Apple-designed Robots Would Be Cute. And Probably Homicidal

Patrick Thibodeau over at ComputerWorld writes, "Imagine that Apple will develop a walking, smiling and talking version of your iPhone. It has arms and legs. Its eye cameras recognize you. It will drive your car (and engage in Bullitt-like races with Google’s driverless car), do your grocery shopping, fix dinner and discuss the day’s news.... Will [Apple] argue that these cognitive or social robots deserve rights of their own not unlike the protections extended to pets?" Sounds intriguing. Of course,our pets don't get much more protection

than our iPhones, as it is. But the idea that the smarts in our smart phones is pretty close to what we could be using as service robots does hold merit. There's already a movement afoot to have your average tele-commuter show up at work, via a robot. That is an idea that we should wait and see if it pans out -- I'm not sure having a strange robot with your co-worker's face on it bugging you at your cubical will really improve productivity. But who knows? Video conferences have made tele-commutes much shorter. So machine rights may be in the cards, perhaps modeled on corporate rights? Maybe at the intersection of "created beings" such as the corporation, and animals who merit being treated more than just as cat food and a nuisance to weapons systems testing?