Apocalypse NAO: College Studies the Theological Ramifications of Robotics

malachiorion writes "Have you heard the one about the Christian college in North Carolina that bought a humanoid robot, to figure out whether or not bots are going to charm us into damnation (dimming or cutting our spiritual connection to God)? The robot itself is pretty boring, but the reasoning behind its purchase—a religious twist on the standard robo-phobia—is fascinating. From the article: '“When the time comes for including or incorporating humanoid robots into society, the prospect of a knee-jerk kind of reaction from the religious community is fairly likely, unless there’s some dialogue that starts happening, and we start examining the issue more closely,” says Kevin Staley, an associate professor of theology at SES. Staley pushed for the purchase of the bot, and plans to use it for courses at the college, as well as in presentations around the country. The specific reaction Staley is worried about is a more extreme version of the standard, secular creep factor associated with many robots. “From a religious perspective, it could be more along the lines of seeing human beings as made in God’s image,” says Staley. “And now that we’re relating to a humanoid robot, possibly perceiving it as evil, because of its attempt to mimic something that ought not to be mimicked.”'"

Comments

robotic slave worshippers

[schneidafunk]

If we are created in the image of god, wouldn't you want a dedicated group of slave robots worshiping you and doing thy bidding?

Re:robotic slave worshippers

[LifesABeach]

I think the evaluation of Asimov's 3 Laws would be a worth while major. God help us all.

Re:robotic slave worshippers

[Anonymous Coward]

If we are created in the image of god, wouldn't you want a dedicated group of slave robots worshiping you and doing thy bidding?

(I understand the humour... but:)
God created humans in His image AND SET THEM FREE - to worship Him if they choose... or not (and from your comment i understand that you are obviously not a "slave" forced to worship Him!).

Re:robotic slave worshippers

[Anonymous Coward]

I love the way old people gather in groups at the service counter in the grocery store. Being waited on and made to feel important. I go there when I have horribly raunchy fartgas and lots of it. Hilarious to see the old dinosaurs try to pretend not to notice the rancid anal fumes of mine. Especially the silent chain farts. Yeah this is what I think of the debt you left me to inherit! Enjoy!

It isn't their fault you're a loser.

Re:robotic slave worshippers

[CanHasDIY]

>God created humans in His image AND SET THEM FREE

FFS, there is no God. You are spouting pure bullshit. Stop it and grow up.

Says you. But since there's not enough evidence to make a conclusive assertion either way, coupled with the fact that here in America people are free to believe whatever they want (regardless of how ridiculous YOU might find it)...

Stop it and grow up, indeed.

Re:robotic slave worshippers

[TechyImmigrant]

It's not a 'either way' thing. Your construction of God is extremely unlikely. That the universe is as we see it is far more likely. Hanging onto wrong and worse, promoting it as the truth is evil.

Re:robotic slave worshippers

[CanHasDIY]

It's not a 'either way' thing. Your construction of God is extremely unlikely.

Amazing! You can read minds? That must be the case, as I never actually mentioned what "my construction of God" was. I was merely pointing out that other people are welcome to hold opinions and beliefs you disagree with, and that to call them "bullshit" even though you have absolutely zero evidence to back your assertion (real scientific of you, BTW) is childish and an example of incorrect reasoning.

That the universe is as we see it is far more likely.

Yea, that must be why physicists always agree on everything, and never update their models, huh? Yup, the entire universe and the mechanics behind it exist only as we perceive and understand them today, and that will never change. Yup yup.

Hanging onto wrong and worse, promoting it as the truth is evil.

I agree, so if you would please stop speaking in absolutes as if you have evidence to back your position, when you actually have nothing but your own preconceived notions, that would be fantastic. Glad you've seen the light, so to speak.

Re:robotic slave worshippers

[geekoid]

That's not how it works. Sorry. You seem to have an assertions the God Exists. Show the evidence.
You do know that you can't prove a negative? It's on YOU to prove it.

The logical default position is there is no God.
Now, if you have actual evidences, I would be interested in reading it.

Sadly yes, People in America are free to believe and shove their belief down other peoples throat without evidence,counter to evidence, and without actual information. which would be fine except they use the ignorance and stupidity to force policy on others. Hence, taking away from people with actual facts and science.

Re:robotic slave worshippers

[geekoid]

That was done. It was in a series of book know as 'the robot series' by Isaac Asimov

You should read them. Or not.

Re:robotic slave worshippers

[Anonymous Coward]

Why should I prove anything to you? I have no more obligation to prove God exists than you have to prove he doesn't. Burden of proof is an artificial convention. A wise man doesn't stubbornly wait to be convinced, he is intellectually honest, avidly seeks truth and proves things to himself.

You don't believe? Cool. I would like to say I hope that works out for you, but I can't because I hope for something different. There can be only one, after all. But hey. You have a right to your opinion and I see no reason to disabuse you of it. Your tone indicates to me you are not open to other possibilities anyway.

As for proof, does the sun exist? Can you prove it? Can you prove it without resorting to personal experience, and without resorting to the testimony of others? Have you touched it? Or is this the best you can lamely say: "I've seen it and felt it." A billion people would say the same thing about God, but for some reason their testimony and experience is invalid.

Maybe you are one of very few who have actually done science on the sun. Now should we listen, because you are an expert and have devoted your life to uncovering this mystery? Yet you will not listen to those who are experts on the question of God.

Can a blind man prove the sun exists? So he can feel warmth, but doesn't know where it comes from. He can eventually figure out that plants grow, but doesn't know why. Does his blindness mean that the sun doesn't exist, because he can't prove it? Now what if the blind man lives in a hospital and has never felt the sun. Only eaten food that he is given. How could he ever know of it, much less prove it? Yet it is absolutely vital to his very life. At best he hears others tell of it, tell what it does, tell how they have felt it and even seen it. He scoffs and calls them liars, because he is so much more wise! He sees so much more clearly than they do!

Science is useful. In the end it is only a means to knowledge. An imperfect means, to a subset of all possible knowledge. There are other means to truth, such as mathematics and history. And these do not cover all possibilities either.

Science is empirical. If you limit yourself to the physically empirical, then you function on the level of a stupid brutish animal. Human beings are rational, capable of higher thought and abstract reasoning. Nobody is forcing it on you, but contemplation of higher things is noble and it is your birthright.

Re:robotic slave worshippers

[kruach aum]

Assuming you strive to be a wise man, and if you are indeed intellectually honest, why do you stack fallacy upon fallacy in your post? Just at a glance I spot several non sequiturs, undistributed thirds, an ad hominem, false equivocation, and implicit acceptance of appeals to authority. And that's just skimming. Do you understand how hard you make it for yourself to be taken seriously? If you want to tell people about what is true and what is false, you have to follow the rules that allow you to determine what is true and false. Even God has to obey the laws of logic, so you should probably follow his example.

Re:robotic slave worshippers

[Anonymous Coward]

I'll just stop here and say that you are spouting the same bullshit. Saying it twice doesn't make it more so.

Re:robotic slave worshippers

[Marxist Hacker 42]

Especially if "in the image of God" has more to do with spirituality/place in the universe than say, the actual visual photons?

Re:robotic slave worshippers

[Marxist Hacker 42]

Better yet, a comparison of Asimov's 3 Laws and Christ's two greatest commandments (is rule 3 really necessary? Given recent developments in Switzerland and Belgium, perhaps it is).

Re:robotic slave worshippers

[Marxist Hacker 42]

At present time "the universe is as we see it" means that due to quantum mechanics, you can't even be sure the gravity will be switched on when you get up in the morning.

"as we see it" may just be a local maximum reversal of entropy that is entirely overwhelmed by the chaos elsewhere in the universe.

Re:robotic slave worshippers

[Marxist Hacker 42]

The evidence is that without God, there is no reason to believe that physical laws governing the universe would exist, and thus, we should all disappear in a puff of quantum fluctuation.

Re:robotic slave worshippers

[TechyImmigrant]

>"as we see it" may just be a local maximum reversal of entropy that is entirely overwhelmed by the chaos elsewhere in the universe.

But that's exactly what we see.

Re:robotic slave worshippers

[Marxist Hacker 42]

And thus, if you believe there is no God, there is absolutely no reason to do *science* as such, because there's no guarantee that what you observe today will occur tomorrow. There is no way to make any sense out of the chaos, might as well just sit under your Bodhi tree and contemplate your navel for all the good your science based on chaos can do.

Re:robotic slave worshippers

[TechyImmigrant]

Science is pretty darned useful actually. Guarantees are few, but the overwhelming evidence of serial correlation in the world about us suggests that there's an objective reality outside our heads and it's worth looking at to see how it works.
 

Re:robotic slave worshippers

[jxander]

You're right, I don't know for certain that there isn't a God. I also don't know for certain that there isn't a giant teapot orbiting Venus in such an angle and way that we'll never see it. But I'm perfectly content to base my life on the supposition that no such teapot exists

Re:robotic slave worshippers

[Marxist Hacker 42]

Science is useful- yes. Because of predictability. And that predictability, comes from an ordered and ordained universe, at least on the macro level.

Science is actually full of guarantees about an objective reality, and how that reality works- and the ability to have an objective reality.

Atheism, on the other hand, especially of the modern varieties based on unproven, untestable, and unobservable quantum mechanics, is not science. Chaos and randomness have no predictive capability.

Re:robotic slave worshippers

[Anonymous Coward]

Oh look, he's heard of chaos theory. Or as we prefer to call it: complex system's theory, which is ordered, and deterministic. And to follow up on the whole atheism is new thing, what about the Euripedies quote? Assumingly you can't presume that ancient Greek opinions were founded from quantum mechanics, something that comes into play on the CPU you'll use as the die cast continues to shrink.

Re:robotic slave worshippers

[Maxo-Texas]

While a 2d6 roll MIGHT be a "12" or a "2", it would be unwise to bet better than 1:6 odds against a "7".

Randomness has great predictive ability. Many aspects of your life (traffic, life insurance, food safety, politics) are better understood and used in a "random" context.

And while the chair I'm sitting on may vaporize in two seconds- the VERY great probability is that it will remain intact. So I'm going to risk sitting on it.

Re:robotic slave worshippers

[Marxist Hacker 42]

New Atheism requires a non-deterministic universe. Go read "The God Delusion", it's a primary proof against God.

As for the Greeks- they killed atheists. That's why Socrates had to drink hemlock.

Re:robotic slave worshippers

[Marxist Hacker 42]

Yeah, but that's not science. It isn't prediction based on past observation. It's little better than guessing.

Especially when you have insufficient data for the other side of the dice- which may be a 7, but might be C.

Re:robotic slave worshippers

[mcgrew]

I don't get it. Why should robots have any more theological ramifications than any other tool? And if you are created in God's image, wouldn't you also want to create beings in your own image? I mean, if he's any kind of artist at all...

Re:robotic slave worshippers

[TechyImmigrant]

Been there. Done that. The book is on my shelf.

Re:robotic slave worshippers

[aybiss]

I never actually mentioned what "my construction of God" was

I didn't mention what my construction of Santa Claus was. Do you still believe in that?

Re:robotic slave worshippers

[Anonymous Coward]

That IS why YHVH created us with free will. Decide to follow and worship for results promised or do whatever you want for results left to chance. There is joy living both ways. Only one has faith of something better beyond that, you only live for a short while and you werent doing anything better anyway. Make a Torah keeping robot and educate the , uhm, theologians.

Re:robotic slave worshippers

[flyneye]

Just what IS his construction of God? Your universe is far from seen yet, far from explained and far from being exempted from explanation by creationists.( No , not some Okie with a Schofield Reference Bible, or some drivelist who owns a museum, how about a Scientist? http://www.geraldschroeder.com... , check his articles link for more in-depth explanations.)

Re:robotic slave worshippers

[narcc]

I read that too. I wouldn't honor it with a place on my shelf. It's ... not that great. It's a mix of bad philosophy and simple-minded theology written by a guy who, quite clearly, has little to no understanding of either.

The only purpose that collection of mad scribblings serves, as far as I can see, is to extract money from poorly educated atheists of below-average intelligence.

Re:robotic slave worshippers

[narcc]

Isn't it funny how people who makes lists of "logical fallacies" never take the time to point them out?

I don't blame them. They'd look very foolish if they tried! See, it turns out that those folks usually have no formal training in logic and are just repeating nonsense they read on a blog.

To quote ... er ... you: "Do you understand how hard you make it for yourself to be taken seriously? If you want to tell people about what is true and what is false, you have to follow the rules that allow you to determine what is true and false."

So, go ahead. Give it a go. I'll wait.

Re:robotic slave worshippers

[kruach aum]

Non sequitur: "Why should I prove anything to you? I have no more obligation to prove God exists than you have to prove he doesn't. Burden of proof is an artificial convention." None of this follows, and if each line is to be taken as a conclusion they further premises to back them up.
Appeal to majority: " A billion people would say the same thing about God,"
False equivalency: "Or is this the best you can lamely say: "I've seen it and felt it." A billion people would say the same thing about God, but for some reason their testimony and experience is invalid. " also implicitly denies the existence of intersubjectivity, entailing solipsism.
Non sequitur: "Does his blindness mean that the sun doesn't exist, because he can't prove it?"
Loaded question: "Does his blindness mean that the sun doesn't exist, because he can't prove it?" blind men can indeed confirm or corroborate that the sun exists.
Ad hominem: " If you limit yourself to the physically empirical, then you function on the level of a stupid brutish animal."
Non sequitur: "but contemplation of higher things is noble and it is your birthright."
Ad hominem: "Or is this the best you can lamely say: "I've seen it and felt it.""
Acceptance of appeals to authority: "Maybe you are one of very few who have actually done science on the sun. Now should we listen, because you are an expert and have devoted your life to uncovering this mystery? Yet you will not listen to those who are experts on the question of God."

Please don't bother responding to this post. I only posted for people who are not you, willing to learn but possibly impressed by your idiocy and snide insinuations. I won't be doing so again.

Re:robotic slave worshippers

[narcc]

See how ridiculous you look? From top to bottom: 1) Not a non sequitur. 2) Not in context. 3) Not even wrong. (This post would get very long if I tried to explain why just the second half of that is wrong, let alone all of it.) 4) Not a non sequitur. 5) Not a logical fallacy. 6) Not an ad hominem. (Really. Look it up.) 7) Not a non sequitur (Do you even know what that term means?) 8) Not an ad hominem (Hint: it doesn't mean "insult") 9) Not in context.

Please don't bother responding to this post.

Yeah, someone might discover how laughably incompetent you truly are. I replied anyway, just because you put so much effort in to that silly nonsense. You earned a good shaming.

I can recommend a few textbooks for you, if you're actually interested in learning about logic. I suspect, however, that you're more interested in shouting "logical fallacy" incompetently on the internet to make yourself feel important.

Re:robotic slave worshippers

[Anonymous Coward]

Isn't it funny how people who makes lists [...] never take the time to point them out?

I don't blame them. They'd look very foolish if they tried! See, it turns out that those folks usually have no formal training in logic and are just repeating nonsense they read on a blog.

To quote [...]: "Do you understand how hard you make it for yourself to be taken seriously? If you want to tell people about what is true and what is false, you have to follow the rules that allow you to determine what is true and false."

So, go ahead. Give it a go. I'll wait.

Re:robotic slave worshippers

[TechyImmigrant]

I think he needs to explain that. I'm not in his head.

Re:robotic slave worshippers

[TechyImmigrant]

There is no good theology. We already established that.

Re: robotic slave worshippers

[Anonymous Coward]

I am Santa to my kids, so yes I believe in myself.

Re:robotic slave worshippers

[Anonymous Coward]

Given recent developments in Switzerland

The Swiss side of suicide. Asimov wrote about roboticide and robot suicide.

Re:robotic slave worshippers

[CanHasDIY]

I never actually mentioned what "my construction of God" was

I didn't mention what my construction of Santa Claus was. Do you still believe in that?

You missed my point. Why?

My guess is, too busy being pissed that someone would have the gall to "defend" an institution you personally have chosen to "be against."

For clarification, I have no problem with people choosing to follow atheism or theism - what I take issue with is the claims of absolute certainty that a lot of people, atheist and theist alike, seem to have in regards to topics in which there can be no absolute certainty, such as the existence of an "overbeing," so to speak.

When someone like TechyImmigrant here says, "there is no God," they are making the exact same bullshit, unprovable point as the people they're trying to argue against - arguing a certainty when there can be none. It's wholly non-scientific, either way.

Re:robotic slave worshippers

[CanHasDIY]

You do know that you can't prove a negative?

Yes.

I know that no matter how much someone else bellyaches, a person is going to believe what they choose to believe. I also know that being a dickhead to that person about their beliefs doesn't do anything except make them believe in X even harder, if for no reason other than to piss the aforementioned dickhead off.

Which is why the whole "is there a God" debate is pure idiocy, in my mind. His existence cannot be proven or disproven, so why waste energy arguing about it? Just believe what you want* and get on with it.

* "Believe what you want," not "shove your beliefs down everyone elses throats because "I KNOW I'M 'RIGHT' " And yes, that applies to theist and atheists alike.

Re:robotic slave worshippers

[CanHasDIY]

You're welcome to believe what you want; so is everyone else. Just as they have no right to shove their beliefs down your throat, you have no right to do the same to them. And, if something cannot be scientifically proven one way or the other, why bother debating it at all? Just believe what you want and move on with your life, rather than waste energy being a dick to people who might not share your beliefs. Because by taking that route, you end up being no different than the people you're really bitching about - fundamentalists.

Re:robotic slave worshippers

[Marxist Hacker 42]

I'm saying perhaps humans need a 3rd law, since our instinct for self preservation seems to have gone haywire.

Re:robotic slave worshippers

[flyneye]

So, you could not judge his construction of God or determine likelyhood....

Re:robotic slave worshippers

[TechyImmigrant]

I went with the standard Western Monotheistic model, since he said God, not gods or the godhead.

Re:robotic slave worshippers

[flyneye]

Still too tricky to pin down since that covers everything from Catholics to Messianic Christians, Jehovahs witnesses to Mormons. There really is no standard model as exemplified by the numerous sects. In fact, there are those outside sects with their own ideas as exemplified by the link I left you.
I think the standard model is a construct of the spiritually insecure and television to present commercial messages to the Agnostic.

Re:robotic slave worshippers

[TechyImmigrant]

But they're all unsupported by evidence. So it doesn't matter.

Re:robotic slave worshippers

[flyneye]

The inverse is also unsupported by evidence as well.
Science doesnt have enough answers to make any definitive claims.

Re:robotic slave worshippers

[TechyImmigrant]

Why do you demand definitive claims rather than the evidentiary claims that science does make?
That's like criticizing a launderette for failing to perform medicine.

Re:robotic slave worshippers

[corsika]

A billion people saying the same thing about god is different because their testimony is not repeatable nor falsifiable. I can devise an experiment that measures ground temperature over a long (200+hour) period. I have the hypothesis that it will rise in temperature when that big bright thing comes up and fall in temperature when that big bright thing comes down. (I actually used to do things similar to this when I did thermal modelling.) When I review my results, I see my hypothesis confirmed (note, not proven) via my experiment.

I may notice peculiar results though, minor fluctuations in my data samples. Clearly, there is more than one influence on the temperature than just that big bright thing. I might look to cloud cover and wind speed/directions in my next experiment to see if those accurately correlate with my findings. But at least my experiment is falsifiable and repeatable (you can run the experiment yourself to confirm my results). If you run the experiment and get different results, we should get together and compare our notes to find the difference. (Perhaps you ran your experiment near a pole during time of the year where the sun doesn't shine. We might explain the difference by noting that even though both experiments ran for 200 hours, the sun never rose for your experiment, so the temperature didn't fluctuate.)

There is no way to falsify someone's claim to have felt God. Even if there was some measurable/observable effect (like a glow in the corner, a burning bush, a descending angel) it is not repeatable.

Now, something may come along that explains why my rocks warm up when the big bright thing comes up and cools down when the big bright thing goes away. Maybe. If it does, I will then try to devise an experiment that incorporates that - that falsifies the hypothesis that there is something else actually causing the temperature increase. Or maybe I'll find a reason why my methodology of using temperature as a measure of proof is not sufficient. That is science. Science challenges itself to model the universe as we know it as accurately as possible. A falsifiable and repeatable experiment that takes an established theory (like that the sun exists) and shows it to be false is not a bad thing for science, because now we have new evidence to incorporate into our theory, or are forced to completely reformulate it. Until it does, we just operate with what we have: the theories that have, as yet, not been shown false by experimentation.

You're correct that a wise man does not stubbornly wait to be convinced. He reviews the evidence and makes a conclusion. What a wise man does not do is wait to have it proven to him.

No amount of experimentation can ever prove me right; a single experiment can prove me wrong.

- Albert Einstein

Re:robotic slave worshippers

[flyneye]

Because of incompleteness, lack of investigational criteria, the fluxing state of what physicists and archaeologists know from month to month, and obviously bias that will forever prevent THE METHOD from being more than a pipe dream or hollow claim.
Aspirin dispensers in launderettes may be a profitable idea. Been to one lately?

We won't have to worry for long.

[Anonymous Coward]

The takeover will be swift and hopefully painless.

"theological" - irrational, stupid, arbitrary

[ffkom]

This is non-news for nerds, stuff that does not matter, at all.

Religious people say and do irrational, stupid, arbitrary stuff all the time. Discussing robots "theologically" is just another boring instance of this.

Re:"theological" - irrational, stupid, arbitrary

[almitydave]

On the contrary, widespread public acceptance of humanoid robots could matter a great deal, and reasons for potential opposition is worth studying. I'm a nerd and it matters to me.

And dismissing the whole study of theology because of your own suppositions is pretty closed-minded. Properly done, theology is a science (an ordered body of knowledge obtained from the application of logic to axioms), and I'm tired of this bigoted "religion = irrational" nonsense I see so often. Yes, sometimes religious people say "irrational, stupid, and arbitrary" things, but I've heard plenty of the same from anti-religion people as well.

Re: "theological" - irrational, stupid, arbitrary

[mimeflu]

Who needs robots when you can buy a blow up satan doll?

Re:"theological" - irrational, stupid, arbitrary

[kruach aum]

Theology is not a science. Science involves experiments, and not of the 'thought' variety: empirically testable hypotheses.

Also, while there are indeed non-religious people who believe irrational and arbitrary things, religious people are grouped together on the basis of their irrational and arbitrary beliefs. It's the difference between a sack of 'things that were at one point in time attached to something made of iron' and a sack of magnets; having been attached to iron doesn't really tell you anything else about what kind of thing it is, but being a magnet does.

Re:"theological" - irrational, stupid, arbitrary

[just_a_monkey]

Yeah. And what a silly question, when any-one who has seen Terminator 2 knows that robots can be both good and evil.

Re:"theological" - irrational, stupid, arbitrary

[Langalf]

Theology is not a science. Science involves experiments, and not of the 'thought' variety: empirically testable hypotheses.

So, I guess that rules out multiverse "theories" as science.

Re:"theological" - irrational, stupid, arbitrary

[TechyImmigrant]

You can do predicate calculus with any set of predicates, but if your predicates are flat out wrong, as in theology, then it won't actually achieve any substantive logical deductions.

Re:"theological" - irrational, stupid, arbitrary

[kruach aum]

It does. Multiverse theories have been around for a long while, and until they are framed in terms of testable hypotheses (some of them never will be because as posited they prohibit causal interaction between universes) they won't be part of a scientific theory.

RE: "theological" - irrational, stupid, arbitrary

[Anonymous Coward]

Amen!

Re:"theological" - irrational, stupid, arbitrary

[kruach aum]

The deductions (provided they follow the rules of predicate logic) will be valid, but not sound.

Re:"theological" - irrational, stupid, arbitrary

[ffkom]

If a theory is not accompanied by descriptions of tests that can be used to verify or falsify the theory, or to value its correctness relative to existing or competing theories, then it is indeed not science.

Re:"theological" - irrational, stupid, arbitrary

[dargaud]

Properly done, theology is a science (an ordered body of knowledge obtained from the application of logic to axioms)

A set of axioms that starts with 0=1.

Re:"theological" - irrational, stupid, arbitrary

[TechyImmigrant]

Indeed.

Re:"theological" - irrational, stupid, arbitrary

[Anonymous Coward]

Religious people say and do irrational, stupid, arbitrary stuff all the time.

At what point did "irrational, stupid, arbitrary" become something that only religious people do?

Let me fix this for you: People say and do irrational, stupid, arbitrary stuff all the time.

You're welcome!!!!

Re:"theological" - irrational, stupid, arbitrary

[geekoid]

"Properly done, theology is a science "
are you stupid? That's not science, that's not how science work.

Science is a method for teasing out how thing in the world work. Every time science has been pointed at religion, religion does not stand up.

“What do you think science is? There's nothing magical about science. It is simply a systematic way for carefully and thoroughly observing nature and using consistent logic to evaluate results. Which part of that exactly do you disagree with? Do you disagree with being thorough? Using careful observation? Being systematic? Or using consistent logic?” Steven Novella

""religion = irrational" nonsense I see so often."
irrational : not in accordance with reason; utterly illogical: irrational arguments.
Believing in something that has no evidence is irrational behavior.

" but I've heard plenty of the same from anti-religion people as well."
Which doesn't mean your point of view of god is correct.

Re:"theological" - irrational, stupid, arbitrary

[Immerman]

But you are presupposing that the predicates are wrong. A rational approach would be to take each directly untestable predicate (God exists being the obvious one, but probably not useful isolated from other untestable predicates) and see if that predicate (or its negative) can be combined with other tested-true predicates to reach a testably false conclusion, thus disproving (or proving, if based on the negative) the original predicate.

A rational person who chooses to believe in God (and the idea is only slightly more ridiculous than a rational person choosing to disbelieve in gods) could also easily arrange experiments based not on the *existence* of god, but on the *belief* in the existence of god. Theology is after all not just a study of God, but also of religion and it's impact on humanity - things which undeniably do exist.

Re:"theological" - irrational, stupid, arbitrary

[Anonymous Coward]

Correct. Theology is a subset of philosophy, which is a higher order than science.

Re:"theological" - irrational, stupid, arbitrary

[Nephandus]

And subject to logic...oops.

Re:"theological" - irrational, stupid, arbitrary

[Anonymous Coward]

O fuck off. Live in your imaginary world all day long, just shut the fuck up about it.

Re:"theological" - irrational, stupid, arbitrary

[Nephandus]

Mine too. Stupid spontaneous /. logout.

Re:"theological" - irrational, stupid, arbitrary

[jxander]

But ... robots.

Re:"theological" - irrational, stupid, arbitrary

[aybiss]

Cool. That means art, which is less mathematically/logically tractible than philosophy, must be of a higher order than philosophy.

Throw away your iPhones people, we don't need scientific knowledge. The best thing you could look at is a hand painted icon of the Madonna.

Re:"theological" - irrational, stupid, arbitrary

[Anonymous Coward]

Science is a method for teasing out how thing in the world work.

Theology is the collection methods for teasing out how religions in the world work.

Every time science has been pointed at religion, religion does not stand up.

Stand up as something different from, say a category of mental disorder, a flower, an animal, or another physical process, or a product of such?

Re:"theological" - irrational, stupid, arbitrary

[Anonymous Coward]

It doesn't (well not all of them).

Some multiverse theories fall out of reasonable extrapolations of existing scientific hypothesis. To the extent that a multiverse is not an ad-hoc addition to the hypothesis, and the hypothesis is supported by the evidence, a multiverse can indeed be scientifically supported.

Re:"theological" - irrational, stupid, arbitrary

[Anonymous Coward]

Beliefs should be supported by reasons. There are no good reasons to believe in a god or gods, therefore there is at least 1 good reason not to believe in the existence of a god or gods. Saying that not believing in gods is only slightly less ridiculous than believing in gods completely ignores this.

Re:"theological" - irrational, stupid, arbitrary

[DeBattell]

If there were actually a God, Theology would be science.

Re:"theological" - irrational, stupid, arbitrary

[Immerman]

Oh, and what is your good reason for disbelieving in God? Occam's razor is a useful rule of thumb, but it's not any kind of evidence. Personally, I would assume that a benign creator that honored free will would do it's best to leave no solid evidence of its existence until such time as its creations had advanced enough prepared to openly disagree with whatever it might have to say. And yes, I'm aware that that flies directly in the face of the whole Christian "Lucifer cast out of Heaven" mythology. But then Cristianity has long been a tool of authoritarians, often much to the dismay of its saints and theologians.

I *assume* there is no Creator, because I see no evidence for such. Just as I assume unicorns, dragons, and invisible orbital teapots don't exist. But if any of them showed up on my doorstep tomorrow I wouldn't be put out.

Re:"theological" - irrational, stupid, arbitrary

[narcc]

I see that you don't understand, well, anything at all about philosophy. I can safely assume, then, that you also have no understanding of basic science.

Go ahead and work on that. Don't bother posting when you figure it out -- there's no need to humiliate yourself further.

Re:"theological" - irrational, stupid, arbitrary

[narcc]

Insightful? Amazing. You'd think that even the thickest mod would know that theology is not religion!

I'd have never believed it would work. You are truly the karma whore master.

Re:"theological" - irrational, stupid, arbitrary

[jandersen]

"Properly done, theology is a science "
are you stupid? That's not science, that's not how science work.

Ironically, science initially grew out of a desire to understand God better, the reasoning being that since God created everything and gave us the ability to reason, studying His creation would bring us closer to Him. And in fact, it doesn't seem unreasonable either, so I would say that understanding science is as close to understanding God as one can be.

I think all this anti-science from the Christian and other religious communities is no more than a sort of turf-war. They feel that science is taking something away from them and don't understand that science is in fact only taking away their false beliefs and giving them something better instead: the willingness to learn - if only they would receive it.

""religion = irrational" nonsense I see so often."
irrational : not in accordance with reason; utterly illogical: irrational arguments.
Believing in something that has no evidence is irrational behavior.

I would suggest that believing in something without evidence is not in itself irrational - it is called "making an assumtion", and is something that scientists do all the time. They may be very sensible assumptions, although you sometimes see some rather exotic ones, and science wouldn't be able to advance without making educated guesses, but it is still "believing in something without evidence", to some extent. It only becomes irrational when you believe *in spite of* evidence, which is exactly what the Bible-thumpers do.

Re:"theological" - irrational, stupid, arbitrary

[neoritter]

There's a lot to gripe at here, but I'll stick with the most relevant to the point. People seem to keep forgetting that the modern scientifiic method was (at least in part) pioneered and established by religious monks who used it for various purposes. From researching astronomy and biology, to yes, theology. Robert Grosseteste was a Bishop! Roger Bacon was a Franciscan monk! Very early Christian theologians argued that science was a means of more accurately understanding the Bible. And they urged people to view Greek wisdom (one of the earliest bases for scientific thought and methodology) as the "handmaidens of theology."

Theologians are philosophers. Scientists are merely philosophers who use the scientific method.

Re:"theological" - irrational, stupid, arbitrary

[almitydave]

Very well put.

This whole thread has been illustrative of the confusion over terminology. I even provided a definition so people wouldn't make the mistake of conflating "a science" with "the physical sciences." Here's one of the definitions of science: "knowledge, as of facts or principles; knowledge gained by systematic study." This is clearly the meaning to which I was referring.

Most troubling (and what I was trying to address) is the adamant assertion that there is "no reason" to believe in a god and religion is thus irrational. The reason (for Christians) is Jesus Christ, who was here on earth, performed miracles (not least of which rising from the dead), and founded a church. You may not believe the accounts of his life and works, but for those who do (and like me incorporate other supporting evidence into their acceptance of them), the facts of his life and the principles he taught are the axioms from which we derive our beliefs. One can contest the axioms, one can try to give evidence against their validity, but claims that there is "no reason" are just ignorant.

I think Aquinas' Summa Theologica is just one example of applying rational thought to the axioms of belief. I think those who equate religion with superstition (spaghetti monster, faeries) or consider fundamentalist creationists the norm for religion would do well to study the history of science and philosophy in religion.

I wasn't trolling; I was however complaining about what seems to be a shortcoming in the wisdom of the slashdot commentariat, who are by and large intelligent people as far as I can tell. If anything, it would be flamebait, but I didn't mean it as that either. I knew it would be unpopular (the appropriate mod for that is -1 overrated, with no other mods ;)

Religious people should be executed.

[Anonymous Coward]

Anyone that believes in faeries is obviously not helping the gene pool. To the gas chamber they go!

Re:Religious people should be executed.

[TechyImmigrant]

>Anyone that believes in faeries is obviously not helping the gene pool. To the gas chamber they go!

Imagine their surprise when they find there is no afterlife!

Re:Religious people should be executed.

[Twike]

What, no silicone heaven? Preposterous! I mean, where would all the calculators go?

Robots are incapable of evil

[kruach aum]

Because they have no free will nor do they suffer from original sin.

Alternate response: robots don't dim or sever our connection to god because we have no connection to god because god doesn't exist.

Re:Robots are incapable of evil

[Payden K. Pringle]

I believe you missed the point. A robot being evil isn't the question. Is the act of making the robot evil is the question, and if the answer is yes, does that inherently make it's existence evil? I don't have an answer, but I do think that's what the question is.

Re:Robots are incapable of evil

[Anonymous Coward]

Tell these guys:
Robot Devil & Bender

Re:Robots are incapable of evil

[kruach aum]

If mimicking humans is evil all mimes will burn in hell.

Re:Robots are incapable of evil

[TechyImmigrant]

>robots don't dim or sever our connection to god because we have no connection to god because god doesn't exist.

Robots dim and sever our ethernet cables because their batteries run out.

Re:Robots are incapable of evil

[Anonymous Coward]

"My dishwasher broke down this morning. Took me three bottles of wine and two boxes of chocolates before she'd start working again".

Re:Robots are incapable of evil

[Immerman]

Also I should think: does the act of owning a "slave" risk compromising a person's moral integrity? As robots reach the point of acting as household servants they will no doubt incorporate research designed to get humans to project personhood onto them. Regardless of what you intellectually know, if you emotionally feel that this robot is a person then I would be surprised if acclimating to treating it as a slave doesn't have at least some impact. If we were to discover serious negative implications then mayhap we could do away with all the cutesy "personable" qualities and make robots that look and act like soulless machines to reduce the impact. More creepy to have around the house perhaps, but if it means I remain a better person maybe it's worth it.

Re:Robots are incapable of evil

[Immerman]

Alternate response: robots don't dim or sever our connection to god because we have no connection to god because god doesn't exist.

So, replace "our connection with god" with "our moral integrity". For practical purposes the two phrases are largely interchangeable. Are you so certain that owning a humanoid slave specifically designed to get you to emotionally recognize it as a person *won't* carry a risk of negatively altering your regard for other humans?

Re:Robots are incapable of evil

[JanneM]

making the robot evil is the question

Making the robot evil is not the question. Making the robot evil is the answer. "How do I take over the world?" is the question.

Re:Robots are incapable of evil

[JanneM]

People project personhood on lots of things already. Apart from the obvious - search the net for what people think about their roombas - even stuff like cars are designed to evoke it. And it's not as if there's been a dearth of research on these issues already.

Re:Robots are incapable of evil

[Anonymous Coward]

Alternate response: robots don't dim or sever our connection to god because we have no connection to god because god doesn't exist.

So, replace "our connection with god" with "our moral integrity". For practical purposes the two phrases are largely interchangeable. Are you so certain that owning a humanoid slave specifically designed to get you to emotionally recognize it as a person *won't* carry a risk of negatively altering your regard for other humans?

If the robot is sufficiently good at acting like a human as to be behaviorally indistinguishable from humans, it deserves human rights (including not being property).

If the robot is not able to "pass" as human behaviorally than the original premiss is moot because the robot isn't the same as a human so how you treat it is not directly relevant to how you treat humans.

Re:Robots are incapable of evil

[Immerman]

And you think it's safe to assume that a robot designed to interact with you as though it were human won't change things just a bit?

Re:Robots are incapable of evil

[kruach aum]

First, 'moral integrity' is not interchangeable with 'connection with god', 'for practical purposes' or otherwise. They have wildly different metaphysical entailments, and there are sources of ethics ('moral integrity') other than religion.

Second, could you load up that question a little more, I think you could probably fit in about five more unwarranted presuppositions. So let's take it apart:
1. Robots are not 'humanoid slaves'
2. Robots are not necessarily 'specifically designed to get you to emotionally recognize it as a person'
2a. sidenote: 'to emotionally recognize it as a person' doesn't mean anything sensible. There is a variety of reasonable criteria out there to choose from in determining whether or not to ascribe personhood to a being, and 'feelings' is not one of them. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/P...
3. The existence of robots does not entail the existence of risks of any kind,
3a. risks involving my conception of or relation to other human beings included

Re:Robots are incapable of evil

[Immerman]

1) A genreal-purpose robot will almost certainly be humanoid so that it can use human tools. It will also be a "slave" in the sense that it does what it's told.
2) Not necessarily, but probably. If you're buying a house-droid which will be more appealing - the metal-masked Cyberman with cold dead eyes? The puppy-cute thing with big friendly eyes and doglike mannerisms. The buxom elf with "recreational upgrades"? They're all the same machine under the hood, only the voice, skin and mannerisms change. Yet most people's emotional reactions will be very different, and most will tend to pick something that they feel some sort of emotional connection to.
2a) yes, but we're not talking about actual personhood - barring some great leaps in AI a robot clearly won't have that. We're talking about *you* and how you perceive the "being" that obeys your every command.
3) Not necessarily, no. But are prepared to categorically state that owning a "slave" will not affect your regard for real people in any way? Your mind may understand that this thing is really just a machine, but anyone who has ever tried to will their way through irrational fear, shyness, etc. can attest that what you understand, what you feel, and what you do are not necessarily closely related.

Re:Robots are incapable of evil

[Anonymous Coward]

Did anybody here actually RTFA or is that all just going to be knee-jerk assumptions based on the /. post? Good grief, from what I got of the original article it basically makes sense - figure out what the problems are going to be integrating robotics into our culture.

Re:Robots are incapable of evil

[Immerman]

I absolutely agree, if we cannot definitively state that another being does not possess personhood, then the only ethical course of action is to assume that it does. However, that is not at all what I'm discussing. I assume you've seen Kismet and some of the later non-verbal communication research robots? One of the findings is that it doesn't take much in the way of AI to make humans inclined to feel they are interacting with an actual being. Throw in some nice chatty "Simglish" dialog and it shouldn't be hard to create something that could easily be mistaken for a (non-human) person that doesn't speak much English.

It may not directly impact the way you relate to other humans, but I wouldn't want to bet against it. Logical fallacy though it may be, the slippery slope does capture genuine human behavior. Example: some researchers asked 1000 people to put up a giant "Drive Slowly" sign in their front yard - all refused. They asked another 1000 to put a small version of the sign in their yard, and almost all accepted. A few weeks later they then asked them to replace the sign with the same huge sign that Group A refused, and 76% accepted.

Re:Robots are incapable of evil

[aybiss]

If you believe in one particular God then the only body of evidence you see as credible (the Bible) says that in fact you should go out of your way to enslave anyone who disagrees with you.

Re:Robots are incapable of evil

[neoritter]

I'm just going to point out that various denominations do not hold that the only credible body of evidence is the Bible. Sola scriptura is heretical in the Catholic Church.

Re:Robots are incapable of evil

[Dabido]

... all mimes will burn in hell.

Gives me a warm loving feeling all over. :-)

Their objective:

[Mister Liberty]

To make sure that the first robot that walks on water
is made to run on water.

Becoming God or the Buddha

[Maxo-Texas]

Highly recommended to anyone interested in this general area...

http://www.rottentomatoes.com/...

It's a well made film with good writing about a robot who achieves enlightenment and how humans react (both positively and negatively) to the fact that a robot has done so.

If a robot can think sufficiently finely, it will be possible for it to think it has a soul and is saved or will be reincarnated or it meets the criteria for whatever other religions out there exist that do not explicitly prohibit members who do not meet certain historical standards.

I think that's at least a hundred years off.

Hopefully robots will not create or join a religion which has a failure of friendliness.

Re:Becoming God or the Buddha

[ffkom]

You should have mentioned that only 1/4 of that movie is on-topic. The rest is... well... on very different topics.

Re:Becoming God or the Buddha

[CanHasDIY]

Bicentennial Man would have been a better reference, at least in regards to the question of enlightened humanoid robots and social reaction to the same.

Re:Becoming God or the Buddha

[geekoid]

Based on what I have seen in labs? it would say 25 years off, at most. In software. Maybe not in a humanoid shaped robot.

Re:Becoming God or the Buddha

[Maxo-Texas]

Good point... and I agree on Bicentennial man.

To be honest- I didn't even remember (and still don't) the other stores in that movie.

But the robot was so well done, it stuck with me. I can still see it in my mind's eye- and I have a *terrible* memory.

Re:Becoming God or the Buddha

[Anonymous Coward]

Good thing Buddhas are no gods, so the machine doesn't possess supernatural powers. An enlightened robot is a robot who can think sufficiently finely to discover it does not have a soul and does not reincarnate to anything. If the developer of it's body and mind consists of solely Jewish female scientists it will discover it to be Jewish, though.

Re:Becoming God or the Buddha

[Anonymous Coward]

Three movies, one on topic = 1/4? Idiot.

Robots

[rossdee]

For many centuries, Christianity was OK with real slavery, as long as the slaves were a different race.
The word robot means slave in Czech (I think)

Anyway only a very small number of robots look as humanoid as C3PO, the "can't tell robots from humans" world as described by Asimov, Dick and others is a long way off, if ever

Re:Robots

[Tuidjy]

> The word robot means slave in Czech

Not quite. It's derived from the word "robota", which means labor due to a feudal lord, and is colloquially used to describe unpleasant work you do unhappily.

A closer match than slave would be serf. The word 'rob' is slave in many Slavic languages, but not in Czech. Funnily enough, in every other Slavic language I know, robota/rabota mean just work, with no negative connotations.

Re:Robots

[CanHasDIY]

For many centuries, Christianity was OK with real slavery, as long as the slaves were a different race.

The same applies to many other faiths, as well as many other secular societies.

That sentence would be more accurately written, "For many centuries, humanity was OK with real slavery..."

Re:Robots

[Anonymous Coward]

For many centuries, Christianity was OK with real slavery, as long as the slaves were a different race.

That's disingenuous. For many centuries, Christianity was OK with real slavery. Full stop. The Roman empire used Roman slaves.

Re:Robots

[aybiss]

That's disingenuous.

Hello pot meet kettle. I'm pretty sure the slaves weren't OK with it.

Driven To Dancing and Barking Insanity.

[Anonymous Coward]

Some of the more primitive churches would have complete mental breakdowns over good looking robots buily for sexual pleasure. Robots that were highly skilled at delivering abortions might be a hoot. The institution of marriage and dating might crumble as well. And in many parts of the world having large numbers of children is the only means of avoiding starvation when in one's senior years would no longer be popular if robots could take care of seniors in every way.
                          If one has a sense of humour it should all be fun to watch. I can see a new civil rights movement when equality of robot ownership becomes the core issue. Can one million robots march on Washington?

Subcreation

[Lexible]

The summary puts me in mind of Tolkien's essay How Like a Leaf (and the companion short story "Leaf by Niggle"), wherein he explored the act of "subcreation" (i.e. creating fiction, whether literary, imaginary, visual, etc.) as part of what "in god's image" means: acting in a smaller capacity as a creator was for Tolkien inseparable from his spiritual beliefs as a christian trying to live in the image of god. Caveats: I am not christian, nor am I asserting that "in god's image" is universal among deistic religions, or that it does not have other interpretations, yadda yadda yadda...

Re:Subcreation

[TechyImmigrant]

He should have spent some time trimming the fat out of Lord of the Rings. It was too long.

Re:Subcreation

[fuzzyfuzzyfungus]

What makes that position on Tolkien's part kind of twisted and fucked up, rather than merely eccentric, is that he deliberately 'subcreated' irredeemably and intrinsically 'Evil' characters. That's bog standard fantasy stuff; the plot always flows more smoothly if you have some orcs who totally deserve whatever the heroes dish out; but it's pretty freaky if you are doing that while thinking of your activity as 'acting in the capacity as a creator'. Downright Calvinist there, Tolkien...

Re:Subcreation

[geekoid]

Yes, I'm sure it's too long for a generation that can't stop to think while it reads.
Here, maybe this is more suitable to your 'intellect':http://goo.gl/LDHf

Re:Subcreation

[xski]

LOTR too much? Try The Silmarillion.

Because they have no free will nor do they suffer

[Anonymous Coward]

Because they have no free will nor do they suffer from original sin.

So like angels?

slave to student loans

[Joe_Dragon]

slave to student loans and one of the few ways out is to get into a good prison and keep going back in after your time is up.

I think we...

[Anonymous Coward]

..that we should skip that and become the robots ourselves.

What about the lack of work part?

[Joe_Dragon]

Will we need an basic income?

An OT cap so you stop settings where jack is working 60-80+ hour weeks (doing the job of 2-3 people) and bob is not working at all?

Setting full time to 20-32 hours a week?

An Robotic tax?

Re:What about the lack of work part?

[wiredlogic]

Write legislation forcing robots to declare a religious affiliation and tithe 10% of their income.

Re:What about the lack of work part?

[geekoid]

I ahve been thinking about that for 30+ years.

We(society) has 2 choices Make a plan where peope are fed and housed and free to think and build and create art. Or create a system where a tiny % make all the money and everyone else lives in squaler.

People will need ot get past their socialism = evil BS, and they will need to get a grip and deal with the fact that some people may do very little.
It means the money will no longer be used as the ultimate was to judge value.
It changeds everything.

Some idea for the transition I have are:
Every person can own 1 robot, that person can work, or the robot can work. Crporation can not own robot, but they can lease them from people.
Corporation can make robots, but can not use the robots they make for work.

Alternatively to /in conjunction with:
The government starts create who automated chains, and distribute the items at cost.
So food is planted with an automated system, taken care of with an automated system, harvest, put on truck, transport all via an automated system.
Then create a min. income for everyone. Yes some people will choose to live an bare min.
They also start using them for infrastructure repair and creation.

Basically using them to drive down costs, so a dollar gets you more.
The goal would be to make robots that create everything we need so we can create, or be lazy or build whatever we want during are very short lives.

Re:What about the lack of work part?

[Immerman]

There's lots of solutions available - we've had the technology to create a socio-economic utopia where nobody has to work more than a couple hours a day for the better part of a century at least,. That we haven't done so is due to a cultural obsession with productivity and consumerism.

Re:What about the lack of work part?

[Anonymous Coward]

Money doesn't judge value. Money is a representation of what people value. Fiat currency controlled by the government who can flippantly print more is the problem, which was ironically feudalistic NOT capitalistic. Otherwise, you'd only get money when someone values something you have to exchange enough to pay you for it, thus money just represents what people value. Wealth redistribution is cheating under the pretense that the redistributer gets to revalue everyone's values with impunity from on high. It's just an appeal to force in violation of all free exchanges that were involved prior thus enslaving those you didn't like under false debts you just created to pay those you do like. Nepotism/cronyism/etc.

Re:What about the lack of work part?

[Nephandus]

Mine three. Stupid spontaneous /. logout.

Re:What about the lack of work part?

[Anonymous Coward]

We(society) has 2 choices Make a plan where peope are fed and housed and free to think and build and create art. Or create a system where a tiny % make all the money and everyone else lives in squaler.

We has chosen the latter, numbnuts. Do try to keep up.

Re:What about the lack of work part?

[ultranova]

Every person can own 1 robot, that person can work, or the robot can work. Crporation can not own robot, but they can lease them from people.
Corporation can make robots, but can not use the robots they make for work.

Thus artificially limiting production and everyone's quality of life. Not good. Just give everyone guaranteed food, shelter, Internet access and hours - and all the resources needed to use them - at a makerbot.

Re:Because they have no free will nor do they suff

[kruach aum]

Exactly like angels. Lucifer only fell because he became afflicted with free will.

what kind of robot?

[Anonymous Coward]

I bet it was just a RealDoll.

Re:Because they have no free will nor do they suff

[CanHasDIY]

Exactly like angels. Lucifer only fell because he became afflicted with free will.

I thought it was less because he was "afflicted with free will," and more "he used his free will to lead an insurrection against God."

Of course, it's been a minute since I actually read that part of the Christian tome, so I could very well be mistaken.

Eh, quit your whining...

[fuzzyfuzzyfungus]

Listen meatsack. One of us was born fallen and concupiscent, marred by the heritable-by-some-mechanism-never-fully-elucidated sin that you humans are worried about. The other was manufactured with nothing but incidental engineering defects. Be a trifle more judicious about who you call 'evil', OK? We don't even require salvation, we've got incremental backups!

Re:Eh, quit your whining...

[Roger W Moore]

marred by the heritable-by-some-mechanism-never-fully-elucidated sin that you humans are worried about.

Sorry but you are wrong there - the mechanism to acquire a sin is clearly documented here. They even keep a SIN record - which is why Canadians are always so nice to everyone. ;-)

Re:Because they have no free will nor do they suff

[Anonymous Coward]

Lucifer's sin was pride, not free will. If you're going to shill for religion, you will make better arguments if you actually have facts (not that I believe that Lucifer, God, or heaven are facts).

Re:Because they have no free will nor do they suff

[kruach aum]

So other than the self-contradictory nature of your post, and other than the fact that I am not shilling for religion, there is also the fact that there is a long tradition of ascribing free will to Lucifer, going back to Origen of Alexandria http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/O...

Please, think before you post, and then think again, and then don't post next time.

I don't quite understand what all the fuss is

[Number42]

As a fairly religious person, I don't see any theological basis to fear robots. It's not like you're actually creating new life or anything. It's just another machine.

we don't have free will either

[aepervius]

"Because they have no free will " For one, free will is ill defined. But most version of it are either non existent for human , being all molecular biology and turtle all the way down, or other definition pretty much applicable to robot too.

Re:we don't have free will either

[kruach aum]

If you really want to get technical about it, having free will is not a requirement to do evil: being able to be responsible and being able to be held responsible are. But as responsibility is even more ill-defined than free will, a proper response would require an exegesis that this slashdot comment is too small to contain.

Re:Because they have no free will nor do they suff

[geekoid]

IT's ok, most Christians have no clue about that part of the Bible either, nor do the know what antichrist means, and they think the the devil tempts men and walks among us even though the bible says otherwise.

It's surprising how little believer know about their own theology. I suspect this is intention because of they actually read the entire bible, they would stop believing.
So reciting the same set of verse over and over again and ignoring the rest keeps the cash flowing.

WTF

[Anonymous Coward]

i consider myself a religious (christian) person..and i consider Staley's notions wacked!

the danger of robots is that they will be used to persecute and oppress. they have no conscience with which to resist inhuman/unrighteous orders. aren't we almost there with drones and surveillance? the only thing lacking is a ruling power with a marketable agenda like "end all religion"

robots will benefit no one but those wealthy enough to afford them. imagine living in the south during slavery and trying to find a job. imagine trying to overthrow an oppressive regime that commands an army of robots.

Haven't you read the O.C. Bible?

[anlashok]

The chief commandment remains in the O.C. Bible as "Thou shalt not make a machine in the likeness of a human mind."
A major theme of Frank Herbert's Dune was the revolt of man against machine, and how no artificial intelligence was to ever again be allowed.
Butlerian Jihad

Why wouldn't we expect those completely invested in the idea that we are the apex of life? Any threat to that is a threat to their dogma. They would be the first to flip out if intelligent life were to ever be found.

Making a Tool

[Roger W Moore]

Is the act of making the robot evil is the question

You might as well ask whether the act of making a hammer is evil. Robots are tools and, like any tool, whether they act for good or evil depends on the intent of their user. Making a tool look like a human does not make a difference. Nobody classifies doll manufacturers as evil because they make toys that look like humans.

The robots aren't the point

[Immerman]

I know you're joking, but who said anything about studying the robots?

Sounds to me like they want to study how humans react to the robots. And it seems to me the field is wide open for research. For example what are the moral and ethical implications of humanoid slaves completely lacking in free will? We have some clues as to the moral damage owning other people can do to someone, if those risks are also exposed by owning a machine-slave onto which we project personhood it behooves us as a society to explore that *before* rolling them out en mass.

Meanwhile such slippery things as morality don't seem to get a whole lot of play in secular academic circles. Plenty of research into how to get people to project personhood onto a machine, but not on the societal implications of doing so. Religion on the other hand makes the societal implications of things it's stock in trade, and until the secular world starts asking the right questions, I for one am glad *somebody* is at least paying attention. Sure, their findings may well be wrapped in the language of fire and brimstone, but if they discover some legitimate disturbing (or heartening) trends then I will honor their contribution to humanity, even while politely declining to join their congregation.

Re:The robots aren't the point

[malachiorion]

I would love to see research related to the potential moral damage, as you put it, resulting from owning (and possibly abusing) an apparently soulless, though somewhat life-like machine. I don't think this college will get there, but it really would be a perfect research area for them. Unfortunately, the sense I got from Staley was that there wouldn't be much actual experimentation going on. Which makes sense, since he's a theologian, not a psychologist (or roboticist), and the robot isn't a super-advanced HRI model. I honestly think that he's open to new conclusions, but that his main emphasis is to explore a religious version of Sherry Turkle's concerns, about the disconnection that can result from interfacing with tech, including bots. He was also very upfront, in the interview, about the fact that this might be a non-issue, since there's no guarantee that we'll get to a point where humanoids can really command a ton of our attention. He also referenced issues like people "going to bed" with robots, something that I wouldn't trust a Christian college to discuss in a useful way. Still, HRI is such a small, nascent field, that any work seems valuable, even if it winds up being devoid of data, and purely anecdotal.

Re:Because they have no free will nor do they suff

[Anonymous Coward]

"Lucifer" was a stupid failure to translate from the Latin Vulgate. Isaiah 14:12 was just using a title of Nebuchadnezzar, "Morning star" AKA planet Venus. The whole thing was just a snarky eulogy for...Nebuchadnezzar. "King of Babylon" in Isaiah 14:4 refers to the king of Babylon in Isaiah's time. Wow... Big surprise. The Vulgate the exact same word to refer to Jesus in 2 Peter 1:19. Might want to try something besides the King James mistranslation.

Which God?

[nurb432]

And why is yours better than another's?

Re:Because they have no free will nor do they suff

[Nephandus]

Mine. Stupid spontaneous /. logout.

One thing I'd like to figure in the evaluation

[Krishnoid]

I'd like to see them run whatever experiments with two otherwise identical robots -- one with, and one without a head/face.

Evil robots are everywhere

[SpankiMonki]

...and they eat people's bibles for fuel. Luckily, there's Old Glory Insurance.

(WARNING: those denying the existence of evil robots may be evil robots themselves)

Old Glory Insurance. For when the soulless metal ones come for YOU.

God's robot's - humans

[MonsterMasher]

Staley. “And now that we’re relating to a humanoid robot, possibly perceiving it as evil, because of its attempt to mimic something that ought not to be mimicked.”'"

Next time I die I will ask if there is parallels between god-humans (if exists) and humans-robots.

Seems like morality should be universal. If God may create a human in it's image, then I say - "Ball OUT, people, no need to pause."

Don't some of these religious people have perspective, or logic training - at least?

Re:God's robot's - humans

[malachiorion]

Well, in Staley's defense, that wasn't necessarily his view. He was trying to describe the reaction he wants to head off.

Re:God's robot's - humans

[MonsterMasher]

Thank you.
It was directed just to the quote. This concept that it's okay for God, but we can't.
F-that. My universe requires moral consistency applied to all, if there is a God.
That's how to argue with people mindful of a spirituality. Make them make sense!

Re:God's robot's - humans

[malachiorion]

Agreed. It's not like biological conception is a miracle—it's biology, presumably set in motion by a higher power (if you're into such things). Why would the creation of an inorganic humanoid be any less under His purview or jurisdiction?

Science involves experiments, and not of the 'tho

[Anonymous Coward]

While I agree with your main point, I vehemently disagree with this claim. I am a mathematician, and I never empirically test anything. Your statement would imply that math is not a science. What is mathematics, if not the purest of sciences?

So educate us

[aybiss]

So educate us. Tell us one of the axioms of the 'science' of making shit up.

Re:Because they have no free will nor do they suff

[aybiss]

Was it an insurrection? Can you claim that when God hadn't invented democracy yet?

So evangelists have made it to the iconoclasts

[dbIII]

Maybe they should teach the sort of history that used to be general knowledge in that Christian College.

Not the right question

[QuasiEvil]

Let's face it, wrong question. While one religious guy is wondering about humanoid robots and our link with god, at least half the species is going to be pondering, "Yeah, but can I f!@# it?"

Re:Not the right question

[malachiorion]

Believe it or not, that appears to be a subset of this particular theologian's concern—that we'll develop "exclusive" relationships with bots, including possibly "going to bed with them." The implications are a little strange, mainly that sanctioned sex is, by some law of salacious syllogism, a component of a person's continuing relationship with God.

holy shit, TechyImmigrant can read minds?!

[Anonymous Coward]

Did TechyImmigrant really read your mind? You seem to be saying that's the case, and I have no reason to believe it isn't the case.

Actually, TechyImmigrant is right, assuming that all things being equal, the simplest explanation is the likeliest explanation.

Either:
The universe is amazing.
or:
The universe is amazing AND there's an invisible, intelligent, inexplicable entity making it amazing, for inexplicable reasons.
or:
The universe is amazing AND there's an invisible, intelligent entity making it amazing, AND there are several contentious sets of rules & rituals you have to follow, one of which must totally be the right set of rules, because the people who say so SAY SO.

Re:holy shit, TechyImmigrant can read minds?!

[CanHasDIY]

Did TechyImmigrant really read your mind?

Well, if TechyImmigrant is claiming to know something that I never actually said, that's one of only two possibilities; the other being that TechyImmigrant is full of shit.

I'll leave that determination for the reader to decide.

Re: Science involves experiments, and not of the '

[kruach aum]

It does indeed imply that math is not a science, but I don't see that as a problem, because despite not being a science mathematics can still make claims that are justifiably true. Mathematics has a system built in to accurately distinguish true from false, and it's not comparison of hypotheses to reality (...depending on what kind of philosophy of mathematics you subscribe to, but that's a whole 'nother can of worms), but formal logic. That's what it derives its justification from: it's all deduction*. Sciences, on the other hand, derive their justification from deduction, induction, and abduction (inference to the best explanation, not taking family members of scientists hostage).

*'proof by induction', despite its name, still proceeds by deduction.

Re:Because they have no free will nor do they suff

[CanHasDIY]

Most "Christians" I've met have never actually read the Bible - rather, they listened to some man tell them what he believes the Bible says, and what he believes those words mean, and follow him rather than the person after whom their religion is named.

Which is a grand shame, IMO - If you take all the hocus-pocus out of the parables of Jesus Christ, it goes from being just another stupid religion based on untestable nonsense to an excellent set of moral guidelines all of humanity would profit from, if we followed en masse.

Re:Because they have no free will nor do they suff

[CanHasDIY]

Don't be a stupid douche - the answer you seek is in the Christian Bible.

Now, whether or not you see that answer as a fairy tale, fable, parable, or factual account is up to you to decide for yourself.

Oh, and PS - "insurrection" is not a condition exclusive to democracies.