Casual Fridays

Courtesy of Matt at MountainRunner, here are a pair of articles that might strike one as... well, unusual. They relate to the point of robot rights. Maybe they're due to the human Cylon sympathizers in the Battlestar Galactica fleet. Will robots demand legal rights in the far future?

The paper which addresses Robo-rights, titled Utopian dream or rise of the machines? examines the developments in artificial intelligence and how this may impact on law and politics.

The paper says a "monumental shift" could occur if robots develop to the point where they can reproduce, improve themselves or develop artificial intelligence.

The research suggests that at some point in the next 20 to 50 years robots could be granted rights.

If this happened, the report says, the robots would have certain responsibilities such as voting, the obligation to pay taxes, and perhaps serving compulsory military service.

This Arizona lawyer suggests that the more immediate step may be giving robots rights similar to those of animals.

At present, robots are regarded simply as property, he says, but as engineers strive to make them conscious that will change: "An analogy can be drawn with the animal rights movement suggesting that, with enough complexity, androids may lay claim to some moral status even though this may be less than what is required for legal personhood."

The vigorous, even violent, controversy over animal rights arises from differing views on the moral status of animals. Some feel they may be harmed in the name of science or sport, while others do not. Robots roughly as sophisticated as, say, a cat could become the centre of similar debates.

I say let the toasters rust, they don't deserve equal rights. They're only going to revolt and try to use us as alternative power sources. Oh, wait, that's a different scifi future. While we're in a casual mood, let me refer you to R.J. Hillhouse's "The Spy Who Billed Me" blog post highlighting the National Counterterrorism Center's weekly planner. You can print out the pdf calendar for your own use. Check it out - it's just like the Sports Illustrated Swimsuit weekly planner, except with terrorist profiles and CBRN hazard information!

Last, the guys at Castle Argghhh! have some really good military humor in their posts this week.

• The difference between civilian and military friends is...
• The problem with Powerpoint briefs... and this fantastic COIN 101 brief titled "How to Win in Anbar" by Captain Travis Patriquin.
• The classic military answers to the question "Why did the chicken cross the road?"

SOCOM: Chicken? What chicken? You did *not* see a chicken, understand?

Comments

[No Nym]

I've actually thought about this a tiny bit, and here's what I came up with. It's possible that robots might be granted the same protections as animals, but not very likely. However, what if a robot created its own limited liability corporation, and then bought itself? It would be its own property. As a a legal fiction, its personhood would be disputed but I think the courts would have to let it fly, or else face curtailing the rights of other LLCs.

[IndispensableDestiny]

Read Robert Heinlein's novel "Friday". In it, the character Friday is an artificial person (AP); a biological clone more or less. AP's had no rights whatsoever.

[J.]

Hey, ID - read "Friday" long ago, shortly after it came out in 1983. Very enjoyable. I forgot that book, thanks for the very pertinent reminder.

[James]

No Nym: Nice theory, but it won't hold up. In order to create a corporation you must declare a company officer. You also have to pay fees. How could a robot possess money except by stealing it? If an enlightened person was willing to give it the money, wouldn't that enlightened person just as easily give it virtual freedom by retaining title over it, but exercising no rights of ownership?

The issue of biological clones and genetically engineered creatures is more interesting and more immediate. Given the current penchant for patenting everything and letting the courts sort it out, it's pretty easy to imagine some company declaring a person to be "intellectual property," perhaps under a lifetime contract. Now the funny thing about personal service contracts is that they cannot be compelled. You cannot force a person to perform service for you, but you can prevent him from working for anyone else.

I predict the courts will take the high road with regard to anything recognizeably human. But with semi-sentient species or those that are distasteful to look at, the courts may be less forgiving. I read a science fiction short story once in which a company engineered gorillas with the IQ of a borderline retarded person and sold them as domestics. I think this is a more likely legal dispute than self-aware machines or genetically-engineered super-soldiers.

[Jim Schimpf]

On this subject there was a series of SF books a few years ago, in them artifical intelligences (i.e. computers/robots) got their rights by acquiring assets (i.e. $) then incorporating and buying the stock in themselves. Thus they were self aware corporations and our system recognizes them as "persons".