• Question: What would be the perks of robot consciousness??

    Asked by isla to Darren on 4 Nov 2016.
    • Photo: Darren Rhodes

      Darren Rhodes answered on 4 Nov 2016:


      Hi. Great question.

      I will start off with a real philsopsophical answer, before trying to convince you of the practical applications of having machines with human-like consciousness.

      First of all, we know a lot about the external universe: physics, chemistry, biology, astronomy have taught us how the world interacts within our solar system and galaxy, but also how atoms interact with each other at the qunatum level. Consciousness is the study of our inner-universe. Whilst there is the scientific study of consciousness (of which I work in a centre that tries to do exactly this)… no-one really knows why or how consciousness exists.
      Robots give us the chance to study human consciousness. By eventually creating a ‘conscious-robot’, not only does science achieve something absolutely amazing (it would be one of the greatest ever scientific achievements throughout all history) but we also get to understand how our own consciousness is constructed. We get to understand through robots, what it is to be human.

      Second, there are lots of practical applications for human-like robots. Though not conscious, robots that have human-like qualitiesthat have social benefits such as helping autisitc children interact in the world, to more practical applications such as in factory automation.

      A project I am working on right now, is trying to get a robot to have a human-like sense of time. The whole point of this research, is to allow a robot to better interact with a human. Our end goal is to have a robot help a human make breakfast – but not only that, the robot will have a memory of how long you like your eggs cooked, how long it takes to make a cup of tea, and what to do if you drop your cup on the floor.

      I am excited by advances towards robotic consciousness. Though still a long way off, there are real efforts to get to real conscious artificial intelligence. One thing to consider too, is that if a synthetic being becomes conscious, does it then have the same rights as humans? What happens if a robot commits a crime? What happens if a robot has a crime commited toward them? These are jus tteh tip of the iceberg of ethical questions we must consider when researching artificial intelligence.

Comments