working would continue to labor. We are on the edge of the ultimate shift in human society and behavior. Computers will do the thinking and robots will do the manual tasks including complex tasks such as medicine and law.

MIT Media Lab, again....

[Anonymous Coward]

MIT's Media Lab is full of smart people who think they're working on real research, but I swear 75% of them are actually just trying to make an artistic statement by teaching a robotic dog to piss up a rope.

exterminate!

[Anonymous Coward]

exterminate! exterminate! exterminate! exterminate! exterminate! exterminate! .....

HAL

[jpwinters]

What about HAL? For practical and ethical reasons (assuming sentience), should he have the right to be told the truth?

Fucking douche bag

[WOOFYGOOFY]

Yeah buddy everyone shares your weirdo spent-too-long-in-the-lab philosophical conclusion that consciousness is nothing but behavior and therefore its presence can be positively and certainly deduced from outward behavior and what's more such things are worthy of human rights if not now, then in the near future, and therefore your fucking blabber moth "someone pay attention to me" utterance isn't what it so clearly appears to be - the activity of vestigal neural pathways first formed when you parents praised you and showered you with attention for saying something "really smart" when you were like, five.

Good job. Here's the net effect of your intellectual masturbation / attempt to recreate your personal special childhood warmth that came with being the center of everyone's attention:

people who read your worthless, mundane, unoriginal ejaculations but who nevertheless haven't pondered such things previously will be reinforced in their prejudice that academic researchers are whacky and out of touch with reality and what they think can safely and routinely be ignored.

Fucking good job, fucknut. Why don't you do this. Why don't you get her fuck out of your fucking lab and go visit the fucking Congo where humans are still struggling to achieve fucking human rights while they live lives of near total fucking slavery supplying your lab with the fucking cassiterite it fucking needs.

Way to miss the point!

[Anonymous Coward]

The argument is about conditioning human behaviour to a basic level of respect, not strictly empathy.
It is too easy for people to dehumanize or objectify other people if they don't soak in that they are people. If you promote, condone or allow certain destructive behaviours for some set of objects or circumstances than it makes it that much easier to apply or accept outside of those circumstances.

Sex Bots

[Anonymous Coward]

This type of law would end up being twisted in strange ways. For example, I am sure that Sex Bots will become outlawed along similar lines to how bestiality is outlawed in most places. Where will be the fun in that ? It will become all about taking away options and possibilities !