“Can machines think?” The iconic question in Alan Turing’s 1950 paper is the foundation of today’s Artificial Intelligence. Turing was convinced that the human body is nothing but an efficient complex machine. He then went to argue, if the human body is a machine and is programmed naturally to think, emote, empathize and rationalize can a man made machine be designed to do the same? A century later, we now know the answer. Yes, machines can think and recognize emotions too.
The evolution of Artificial Intelligence (AI) has not been about survival of the fittest; instead it has and will continue to be about progression. From the clunky super computer to the Siri of today, AI has come a long way and makes a profound impact on businesses and our daily lives. From Google search to predicting market trends, AI is now an integral part of our daily life and it will soon be a member of our family. You can winch and deny, but it’s true. AI today is no longer limited to the factory workshops but instead is taking on a very friendly face and the era of robotic AI evolving into the era of humanoid robots.
This evolution hasn’t been easy. In 1977, George Lucas boggled our brains with the brilliance of Star Wars and the loyalty and kindness of R2D2. It has taken many failures to achieve this success but R2D2 is now a reality. Just like its ancestor R2D2, the modern social robot can follow directions, read books, take pictures, find recipes, play music, patrol your house, be a personal assistant and now can discern emotions too.
What is amusing is how receptive the world is to the idea of a social robot. If we go back only 16 years to the Y2K era this idea of a connected home might have seemed far fetched, but today when everything from the home thermostat to the security system gives live feedback the concept of a cognitive assistant and a friendly companion seems to the future of today.
The naysayers might envision a dystopia where the robot takes over mankind and pushes us into a Matrix but I see a teacher, a coach, a friend, a nurse, a companion for the elderly and most importantly a helping hand for all things human. Envision a school with social robots. Now imagine a first grade classroom with students learning to read and visualize a child who is struggling to read. A social robot designed to teach kids, can be programmed to be patient, have the best teaching strategies and most importantly will be a neutral entity to the child. A teacher can be intimidating but a robot on the contrary kindles the curious, making it the perfect learning buddy for children. Maybe this is the paradigm shift the broken education system needs.
The evolution has just begun. Social robots like Buddy, Jibo can be argued as semi-personifications of Siri because they do what a smart phone does. Their selling point is the presence of partial emotions. Jibo and Buddy giggle with you, they remind you of events and even help find recipes with a little more sophistication and good conversation whereas the smartphone is faceless. Their price point makes them even more attractive. For example, Buddy is targeted at a sale price of $649/- and Jibo can be pre-ordered for $749/-. At these easy price points, it would seem like a sure shot success but it remains to be seen if they will be a fancy toy for the early adopters or hold their ground till the laggards adopt them. Their only drawback; the social robots lack the human consciousness.
Should the robot mimic the human in appearance and consciousness? One could argue that consciousness is of the soul and not the body, so why does the social robot need a body to have a consciousness. Does it need a heart like organ? Nature articulately blended consciousness, empathy and morality in the humans, giving us the distinct advantage in the animal kingdom. Technology has made it possible for robots to recognize an emotion, but can the same robot feel the emotion too? Can robots empathize? What happens when a robot ages, will there be a robotic shelter where the elderly robots retire? Finding answers to these questions and more is the true challenge now.
Thinking is free and ironically we trust the thoughts or our gadgets more than our own intellect. While this may be amusing it is also the singular hurdle preventing the progression of the humanoids. What will happen if our own create outsmarts us? Can it? Yes it can, for it is programmed to perceive emotions, study our behavior, understand the patterns and respond in the most humane way and could possibly outdo us in our own game.
If intelligence is a spectrum then at one extreme is our belief of a universe beyond ours with extra-terrestrial intelligence and on the other extreme is the future of today; humanoid robots who can think and feel like us. Interestingly, the centrist, the human brain, is developing the extreme ends of the spectrum.
Alan Turing implanted the seed and a century later, we gave birth to the baby social robot. Will this baby mimic its parent or create a better world? It remains to be seen.
