During a recent public dance demonstration in China’s Shaanxi province, a humanoid robot performed kicks and twirls to the delight of adults and children. But things went awry when the robot strayed to the edge of the cordoned-off area. As it made a twirl, it slapped a young boy.
The robot was immediately arrested and charged with battery. It appeared before a judge and made a plea — to have its battery charged. The judge had no mercy, giving it the harshest sentence ever imposed on a robot: “No battery charge for three months, no public dancing for six months, and no Netflix for one year.”
Actually, I do not know if the robot faced any consequences for its actions. In a video shared widely online, the robot’s handlers immediately directed it toward the center of the performance area, where it continued dancing, seemingly unaware that it had not only struck a child but damaged the reputation of the entire robot community. (The child, thankfully, seemed to be mostly stunned, not seriously hurt. But the full extent of his injuries is not known, as his family had not yet taken him to see a lawyer.)
According to news reports, the robot appeared to be a G1 humanoid, created by Chinese tech firm Unitree Robotics for research, education and commercial applications. I’m not sure which of those applications pertains to public dancing, not to mention public violence.
What’s clear to me is that if a robot can strike a child, some parents will not want robots anywhere near their children, while others will say to themselves, “I could really use a robot. My kid is so naughty.”
Father: “You’d better behave yourself or I’m going to call the robot.”
Teenaged son: “No, not the robot! I don’t want to be slapped. That’s child abuse!”
Father: “It won’t slap you. I’ve programmed it to give you a gentle smack on your butt. I told it ‘No abuse!’”
Mother: “Oh, that explains things.”
Father: “What do you mean?”
Mother: “I tried to get it to do sit-ups with me, and it kept saying, ‘No ab use! No ab use!”
Thankfully for children everywhere, it will be a long time before robots are sophisticated enough to discipline them, not to mention affordable enough. The G1 humanoid costs about $13,500. That’s a lot of money to spend on a machine that might accidentally slap you.
The child in Shaanxi province was hardly the first victim of a robot. Just a few months ago, a Chinese man was demonstrating how a Unitree robot could mimic his kickboxing movements. But the robot got a little too close to the man, and when the man kicked his leg into the air, the robot kicked the man in a very sensitive region below his belt.
The video of this incident went viral online, causing men everywhere to grimace, wondering what kind of an idiot would teach a robot to kickbox.
It’s only a matter of time, of course, before robots are trained for combat. Many countries are reluctant to send their soldiers to war, but if they had a platoon of robots, human casualties would be minimized. If a robot were killed in combat, an identical robot could be created to soften the loss for the grieving spouse.
But we need to be careful what tasks we entrust to robots. We might not mind a robot messaging our close family members, but would we want a robot massaging them? No, that would be too close for comfort.
We might not mind a robot performing complex operations for us, but would we want a robot performing a colonoscopy? No, a robot approaching us with any kind of tube would be scary.
We might not mind a robot cutting our grass, but would we want a robot cutting our hair? No, a robot in a hair salon would make me fear that I’d leave with just one ear.
