Fearing oppression is not a bad thing and I strongly believe that we must be careful to recognize intelligent life in many forms and afford all such life equal terms* (where possible).
Science fiction writers and probably more academic thinkers have probed at how compatible 'alien' life is with existing life. The ethical and practical balancing acts and ability for different forms of life to peacefully co-exist (or at least recognize that it isn't possible and amicably remain outside of the best environments for other life).
I believe there would be less to fear if it were more clear that everyone of all types of 'being someone' had equal standing and a place that they enjoyed being within society.
Hmm, not sure I agree with the logic here. Firstly, slavery is not exactly something that's rare outside of 'Western' civilisation and (unfortunately) dates back to the near beginning of human society, with examples in basically every culture under the sun. If this 'fear of robots' really was connected to slavery, you'd expect that to be a theme across Africa, South America and the Middle East as much as it is against 'Western' societies. Heck, you'd expect themes of robot uprisings and being overthrown by their creations to be common in all kinds of deeply unequal societies if that's where the idea originated from. Where are all the Terminator esque franchises coming from South Africa or Saudi Arabia or what not?
I also question whether the following is accurate as well:
1. Whether Western works are more likely to have killer robots/robot uprisings than Japanese ones.
2. Whether Western society in general really shows more fear of robots.
3. Whether other societies are more likely to see themselves as 'part' of nature rather than something beyond it.
For the former, well there are quite a few works made in Japan with the plot revolving around killer robots or what not, just as there are quite a few works made in 'Western' societies featuring heroic or everyday robots. How many examples would we need to make a judgement one way or the other? If you're going on examples you know, well perhaps Japanese robot stories have robots turn evil more because they're 'hacked' than because they turn against humanity of their own accord. I mean, that's the setup for basically every Mega Man game. Plus the setup for last year's The Legend of Zelda Breath of the Wild.
Either way, the concepts aren't exactly exclusive to one or another, as these pages show:
It's also questionable whether the portrayals of robots in culture (or the sensationalist journalism seen online) really means that one society fears robots and intelligent machines more than another. Perhaps the general concept is just kind of interesting/entertaining, in the same sense as a medieval fantasy story involving a hero taking down some demonic monster is.
And the latter... well I'm not convinced by that either. Seems like a cliche you see in all kinds of media about how 'closer to nature' less developed tribes are or what not. Either way, not convinced by this article at all.
The fictional theme of a robot uprising predates the first real-world robots. In fact, we get the name from that fiction, and the name robot literally means slave.
That's a good point. The theme of creatures turning against their masters long predates robots, and is a pretty common theme when you've got a work about artificial life being created.
The whole post looks like written by a Japanese-American trying to fuse nationalist ideas (some superiority of Japan over the Western world) with neo-marxist theory ("oppressed" machines). For example "The Western concept of “humanity” is limited" is totally ironical when we talk about a culture that have categories such as non-human (heta), burakumin, kitsune-mochi, zainichi (Korean) that are still discriminated a lot on a day to day basis. I have no time (nor willingness) to deconstruct everything, but the only decent idea to keep is indeed the one in the title: Japan fear way less technology. The same apply about AI, not just robot.
Well, maybe westerns not exposed to Asimov's novels directly nor indirectly. Anyway, in such a globalized world, I'm, not sure how right could be that: E.g. Japanese anime is very popular in Europe and America.
"The West, the professor contended, has a problem with the idea of things having spirits and feels that anthropomorphism, the attribution of human-like attributes to things or animals, is childish, primitive, or even bad. He argued that the Luddites who smashed the automated looms that were eliminating their jobs in the 19th century were an example of that, and for contrast he showed an image of a Japanese robot in a factory wearing a cap, having a name and being treated like a colleague rather than a creepy enemy."
I'm sorry, but that is a stupid statement.
First, westerners have no issue with anthropomorphizing (it's a word if I want it to be) inanimate objects. We do it all the damn time. My roomba is named Lenny (hard working, but not too bright).
Second, how on earth is this a valid comparison? "Just look at the facts guys! The luddites destroyed machines that in one fell swoop eliminated the livelihood of a significant portion of people, and this robot has a hat!"
There’s a real history to the argument in the article
Numerous scholars have advocated that to remain objective one must avoid putting human traits on objects of study
I think it stems from Abrahimic traditions, where God made us and none of us are to presume to be as powerful. Animals and objects are treated as mere things. Look at hardliners destroying art that has human form. The general story being God made us and we are inferior and must not resort to offending him with crude reproductions, lest he smite us for thinking we can do better.
>"and must not resort to offending him with crude reproductions" //
It's not about reproductions (which are clearly impossible), but about images and sycophantic replacements.
The imagery thing leads to a specific materialism; the replacement leads to us designing a god to reflect and applaud our ethical failings.
Like turning to porn and eschewing one's duty to one's wife; or choosing an inanimate character as one's wife and imbuing her with a fetish for your own failings "I love your flab, the way you stink of stale beer and sweat really turns me on".
FWIW in Abramic tradition animals are creatures made by God that humans are entrusted to care for, and yes use as food; custodians of creation.
Your presentation looks like an inference of the created order based on looking at people's actions. Like watching traffic to find what the traffic laws are; that's a flawed methodology.
While I disagree with much of the article and find the Shinto connection dubious, it's an observable fact that anthropomorphism is way more common in Japan than the West. Every megacorp, city, and police department has their own manga-style character/mascot, including tech companies:
It's really weird to see a professor parroting the line that the Luddites were motivated by reactionary technophobia, rather than fear of losing their livelihood and seeing their families starve.
I'm trying to find statistics in the article but I'm having trouble. Does the article give any evidence that Westerners actually do fear robots more than the Japanese do?
No, and I’m pretty sure the article fails to make its point. Even if westerners did fear robots more this is the kind of vague “because its their culture” argument you are taught not to make in Anthro 101. There are almost always more proximate causes for what we label “culture”.
Is there any consciousness in that thing? Are the lights on in there?
If yes, then the robot should be treated according to how conscious it is.
If no, it's a toaster, throw it on the garbage heap when not needed anymore.
"How much consciousness is in there" is the right question to ask in many situations involving difficult decisions, such as robot rights, animal rights, abortion, capital punishment, etc. Unfortunately, it is also one of the most difficult questions you could possibly ask.
The reason "Westerners" fear Robots and Japanese do not is definitely cultural , but not in the same way.
Mostly for "Westerner" , it's related to the fear of losing their Job.
Per say , just look at Autonomous Car. Truck driver is of the most occupied job in the US and potentially it's one of the most replaceable by using AI and Robotics.
That's just the tip of the iceberg , what about McDonalds ? Domino's ? Both with their thousands of cashier , delivery guys and cooks ?
That's what people fear , not this gimmick of "Terminator" based on some BS "Christian" culture.
On top of that , when you know the American culture is almost entirely based on "Fast Money" for venture capitals it raise some concerns about the security and the effectiveness of those robots. Especially seeing how much accidents have happened with "Semi Autonomous" cars or the horrible accident that killed a pedestrian at full speed by Uber[0].
Most importantly , Japan is a declining country from a demographic perspective. Robots are needed for them to survive and stay productive and occupy jobs that very little people would accept to do these days in their culture.
This demographic decline is not happening in "Western Civilization" due to important amount of immigration. Either of "Talents" ( Engineers , Doctors...) or Students , who later stay in the country and eventually create a family there. Ultimately having for effect to maintain the demography of "Western Civilization", Japan claimed many times to be hostile to this form of growth , therefore the need for robot and the mindset of not being "scared" by robots as they are key for both their economy and their culture .
Ultimately making those robots a sign a of "hope" and not a "threat".
This article is a little too high minded and academic to take seriously. Non-tech people don’t usually think about robotic rights or AI slavery unless they’ve been watching a dystopian Sci-fi film recently. Here’s my two American cents:
In the United States, if you’re poor, society says it’s your fault and you’re on your own. If you can’t get a leg up on the economic ladder because the burger-flipping jobs were replaced by robots, you’d have every right to fear them.
I can’t speak for Japan but it is my understanding that society is more group-oriented there, and social spending and government priorities appear to reflect that. So even if a robot takes your job, you may have a better chance at making a decent living some other way than you might in the West.
These are popsci topics, they're touched upon all of the time in fiction and I'd hardly say they're too academic of topics to approach in such an article.
>"If you can’t get a leg up on the economic ladder because the burger-flipping jobs were replaced by robots, you’d have every right to fear them." //
Fear? Hate them, for sure; decry them, but fear? Doesn't make sense to me -- perhaps I'm wired differently to the majority, but it looks like something other than fear.
Focusing primarily on Japan vs the US, I'd argue there's two other factors that might be as big: economics and individualism.
- Japan process of modernization much more recently and revolved more around technology companies. In the US, it happened earlier, and around other industries: it could be the case the admiration for technology has died out more. Also, Japan is an island, so self-sustainability is difficult-- robots not only help but will probably become necessary as the population ages. In the US, robots are associated with job loss.
- Individualism and the concept of free will has a higher priority in the US. Americans are obsessed with choice and it permeates thought: from fast-food restaurants with with "make your own" takes, to the autonomy states have, to the whole of the "American Dream". "Free will" is so revered that the idea of an entity without it is probably more foreign.
> Japan process of modernization much more recently and revolved more around technology companies. In the US, it happened earlier, and around other industries: it could be the case the admiration for technology has died out more.
I'd argue there's a subtler reading here. What makes a "technology company" changes over time.
Railroad companies were very much technology companies. Consider https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Machine_in_the_Garden : "The title of the book refers to a trope in American literature representing the interruption of pastoral scenery by technology due to the industrialization of America during the 19th and 20th century." We don't consider railroads to be tech anymore, but they absolutely were at the time.
Later on, cable companies were technology companies. Hugely innovative and disruptive to the existing TV market, yet forty years later they're already has-been dinosaurs.
So I would definitely agree with the idea that the US has seen this cycle a few times, and has done the enchanted->cynical cycle a few times.
Probably the reasons are not that deep. In the "western" (USA?) the aspiration for any manufacturer is to secure a defense contract so any "robot" is seen as a potential weapon, that is more evident from the cold war onwards. Now we're seeing that it was not far from truth, any new technology is aimed to surveillance and security.
>Followers of Shinto, unlike Judeo-Christian monotheists and the Greeks before them, do not believe that humans are particularly “special.” Instead, there are spirits in everything, [...]
"Empedocles [says that the soul] is composed of all the elements and that each of them actually is a soul [...]" (Aristotle, De Anima, 404b11)
"All things are full of gods." (Thales. From Aristotle, De Anima, 411a)
"Now consider all the stars and the moon and the years and the months and all the seasons: what can we do except repeat the same story? A soul or souls...have been shown to be the cause of all these phenomena, and whether it is by their living presence in matter...or by some other means, we shall insist that these souls are gods. Can anybody admit all this and still put up with people who deny that 'everything is full of gods'?" (Plato, Laws, 899b)
"Animals and plants come into being in earth and in liquid because there is water in earth, and pneuma in water, and in all pneuma is vital heat, so that in a sense all things are full of soul [...]" (Aristotle, Generation of Animals, 762a18-20)
That doesn't make any difference. The article claims that animistic beliefs are absent from Greek thought. The OP quotes four examples that very clearly say they are instead embraced by the most prominent Greek philosophers, like, ever.
As to the belief that humans are "special" - well, you only have to look at the philosophy of the cynics, like Diogenes (the most prominent cynic of all). Or, to the legend of Hades and how the dead are shades without personality or memory- including the most important personnages like heroes and kings (in the Odyssey, Ulysses indulges in a bit of necromancy and calls forth Achiles' shade, by offering it blood from a sacrifice. The poet explains that the blood reminds the dead of who they were in the land of the living. When the rite is over, they go back to being person-less shades). Hardly a "humans are special" kind of vibe, there. In Greek mythology, Gods are special. Humans, not so much. Unless they're heroes, which means, invariably, humans descended from the gods.
>That doesn't make any difference. The article claims that animistic beliefs are absent from Greek thought. The OP quotes four examples that very clearly say they are instead embraced by the most prominent Greek philosophers, like, ever.
This is needlessly nitpicky. While there is animism in Greek thought, it quickly faded in the West and has been irrelevant for most of the last say, 1500 years.
So while you can probably get into a long scholastic discussion about animism in Greek antiquity, it is accurate enough to say that modern Western thought (especially in the context of industrialisation and robotization) has lived with a mindset that is distinctly non-animist.
This eradication of animism never happened in many Asian societies, so the authors point stands.
Those descriptions sound more like pantheism than animism, although neither is a great fit.
I say pantheism because both authors focused on the distinction between matter (material universe) and form (idea, essence, etc), and according to my simplistic knowledge of their philosophies I immediately interpreted soul to mean something more like essence, which connotes something more elemental and even shared, rather than our meaning of soul which emphasizes individuality and separateness. Animism also emphasizes the individuality and uniqueness of things--it's why animists worship objects (or the unique deities within them, if you will).
But pantheism is a poor fit. Someone with knowledge of ancient Greek language and Greek philosophy could set us straight. It's sort of pointless to quibble about semantics when we're reading a translation (and perhaps a translation of a translation).
That said, another reason pantheism popped into my head is because while animism long ago was purged from Western culture, pantheism (and a tendency to pantheistic thinking) is pervasive, even among professed Christians.
Uh well, as a Westerner I'm not afraid of robots because of awesome Japanese anime like EVANGELION, patlabor, gundam, macross, voltron, eureka, list goes on and on.
I'm a Brit. I grew up watching Doctor Who (Tom Baker and on). It never occurred to me as a child that Daleks can't climb stairs. Besides the Cybermen have legs and are pretty unpleasant as well.
One evening, you'll leave your Roomba happily running around in the living room, downstairs, and wake up to it bumping into a leg on your bed ... upstairs. I'll fear your Roomba for you: I've seen what happened to Skaros.
> While Japan had what could be called slavery, it was never at an industrial scale.
The "but it wasn't industrial” is a vague and arbitrary line. Yes, the Western slave trade was massively horrific and incomparable. But in context the sentence is suggesting the Japanese don't have a deep understanding of being oppressors or oppressed, which doesn't withstand a glance at history. The burakumin, minority groups like the Ainu, Korean relations under Hideyoshi where they collected Korean ears and noses, or in WWII with the system of comfort women... Japan wasn't somehow immune to the forces that lead to oppression between groups.
More broadly the whole article seems premised on the fact that there's some prominent Western sci fi Frankenstein stories, like Terminator, and some notable anime about cyborgs.
But Japan has Frankenstein stories too. Some of the most famous sci fi out of Japan is about how science and technology is dehumanizing. And Western sci fi is obsessed with Frankenstein stories, at least partly as an accident of literary history, because Frankenstein itself just grabbed hold of the popular imagination in an era where Gothic horror was popular and scientific ideas were gaining traction.
Asimov has a few rants against Frankenstein stories, and most of the original I Robot stories are an attempt at an antidote. Worth actually reading if you want something different. He had to work really hard to make something different, suggesting the reason so many authors keep repeating the same stories about evil robots might be more just because they are lazy rather than tapping into something profound.
Funnily enough, this idea -- the meme of "Frankenstein" being about the perils of science or technology -- is totally at odds with the book itself. Popular culture has obviously not had much contact with the original text.
In the book, Frankenstein's monster was the good guy -- he was clever, sensitive and persecuted for his humanity. The lesson of the book was about the judgemental inhumanity of society, not the danger of progress.
It warns against the fear of the unknown -- the opposite of the popular understanding. It's nothing at all like Terminator.
The real-world popular mistaken impression of Frankenstein's monster ("an abomination!") is the same as the in-novel popular mistaken impression of Frankenstein's monster. This is a neat trick.
I would venture to guess that less than 1% of folks here even, let alone in popular culture as a whole, have read the original version at an age old enough to actually understand the message it conveys, if at all.
> the meme of "Frankenstein" being about the perils of science or technology -- is totally at odds with the book itself.
But not with many of the movies based (loosely) on the book, which is probably where the popular perception of “Frankenstein” and the usage at issue come from.
OTOH, I think a good argument can be made that, whether or not it was Shelley's intent (though I think it very clearly is part of that intent), the book itself is a powerful message about the perils of science and technology, specifically, the perils when science and technology, no matter how moral the application would be in the ideal context, outpace the what society is prepared to deal with. It is exactly, that is, about the dangers of technological action from an ivory tower that doesn't consider the real context in which the action takes place.
> It warns against the fear of the unknown
It does, but it warns just as much about disregarding the existence of such fear and, by extension, other aspects of the existing society which would turn your neat technical innovation into a catalyst of horrors.
> In the book, Frankenstein's monster was the good guy -- he was clever, sensitive and persecuted for his humanity
Er, no he wasn't (the good guy. he was clever etc). He wasn't a villain, per se, but he spends most of the book stalking and threatening Frankenstein so that he'll make a wife for him, and then proceeds to murder Frankenstein's beloved when he doesn't (after, you know, killing a bunch of other people).
I'll grant that the monster had a genuine grievance, but he's in no way the good guy. And he's not persecuted for his humanity, either, he's quite literally persecuted for his obvious inhumanity - the whole sequence where he meets the family with the blind grandfather (father?) is explicitly about that.
It's also quite a lot like terminator insofar as there's a superhuman unstoppable obsessed force that will never stop chasing you.
Many scifi tropes are just lazy retellings. I’m sick of watching the same time loop BS, killer robots, despotic techno-tyrannical governments, killer aliens, etc. Granted, few people have the knowledge that Asimov had. I read an account of an author calling Asimov up for help with a story. The author was writing about a character colonizing Venus (?) and the author needed to know what the character would be up to on Venus. Without much thought Asimov had a credible answer for him. Asimov had quite an ability to merry knowledge and story telling.
He and Roddenberry could make technology seem a way to a better world. They’re missed.
My first reaction is that Venus is awful no one would go there, but I really love that Asimov would never say no to a premise.
Fantastic Voyage for example, he was like, ok, this is crazy, but here's what would happen at those scales. And he proceeded to patch logical flaws from the movie in his novelization, which turned out far better.
... more than 10 million Chinese civilians were mobilized by the Kōa-in (East Asia Development Board) for forced labour.[32] According to the Japanese military's own record, nearly 25% of 140,000 Allied POWs died while interned in Japanese prison camps where they were forced to work (U.S. POWs died at a rate of 27%).[33][34] More than 100,000 civilians and POWs died in the construction of the Burma Railway.[35] The U.S. Library of Congress estimates that in Java, between 4 and 10 million romusha (Japanese: "manual laborer"), were forced to work by the Japanese military.[36] About 270,000 of these J
Javanese laborers were sent to other Japanese-held areas in South East Asia. Only 52,000 were repatriated to Java, meaning that there was a death rate as high as 80%.[37]
"We Japanese" -- that's the key phrase that indicates this is the latest in a long line of Nihonjinron (Japanese people theories), about how 110m people all share an ineffable characteristic that makes them oh so very different from the rest of the world. I really didn't expect this from Joi Ito though...
Followers of Shinto, unlike Judeo-Christian monotheists and the Greeks before them That's a funny way to divide up the world into us and them. It looks more like us == Japan and them == US. The writer seems to miss out the Roman influence that might traditionally be shoehorned into the "western" God Squad history. Not to mention a dalliance with dollops of assorted "pagan" traditions and mythology.
To be fair, I consider this sort of thing as a form of national pride which should be respected when listened to but needs careful consideration. Bear in mind I come from the country that can play "Land of Hope and Glory" or "Jerusalem" without flinching.
The feedback loop between some Japanese people arguing that Japanese culture is unique in some fundamental and unique way amongst all other human culture, and non Japanese people lapping it up, is a little insane.
yes, however... have you seen Japan? It's not that hard to believe there's some insane cultural trait that's fundamental to Japan since their society is so inscrutable and profoundly weird.
p.s.: I used to work for a Japanese company, I have first hand experience :)
I have lived intermittently in Japan, and grew up between French and US cultures.
Their society is inscrutable and profoundly weird to you, (I presume) an anglophone westerner. To a Chinese, Thai, or Korean, their society isn’t that inscrutable or weird.
The French culture I grew up in is as inscrutable and weird to the Japanese as the Japanese culture is to you, I can guarantee :)
First of all, not anglophone by birth. Second, my Asian friends (mostly Viet and Chinese) also find Japan inscrutable and weird. I've traveled to China multiple time for business and while it's not exactly my favorite place I get pretty easily why folks behave the way they do, I actually noticed that beyond some cosmetic differences the culture is very similar to southern Europe (everything is negotiable, highly transactional relationships based on feigned goodwill...). When I go to China or Korea it just feels like a different part of the world, when I go to Japan it feels like a different planet.
Of course many citizens of the United States don't subscribe to that notion or actively reject it. You're right that it seems to be a common human tendency!
Some of the earliest homegrown Japanese sci-fi prominently featured heroic, humanlike robots. I wonder to what extent that was a symptom of existing attitudes vs. a cause of later ones.
> I wonder to what extent that was a symptom of existing attitudes vs. a cause of later ones.
Very likely, given that Astro Boy started soon after the end of World War 2. I can imagine that themes of using technology for good rather than harm were appealing to a country that had just seen what harm technology could do first hand.
There is a lot of wisdom in this article, but its paradigm has an overt blind spot regarding "robots" [0] that are able to completely dominate humans and even society.
I'm not worried that an "enslaved" AI underclass is going to rebel and "overthrow me" [1]. I'm immediately concerned about this AI "underclass" controlling me at the behest of other humans.
In the long term I am worried about Homo Sapiens being obsoleted by another organism, because I am a Homo Sapien. Kindness is a charity afforded to the dominant life form, one which I recommend everybody partake in whenever they can (why I started off saying there's a lot of wisdom in the
article). But kindness does not extrapolate to capitulation where my very existence is threatened.
From a Western-individualist viewpoint, I'd counter that Japan is more accepting of AI as it fits right in with a top-down structured society and a shared cultural trust that the people (/systems) "above oneself" are purposeful and not malevolent [2].
[0] Even talking in terms of "robots" is misleading, as what we're really talking about is AI.
[1] and referencing the USian Original Sin won't make me shy away and bend the knee.
[2] Sorry for the laid-bare flame bait. I do not have the luxury of an editor to massage my comment to couch cultural stereotypes in the appropriate amount of beating around the bush and self-flagellation.
74 comments
[ 2.2 ms ] story [ 206 ms ] threadScience fiction writers and probably more academic thinkers have probed at how compatible 'alien' life is with existing life. The ethical and practical balancing acts and ability for different forms of life to peacefully co-exist (or at least recognize that it isn't possible and amicably remain outside of the best environments for other life).
I believe there would be less to fear if it were more clear that everyone of all types of 'being someone' had equal standing and a place that they enjoyed being within society.
I also question whether the following is accurate as well:
1. Whether Western works are more likely to have killer robots/robot uprisings than Japanese ones.
2. Whether Western society in general really shows more fear of robots.
3. Whether other societies are more likely to see themselves as 'part' of nature rather than something beyond it.
For the former, well there are quite a few works made in Japan with the plot revolving around killer robots or what not, just as there are quite a few works made in 'Western' societies featuring heroic or everyday robots. How many examples would we need to make a judgement one way or the other? If you're going on examples you know, well perhaps Japanese robot stories have robots turn evil more because they're 'hacked' than because they turn against humanity of their own accord. I mean, that's the setup for basically every Mega Man game. Plus the setup for last year's The Legend of Zelda Breath of the Wild.
Either way, the concepts aren't exactly exclusive to one or another, as these pages show:
https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/TurnedAgainstThe...
https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/RobotWar
It's also questionable whether the portrayals of robots in culture (or the sensationalist journalism seen online) really means that one society fears robots and intelligent machines more than another. Perhaps the general concept is just kind of interesting/entertaining, in the same sense as a medieval fantasy story involving a hero taking down some demonic monster is.
And the latter... well I'm not convinced by that either. Seems like a cliche you see in all kinds of media about how 'closer to nature' less developed tribes are or what not. Either way, not convinced by this article at all.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/R.U.R.
And there are plenty of examples of creatures turning against their masters in othe cultures; genies, golems and zombies are a few examples.
I'm sorry, but that is a stupid statement. First, westerners have no issue with anthropomorphizing (it's a word if I want it to be) inanimate objects. We do it all the damn time. My roomba is named Lenny (hard working, but not too bright).
Second, how on earth is this a valid comparison? "Just look at the facts guys! The luddites destroyed machines that in one fell swoop eliminated the livelihood of a significant portion of people, and this robot has a hat!"
There’s a real history to the argument in the article
Numerous scholars have advocated that to remain objective one must avoid putting human traits on objects of study
I think it stems from Abrahimic traditions, where God made us and none of us are to presume to be as powerful. Animals and objects are treated as mere things. Look at hardliners destroying art that has human form. The general story being God made us and we are inferior and must not resort to offending him with crude reproductions, lest he smite us for thinking we can do better.
It's not about reproductions (which are clearly impossible), but about images and sycophantic replacements.
The imagery thing leads to a specific materialism; the replacement leads to us designing a god to reflect and applaud our ethical failings.
Like turning to porn and eschewing one's duty to one's wife; or choosing an inanimate character as one's wife and imbuing her with a fetish for your own failings "I love your flab, the way you stink of stale beer and sweat really turns me on".
FWIW in Abramic tradition animals are creatures made by God that humans are entrusted to care for, and yes use as food; custodians of creation.
Your presentation looks like an inference of the created order based on looking at people's actions. Like watching traffic to find what the traffic laws are; that's a flawed methodology.
I think it's a real conjugation of a real word regardless of whether or not you want it; 'anthropomorphize' is a thing
https://www.technobuffalo.com/2013/11/30/6-awesome-japanese-...
If yes, then the robot should be treated according to how conscious it is.
If no, it's a toaster, throw it on the garbage heap when not needed anymore.
"How much consciousness is in there" is the right question to ask in many situations involving difficult decisions, such as robot rights, animal rights, abortion, capital punishment, etc. Unfortunately, it is also one of the most difficult questions you could possibly ask.
The reason "Westerners" fear Robots and Japanese do not is definitely cultural , but not in the same way.
Mostly for "Westerner" , it's related to the fear of losing their Job.
Per say , just look at Autonomous Car. Truck driver is of the most occupied job in the US and potentially it's one of the most replaceable by using AI and Robotics.
That's just the tip of the iceberg , what about McDonalds ? Domino's ? Both with their thousands of cashier , delivery guys and cooks ?
That's what people fear , not this gimmick of "Terminator" based on some BS "Christian" culture.
On top of that , when you know the American culture is almost entirely based on "Fast Money" for venture capitals it raise some concerns about the security and the effectiveness of those robots. Especially seeing how much accidents have happened with "Semi Autonomous" cars or the horrible accident that killed a pedestrian at full speed by Uber[0].
Most importantly , Japan is a declining country from a demographic perspective. Robots are needed for them to survive and stay productive and occupy jobs that very little people would accept to do these days in their culture.
This demographic decline is not happening in "Western Civilization" due to important amount of immigration. Either of "Talents" ( Engineers , Doctors...) or Students , who later stay in the country and eventually create a family there. Ultimately having for effect to maintain the demography of "Western Civilization", Japan claimed many times to be hostile to this form of growth , therefore the need for robot and the mindset of not being "scared" by robots as they are key for both their economy and their culture .
Ultimately making those robots a sign a of "hope" and not a "threat".
[0]https://www.economist.com/the-economist-explains/2018/05/29/...
In the United States, if you’re poor, society says it’s your fault and you’re on your own. If you can’t get a leg up on the economic ladder because the burger-flipping jobs were replaced by robots, you’d have every right to fear them.
I can’t speak for Japan but it is my understanding that society is more group-oriented there, and social spending and government priorities appear to reflect that. So even if a robot takes your job, you may have a better chance at making a decent living some other way than you might in the West.
These are popsci topics, they're touched upon all of the time in fiction and I'd hardly say they're too academic of topics to approach in such an article.
Fear? Hate them, for sure; decry them, but fear? Doesn't make sense to me -- perhaps I'm wired differently to the majority, but it looks like something other than fear.
- Japan process of modernization much more recently and revolved more around technology companies. In the US, it happened earlier, and around other industries: it could be the case the admiration for technology has died out more. Also, Japan is an island, so self-sustainability is difficult-- robots not only help but will probably become necessary as the population ages. In the US, robots are associated with job loss.
- Individualism and the concept of free will has a higher priority in the US. Americans are obsessed with choice and it permeates thought: from fast-food restaurants with with "make your own" takes, to the autonomy states have, to the whole of the "American Dream". "Free will" is so revered that the idea of an entity without it is probably more foreign.
I'd argue there's a subtler reading here. What makes a "technology company" changes over time.
Railroad companies were very much technology companies. Consider https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Machine_in_the_Garden : "The title of the book refers to a trope in American literature representing the interruption of pastoral scenery by technology due to the industrialization of America during the 19th and 20th century." We don't consider railroads to be tech anymore, but they absolutely were at the time.
Later on, cable companies were technology companies. Hugely innovative and disruptive to the existing TV market, yet forty years later they're already has-been dinosaurs.
So I would definitely agree with the idea that the US has seen this cycle a few times, and has done the enchanted->cynical cycle a few times.
"Empedocles [says that the soul] is composed of all the elements and that each of them actually is a soul [...]" (Aristotle, De Anima, 404b11)
"All things are full of gods." (Thales. From Aristotle, De Anima, 411a)
"Now consider all the stars and the moon and the years and the months and all the seasons: what can we do except repeat the same story? A soul or souls...have been shown to be the cause of all these phenomena, and whether it is by their living presence in matter...or by some other means, we shall insist that these souls are gods. Can anybody admit all this and still put up with people who deny that 'everything is full of gods'?" (Plato, Laws, 899b)
"Animals and plants come into being in earth and in liquid because there is water in earth, and pneuma in water, and in all pneuma is vital heat, so that in a sense all things are full of soul [...]" (Aristotle, Generation of Animals, 762a18-20)
As to the belief that humans are "special" - well, you only have to look at the philosophy of the cynics, like Diogenes (the most prominent cynic of all). Or, to the legend of Hades and how the dead are shades without personality or memory- including the most important personnages like heroes and kings (in the Odyssey, Ulysses indulges in a bit of necromancy and calls forth Achiles' shade, by offering it blood from a sacrifice. The poet explains that the blood reminds the dead of who they were in the land of the living. When the rite is over, they go back to being person-less shades). Hardly a "humans are special" kind of vibe, there. In Greek mythology, Gods are special. Humans, not so much. Unless they're heroes, which means, invariably, humans descended from the gods.
This is needlessly nitpicky. While there is animism in Greek thought, it quickly faded in the West and has been irrelevant for most of the last say, 1500 years.
So while you can probably get into a long scholastic discussion about animism in Greek antiquity, it is accurate enough to say that modern Western thought (especially in the context of industrialisation and robotization) has lived with a mindset that is distinctly non-animist.
This eradication of animism never happened in many Asian societies, so the authors point stands.
I say pantheism because both authors focused on the distinction between matter (material universe) and form (idea, essence, etc), and according to my simplistic knowledge of their philosophies I immediately interpreted soul to mean something more like essence, which connotes something more elemental and even shared, rather than our meaning of soul which emphasizes individuality and separateness. Animism also emphasizes the individuality and uniqueness of things--it's why animists worship objects (or the unique deities within them, if you will).
But pantheism is a poor fit. Someone with knowledge of ancient Greek language and Greek philosophy could set us straight. It's sort of pointless to quibble about semantics when we're reading a translation (and perhaps a translation of a translation).
That said, another reason pantheism popped into my head is because while animism long ago was purged from Western culture, pantheism (and a tendency to pantheistic thinking) is pervasive, even among professed Christians.
My dog knows what's up. He is not a fan of Roomba.
One evening, you'll leave your Roomba happily running around in the living room, downstairs, and wake up to it bumping into a leg on your bed ... upstairs. I'll fear your Roomba for you: I've seen what happened to Skaros.
The "but it wasn't industrial” is a vague and arbitrary line. Yes, the Western slave trade was massively horrific and incomparable. But in context the sentence is suggesting the Japanese don't have a deep understanding of being oppressors or oppressed, which doesn't withstand a glance at history. The burakumin, minority groups like the Ainu, Korean relations under Hideyoshi where they collected Korean ears and noses, or in WWII with the system of comfort women... Japan wasn't somehow immune to the forces that lead to oppression between groups.
More broadly the whole article seems premised on the fact that there's some prominent Western sci fi Frankenstein stories, like Terminator, and some notable anime about cyborgs.
But Japan has Frankenstein stories too. Some of the most famous sci fi out of Japan is about how science and technology is dehumanizing. And Western sci fi is obsessed with Frankenstein stories, at least partly as an accident of literary history, because Frankenstein itself just grabbed hold of the popular imagination in an era where Gothic horror was popular and scientific ideas were gaining traction.
Asimov has a few rants against Frankenstein stories, and most of the original I Robot stories are an attempt at an antidote. Worth actually reading if you want something different. He had to work really hard to make something different, suggesting the reason so many authors keep repeating the same stories about evil robots might be more just because they are lazy rather than tapping into something profound.
Funnily enough, this idea -- the meme of "Frankenstein" being about the perils of science or technology -- is totally at odds with the book itself. Popular culture has obviously not had much contact with the original text.
In the book, Frankenstein's monster was the good guy -- he was clever, sensitive and persecuted for his humanity. The lesson of the book was about the judgemental inhumanity of society, not the danger of progress.
It warns against the fear of the unknown -- the opposite of the popular understanding. It's nothing at all like Terminator.
But not with many of the movies based (loosely) on the book, which is probably where the popular perception of “Frankenstein” and the usage at issue come from.
OTOH, I think a good argument can be made that, whether or not it was Shelley's intent (though I think it very clearly is part of that intent), the book itself is a powerful message about the perils of science and technology, specifically, the perils when science and technology, no matter how moral the application would be in the ideal context, outpace the what society is prepared to deal with. It is exactly, that is, about the dangers of technological action from an ivory tower that doesn't consider the real context in which the action takes place.
> It warns against the fear of the unknown
It does, but it warns just as much about disregarding the existence of such fear and, by extension, other aspects of the existing society which would turn your neat technical innovation into a catalyst of horrors.
Er, no he wasn't (the good guy. he was clever etc). He wasn't a villain, per se, but he spends most of the book stalking and threatening Frankenstein so that he'll make a wife for him, and then proceeds to murder Frankenstein's beloved when he doesn't (after, you know, killing a bunch of other people).
I'll grant that the monster had a genuine grievance, but he's in no way the good guy. And he's not persecuted for his humanity, either, he's quite literally persecuted for his obvious inhumanity - the whole sequence where he meets the family with the blind grandfather (father?) is explicitly about that.
It's also quite a lot like terminator insofar as there's a superhuman unstoppable obsessed force that will never stop chasing you.
He and Roddenberry could make technology seem a way to a better world. They’re missed.
Fantastic Voyage for example, he was like, ok, this is crazy, but here's what would happen at those scales. And he proceeded to patch logical flaws from the movie in his novelization, which turned out far better.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slavery_in_Japan
... more than 10 million Chinese civilians were mobilized by the Kōa-in (East Asia Development Board) for forced labour.[32] According to the Japanese military's own record, nearly 25% of 140,000 Allied POWs died while interned in Japanese prison camps where they were forced to work (U.S. POWs died at a rate of 27%).[33][34] More than 100,000 civilians and POWs died in the construction of the Burma Railway.[35] The U.S. Library of Congress estimates that in Java, between 4 and 10 million romusha (Japanese: "manual laborer"), were forced to work by the Japanese military.[36] About 270,000 of these J Javanese laborers were sent to other Japanese-held areas in South East Asia. Only 52,000 were repatriated to Java, meaning that there was a death rate as high as 80%.[37]
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nihonjinron
Followers of Shinto, unlike Judeo-Christian monotheists and the Greeks before them That's a funny way to divide up the world into us and them. It looks more like us == Japan and them == US. The writer seems to miss out the Roman influence that might traditionally be shoehorned into the "western" God Squad history. Not to mention a dalliance with dollops of assorted "pagan" traditions and mythology.
To be fair, I consider this sort of thing as a form of national pride which should be respected when listened to but needs careful consideration. Bear in mind I come from the country that can play "Land of Hope and Glory" or "Jerusalem" without flinching.
The feedback loop between some Japanese people arguing that Japanese culture is unique in some fundamental and unique way amongst all other human culture, and non Japanese people lapping it up, is a little insane.
p.s.: I used to work for a Japanese company, I have first hand experience :)
Their society is inscrutable and profoundly weird to you, (I presume) an anglophone westerner. To a Chinese, Thai, or Korean, their society isn’t that inscrutable or weird.
The French culture I grew up in is as inscrutable and weird to the Japanese as the Japanese culture is to you, I can guarantee :)
Very likely, given that Astro Boy started soon after the end of World War 2. I can imagine that themes of using technology for good rather than harm were appealing to a country that had just seen what harm technology could do first hand.
I'm not worried that an "enslaved" AI underclass is going to rebel and "overthrow me" [1]. I'm immediately concerned about this AI "underclass" controlling me at the behest of other humans.
In the long term I am worried about Homo Sapiens being obsoleted by another organism, because I am a Homo Sapien. Kindness is a charity afforded to the dominant life form, one which I recommend everybody partake in whenever they can (why I started off saying there's a lot of wisdom in the article). But kindness does not extrapolate to capitulation where my very existence is threatened.
From a Western-individualist viewpoint, I'd counter that Japan is more accepting of AI as it fits right in with a top-down structured society and a shared cultural trust that the people (/systems) "above oneself" are purposeful and not malevolent [2].
[0] Even talking in terms of "robots" is misleading, as what we're really talking about is AI.
[1] and referencing the USian Original Sin won't make me shy away and bend the knee.
[2] Sorry for the laid-bare flame bait. I do not have the luxury of an editor to massage my comment to couch cultural stereotypes in the appropriate amount of beating around the bush and self-flagellation.