Postmodern Robotics

I came across a most interesting discourse on reality. Technical reality to be exact.

Our precise aim is to show that there is no such thing as a robot; that a robot is no more a machine than a statue is a living being; that is merely a product of the imagination, of man’s fictive powers, a product of the art of illusion. Nevertheless, the notion of the machine in present-day culture incorporates, to a considerable extent, this mythic representation of the robot.

Well I have some news for the writer:

Yes. It is true. Robots only exist in the imagination. And yet from time to time factory robots kill people. I guess they were killed by imagination.

In theory there is no difference between theory and practice. In practice there is a difference.

The moral is: You need to be more careful around real robots than theoretical ones.

It is a wonder that people who think like that can even flush a toilet. Or understand the need to.

Which reminds me.

“The society which scorns excellence in plumbing because plumbing is a humble activity, and tolerates shoddiness in philosophy because philosophy is an exalted activity, will have neither good plumbing nor good philosophy. Neither its pipes nor its theories will hold water.” — John W. Gardner, Saturday Evening Post, December 1, 1962

Cross Posted at Classical Values