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| Hatsune Miku, the first Japanese vocaloid, and a holographic jpop star with live concerts. If she had an AI personality matrix, would she be a true idol versus the personality that her fans give her? I blogged about her here: http://tokyoexcess.blogspot.ca/2012/06/vocaloid-hatsune-miku-breaks-out.html |
All of these things I just talked about used to be purely science fiction. In the 1950s, the rise of modern classic SF, it was almost unthinkable that this could happen in this manner. Even now, SF writers are dabbling in it, some are swimming and going with the flow, but in most cases, the future often seems like the past to me. SF on television is some of the worst. I've talked about military technology in SF before and how a great deal of military SF seems to be a rehash of our current combat techniques and old wars. It isn't very futuristic and we are stuck writing about what we are familiar with. Only in the last decade is powered armour and such becoming common along with smart weaponry, but even then battles tend to be the same old thing. When we write (myself included) we don't think what the battlefield should be like if all the new technology comes into play. I myself think war would be very different with cheap robot armies, and the fog of war will be different as tiny little recon drones would saturate the battlefield. These scenarios are likely if there isn't some kind of international accord or something like that to stop it.
The same case is playing out with AI. If there are AIs that have access to the entire Internet and people interact with these AIs, what are the outcomes. How does this affect everything basically as there is a new partner we are dealing with? If they are as intelligent as people, or more so, it is a completely new story as they would be powerful players in society. In this case, are they citizens, starting a revolution, or beings with rights? Would they look at humanity benevolently? If they are not fully intelligent, but "smart" to behave like one they would be amazing augments to human mental capability. Would they be cheap for the masses (don't see why not as tech tends to be cheap as it matures)? How would people still relate to other people and society as a whole? What happens to the structure of society? What if you only had to let your AI work on your behalf and you just did something else to develop your skills/interests, or just have fun? Also, with the growing inequality in wealth distribution and robots taking jobs away, what if the police and army were automated too? Would the 1% beat down the other 99% as they control all the weapons?
These are big questions that SF can always visioning about. I myself don't really have the answers, but I do have a whole bunch of interesting reading linked below that could get you thinking about AI and robotics. Scarey part is that many of the articles are from mainstream magazines and are about now or the near future. Have fun checking them out.
The Coming Technological Singularity: How to Survive in the Post-Human Era by Vernor Vinge
This is the paper that started or helped to kick off the singularity is in our future thinking.
https://www-rohan.sdsu.edu/faculty/vinge/misc/singularity.html
The Singularity is Further Than it Appears by Ramez Naam
Talks more about the singularity and machine progression with monkey wrenches thrown it into the process.
From the blog of SF writer Charles Stross.
http://www.antipope.org/charlie/blog-static/2014/02/the-singularity-is-further-tha.html
What if a Time Traveller Saw a Smartphone?
Interesting article about what a pre-1914 individual would think about a 21st century humans. The pre-1914 individual is in a modified Turing Test where they are dealing with a typical 21st century human augmented with a smartphone linked to the Internet.
http://www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/elements/2014/01/if-a-time-traveller-saw-a-smartphone.html
How Robots Will Work With Us?
Many questions about how humans will interact with the many robots to come.
http://blogs.hbr.org/2014/03/how-robots-will-work-with-us-isnt-only-a-technological-question/
Why Asimov’s Three Laws Of Robotics Can’t Protect Us
It just doesn't look like it would work in practical terms.
http://ieet.org/index.php/IEET/more/dvorsky20140415
The Man Who Would Teach Machines to Think
What is AI? Will we understand how we think and create human-like AI too?
http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2013/11/the-man-who-would-teach-machines-to-think/309529
Facebook, Google, And Sony Are Getting Ready To Fight A Cyberpunk War
The big tech players are getting ready to put the consumer into cyberspace virtual reality. Ghost in the Shell and Snow Crash, here we come. AIs are mandatory of course.
http://www.fastcodesign.com/3027921/facebook-google-and-sony-are-getting-ready-to-fight-a-cyberpunk-war
Making Robots More Like Us
People and robots working together.
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/10/29/science/making-robots-more-like-us.html
As Technology Gets Better, Will Society Get Worse?
How will people and society cope with big technological change?
http://www.fastcodesign.com/3027921/facebook-google-and-sony-are-getting-ready-to-fight-a-cyberpunk-war
An army of robot baristas could mean the end of Starbucks as we know it
Brewing good coffee without the human in the loop.
http://qz.com/134661/briggo-coffee-army-of-robot-baristas-could-mean-the-end-of-starbucks-as-we-know-it/
Drones will cause an upheaval of society like we haven’t seen in 700 years
This could have been titled "The Age of the Gun is Over" too. Will the rich have robot armies to keep the poor in line?
http://qz.com/185945/drones-are-about-to-upheave-society-in-a-way-we-havent-seen-in-700-years/
Robots of death, robots of love
Governing the use of military robots and robots helping us in society.
http://www.techrepublic.com/article/robots-of-death-robots-of-love-the-reality-of-android-soldiers-and-why-laws-for-robots-are-doomed-to-failure
Confessions of a Drone Operator
A view of remote warfare from a drone operator.
http://www.gq.com/news-politics/big-issues/201311/drone-uav-pilot-assassination
AI Could Kill Us All
Title says it all.
http://thenextweb.com/insider/2014/03/08/ai-could-kill-all-meet-man-takes-risk-seriously/
A perspective on alien thinking.
http://io9.com/how-to-write-from-the-perspective-of-a-truly-alien-self-1449703465
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