I knew there was something, but didn’t research it for some time, but for most people in everyday life, it’s really just
And even there, it mostly applies to machines which resemble humans a lot. The closer it seems to us, the better the chances are we might treat it respectfully. That’s the main problem with animal rights - many are against animal testing on primates, but don’t care about how many rats are tortured.
Alexa’s a spying bitch 
I think the key is to define objectively measurable criteria, and apply them strictly to any “subject” you consider. You can only analyze and compare what you can measure. If you start bringing philosophical, theological, emotional considerations into the picture, you can talk about these things until you’re blue in the mouth: nothing of value will come out of the reflexion.
In short: apply scientific rigor to the process and you might get somewhere.
Agree on that, but you do know that philosophy is science, do you?
Even if you love Alexa, you think she’s alive and you don’t think she’s the whoring bitch of a horrible psychopathic megacorporation, it’s okay too: after all, humans yell at each other all the time 
No. Philosophy is a sham. It’s what self-styled intellectuals discuss when they don’t have rational arguments or scientific data on which to base their reflexion.
12 posts were merged into an existing topic: The anti:no_entry_sign:-derailment:railway_car: & thread:thread: hijacking:gun: thread:thread: 
I thought the same, now I think the opposite:
The robot interacted with countless people successfully, however one interaction was fatal.
I would consider it the biggest success you can aim for.
Some found the concept of the robot so disturbing that it got almost powderized.
Not the robot itself was disturbing(at least very unlikely, I think it looked rather funny, almost cute) but the concept behind the robot.
It is well beyond anthropomorphising a "a computer in a bucket wearing rubber boots".
It is in my view recognising the hitchbot as a robot, realising its concept,
(that it is an ambassador, that carries a message, both literally throughout the social media accounts and metaphorically)
disagreeing with the concept (most likely the metaphoric one),
and letting the creators know about the disagreement (while keeping anonymity,
yet causing the maximum impact literally to the robot and getting the most media coverage).
It is on the borderline of political activism.
Vandalism would have been poking a hole on the bucket, or breaking it in half, or water damage, or I’donno.
But the fact it got destroyed as much as it could is a clear and significant message in my view. And me as an external viewer should recognise this.
Of course whoever was involved in the project suffered loss, emotional, financial…etc.
Overall, some dickheads fucked up a funny looking computer, yet it is much much more complex than that. And despite the loss the vandalism itself provides important lesson to learn. Especially to Canadians!! 
Stop being nice under all circumstances!
The robot couldn’t protect itself!!! It was harmless. And despite my naive sentimentality (that will be my ongoing joke for a while): You deserve to be vandalised if you are harmless. And that is the law of nature, not only human cruelty. Whoever can cause the least harm will get to the bottom of the hierarchy chain. And it is the best for the group. And that is a proven fact. Think about chicken. 
Pecking order.
And here we go, another evidence. A broken robot
Therefore I think: Ii IS a really good sign, and especially for people in the US and Canada.
US due to the ppl kill ppl vs. guns kill ppl 
Canada because wanting to be nice... compelled speech etc.
The message is not nice, but is important.
I feel with those who suffered loss, however.
That is a seriously intersting interpretation of that story!
I’m not sure if I agree - does “to be harmless” mean “to do no harm” or “not to be able to do harm” to you? I think this makes a bit of a difference.
I think it is very important to avoid doing harm. We had a similar discussion because of gun laws in a different thread, and I think that even if you could do harm, you should avoid it.
Not being able to do harm might lead to being killed, hurt, destroyed (like the hitchbot) - but I think this is a sad fact about humanity and maybe one we should finally come over.
Yes, exactly!
Edit: But you have to prove it once! You need to, (┛ಠ_ಠ)┛彡┻━┻ so the team has evidence of you being able to cause harm. So you can protect the team if they threatened.
Well… being not really big and neither massive nor very muscular, this might prove difficult for me. But still, people tend to respect me. I think it helps that I am pretty self-confident and never put myself into the role of the victim. Currently, at least in my environment, this seems to be enough. I’m not a big fan of proving that I may be able to hurt someone, anyway 
To get back to the hitchbot, though - do you think the experiment would have been different if he would have been able to defend himself? I think the whole point of it was to show the peacefulness of all that…
That is the best routine.
When I see that happening with others I refer the situation as swan song. The last card losers throw on the table is the victim card.
Oh, yeah! You can get a very good position without showing your teeth! But for a leader position it seems to be mandatory.
Absolutely!
If you can’t get away, because there are consequences… well.
The destroyer(s) wanted to stay anonym. A graffity without signature. And it is a mayor aspect of the act.
(I’d go even further, I’d say it could have provided enough protection to the robot if it was capable to publish the face of the person who destroyed it, without physically defending itself in any other form. One photo might have been enough, and I make this statement as a photographer now.)
The point was peacefulness, and it resulted in failure. (well, questionable result at least)
Because there was nothing backing up peace.
Imagine the fictional story of the strong country invading (helping out) the politically instabil smaller country… Long story short: you start peace with weapons.
Anarchy doesn’t organise itself into hierarchy without power.
I’ll throw in another quote: Fighting for peace is like f*ing for virginity
I don’t think so - the endresult might have been failure, the experiment itself wasn’t. It was a very interesting travel that showed many people were able to peacefully interact with a machine - until it came to the US, which might show a lot as well. And it shows that there already are certain areas of the world where peacefulness doesn’t result in destruction, and that raises my hopes. Maybe one day, all mankind might come to this conclusion.
Nope. Got a leading position at work, without any violence.
Thing is, people sometimes mistake the abscence of violence as weakness, but you can definitely come to a respected position, being strong and all that, without having to resort to (mental or physical) violence.
Yes, I was thinking about it a lot, the quote is funny, but not the most relevant. Peace is a goal, virginity is not a goal, it is a temporary state.
The example is as logically incoherent as saying: living a live for being a baby.
I know you just quoted it as a joke, also I find it funny, but I needed the urge to clarify it once and a while, as I came across with this unsolid reasoning in other debates a few times before.
I used to mention the example of The Little Prince.
(book by Antoine de Saint-Exupéry, that reminds me of Emma Watson 
)
There is a story in the book about growing roses. You have to predict which part of the plant has the biggest chance to grow the nicest flower, focus on that and get rid of the other suckers (technical term). This translates to: Decide your goal!
Also you need to be aware that the caterpillar that represents gluttony in the story will go through metamorphosis and will reward you with it’s beauty as butterfly.
A metaphor to evil, or destruction that - if you face it and come across your fear- will make you stronger eventually.
The caterpillar changes diet, so then it feasts on nectar.
Once you faced your fear and overcome it you look at it from a different (elevated) perspective. It is not something you are afraid of, but rather teaches you. A lesson you learnt. You know the solution, so you are not afraid of the challenge anymore.
Peace is about living in symbiosis with each other in many layers.
The prince looks after the rose, and tolerates the caterpillar. But they fight before 
The rose tolerates the prince and looks after the caterpillar. Also it demands care!
The caterpillar, once accepted, transforms into a butterfly that rewards the prince and the rose as well. Selfish it is!
Prince happy, rose happy, butterfly happy after they put their work in the equation and made their sacrifices. But there is a point when they hate each other. And the story is about them tending towards equilibrium. They have to justify their own acts in order to get accepted by the others.
a failure… Agreed!
Never! That is called Utopia. There ALWAYS will be war, and if you believe otherwise you need to study more!
Well done! Congrats for that! And you chose the right way, as you described, by being strong! Violence can have similar effect to playing the victim. I’d go even further with the thought! Violence often indicate weakness.
Being strong and confident and keeping your cool(!!!) was the evidence you might have given. So you were chosen as leader.
Let me clarify, because you pointed out something important:
Internal conflict—> You MUST stay cool!
External threat—> You MUST show your teeth!
Otherwise you loose the trust you earned before in both cases. It is well studied.
Correction:
A few comments back we mentioned evolution… we think of our ancestors who lived xhundred years ago as barbaric.
Not only us, it is true for the ancient greeks, and pretty much every aera of history.
…yadi-yadi-yada… we face less external threat than we think, so stay cool!
ps: I tried to condense it, yet ended up with a mini essay. Now I 
I live in Philly and I know why the robot was vandalised here and not somewhere else. It’s not a great city, money is tight, and that leads some people to act savagely. It’s a totally fair reaction to tough circumstances.
I don’t agree with the sentiment that being violent or showing dominance is required to reach your goals. That’s the law with animals in nature. Humans have an opportunity to surpass being animals and become more. We’re not doing a great job of it currently, but the potential is definitely there. Classical definitions of evolution and the survival of the fittest do not necessarily need to apply to us.
Sorry if I missed your point when reading your posts, but there were definitely some social darwinist undertones there.
My stance on the “peaceful”
“you can’t truly call yourself “peaceful” unless you are capable of great violence - if you’re not capable of violence you’re not peaceful, you’re harmless. important distinction”
But how you choose to employ violence is very telling, the greater violence you are capable of, the higher standard I hold you to
Also holy crap this got off topic lol
I actually read that book, and it’s far from what we today would like to live like. But I get what you’re saying
I just think if mankind doesn’t finally come to a point where we live together peacefully, it won’t continue to exist at all. Fighting each other is stupid, and we can even learn that from social animals - I studied wolves a lot, and while there is a hierarchy in a wolves pack, it is rarely set up by fighting. The possibility is there, of course, but usually very subtle signs of threatening are enough to keep things working - simply because fighting would be an incredible waste of resources.
I know that one, too - it is almost a mandatory read here, and it’s a great book. There are points I agree with (in the book), and others, where I don’t. I like your interpretation, though, especially
And I think we all fought enought until now, so we might finally be able to find this symbiosis - at least it should be possible at some point. Like
I wouldn’t skip it without responding, but you need to be more specific.
And me too:
Being violent is not a good thing to do! Period!
Yet it does! Evolution studies GENES, and we mostly referring to MEMES.
That is the point, difference between memes and genes.
… let me fix it. Back to cyborg:
I think we are close to that point. People when encounter other people (us vs. them) either they fight or trade.
Specifically they fight first to establish a dominance hierarchy, then they trade from the position they fought for.
My prediction is that we will trade, but on a next level. By exchangeing ideas and thoughts. I am curious about Neuralink. It has the potential to bring us so close that fight might reduce to zero eventually.
@EL0N, what do you think?
Not much other than telling people that I’m now a minority in this world, that I’m the only cyborg to work for Dave and Busters. I just started my apprenticeship as a tattoo artist so whenever the artists yell at Alexa because it won’t listen to them I defend her since she isn’t capable of it right now. Someone has to defend robots.
As someone who carries a deadly weapon every day, I agree with you 100%. I am obligated to be nicer, more understanding, compassionate, and to use every means at my disposal to de-escalate any situation that could potentially turn violent.