The Rights and Behavior of other Intellectual beings
People cannot ignore the modernization and development of the world today in terms of technological advancements and the need to make work easier by coming up with innovative ways or other beings that can work as much as humans. From these advancements, there is need to look into the effects and consequences of this intellectual beings in the society. This includes moral issues. An intellectual being is a smart, intelligent and possesses great mental capacity to a high degree. He or she can to think rationally and be guided by wisdom to do things without the influence of feelings and emotions. A robot is a virtual or mechanical agent that is artificial guided by an electronic circuit or computer program. It has some form of sensing capabilities that helps it to perceive the world around it and a “brain” that directs its actions (Floridi & Sanders, p.197).
This “brain” is normally a computer. Differences between humans and robots Human beings and robots are some of the intellectual beings that are common though they have very major differences which are listed below;
- Emotions and feelings
Humans are controlled by their feelings of joy, love, anger, jealousy and hatred. They can also react to some changes in the environment like cold and heat and also hunger but in robots, this is not experienced because they do not have emotions and cannot react to them (Sullins, p.12).
- Their Structures
While human beings are organic structures with flesh and blood, robots are made up of metals and other mixture of materials and elements. Humans have nerves throughout their systems while robots have innumerable wires within their structures.
- Their functioning
Robots can work day and night without requiring rest unlike human beings who have to get sleep or rest in order to refuel their energy or else their productivity will be lowered. Human beings are affected by diseases and various ailments and die at the end of their life spans but robots will be functional until maybe a malfunction occurs in its system.
- Thinking capability and mental capacities
Humans have the power to think, understand and decide for themselves. All that robots can do is obey commands. It can be said that humans not only think for themselves but also for the robots, they create or operate. Robots have been provided with the ability to understand the commands that human beings give them and function accordingly. Robots are programmed and can only perform their designated functions. They cannot add their inputs, give suggestions, or object to the command.
- Requirements to survive
Human beings require eating, to clothe themselves and to drink water for them to survive and be healthy. They also need to socialize as they are social creatures. Robots do not require any of the above (Arkins, p.76). Apart from being oiled for lubrication and to be charged in order to carry on with their functions effectively without mechanical or electrical hitches they are just as good. Although efforts are being made to create robots that resemble humans in how they look and in their functions, but even if the robots of future are capable of aping human actions and reactions in a more human-like manner, only some differences can be dealt with therefore, all differences between human beings and robot will never vanish.
Rights of Robots
Robot rights are the moral obligations of the society towards its machines; this is similar to human rights or animal rights. These may include rights to long life; that is protection from dangers such as viruses and other things that might lead to the destruction of the structure of the robot or even its complete destruction. In addition, robots have rights to think freely as per how they have been programmed and the right to express what is intellectually correct if they are not having any malfunctions.
How to Treat Robots
Robots are very helpful and should be treated with care so as to ensure that they live long. This means that their rights should be protected just as the way rights of human beings are protected. They should be embraced for the work that they help in accomplishing effectively and fast. With technological advancement, they should be reprogrammed in order to increase their effectiveness. They should be oiled continuously to avoid some parts getting jammed and if they are used in places that have high levels of heat generations to enable them to cool off and avoid overheating (Joachim, p.67).
They should also be charged as often so that if they there are no alternative sources of power that they will continue working without having to slow down to conserve charge or to abruptly stop all processes and this can sometimes be very dangerous at times. If they are “mistreated” then this is very likely to show up in the outcomes or in its results. The definition of “morals” and “agent” The word ‘moral’ means the standards that are concerned with the principles and rules of right and good conduct according to the society. It differentiates between right and wrong.
Morals of machines is concerned with the level and the patience in which robots , machines and other non-human intellectual beings can reach without going wrong or causing harm. An agent is something that causes an action to happen. An entity is a locus of decision making. Artificial Moral Agency of Intellectual Beings Artificial moral agency can be seen as an impossible task to achieve. Most people and especially engineers believe that when a robot meets an ethical problem or a difficult situation, it should just stop and wait for solutions from human beings (Wallach & Allen, p.88).
Although this could also be dangerous and problematic in terms of the slowing down of processes that need to be completed in a specified time and also it could cause deaths of people if the system was to deliver medications and other resources that are needed to conserve or prevent loss of life. Moral agents should be able to discern their actions and inactions, they should monitor and regulate their behavior not to harm or neglect duties. This is seen with human beings but how machines such as robots can be made into artificially moral agents is the real issue at hand. For a system to be morally conscious, it has to make choices that are sensitive to the humans and things that concern and are important to them.
This means that as technology advances, humans will need machines to make the decisions on whether an action is morally correct on their own. Rosalind Picard, the director of the Affective Computing Group in MIT put it well when she said, “The greater the freedom of a machine, the more it will need moral standards.” In cases of warfare, robots that developed into artificial agents of morals would experience significant differences in strengths and weakness found in human beings.
Moral failings in human beings vary from one individual to another depending on personalities and their own ethical levels and certain vices or failings in man would not present themselves in robots. For example, human beings may experience selfishness or jealousy and other humanly feelings that are directly attributed to one’s personality. They may take what they can for themselves and not use their resources for the well-being of others. They may also be driven by lust for power and fail to take action during a crisis and yet they may think that they know more than they do. As a result, they act harshly and the robots may not suffer from similar vices (Joachim, p.75).
Robots may become too liberal especially in the interpretation and capturing of matters that are important. At times, they may fail to capture the emotional connection, body language and deception among other things before they can determine the cause of their actions. Crisis in decision-making may blur their judgment leading to unprecedented results or even gross outcomes like death of human beings. Since man is to err, the programming behind the thinking of the robots may subject them to malfunctions due to technical errors. As a result, necessary measures to fix some of these problems should be kept in place. It would require high-level of technological approach and programming blended in high precision and accuracy (Wallach & Allen, p.56).
The room of creating new robots that can learn, adapt and blend into the society are still open. Various countries around the globe especially in America, Europe and Asia have invested and continue to support innovative minds behind robots inventions. As much as these robots are not susceptible to temptations faced by human beings, they are subject to the limitation, control and manipulation of their designers and developers. As a result, they will not be morally perfect even when they are working in the best conditions or circumstances. Agencies mandated or empowered to come up with good designs of robots exist in a rudimentary form that is less in comparison to other sectors such as communication. This limitation makes the creation of robots that are morally sensitive very difficult especially with the boost experienced in the technology sector. The critical aspects necessary for moral aspects are therefore far from being achieved. However, with the rate that technology is advancing this might probably be challenged. Though there are many arguments that artificial moral agency can be achieved with the advancement of technology.
This can only be supported to be true if there was an assurerity that it will come to a time when robots will have ethical values and have the intelligence to decide whether to act or not act in a certain situation without having humans to come in between or without causing problems. Behavior of Human Beings to Robots The behavior of human beings towards robots and other intellectual beings depends on the situations and the environments where these robots will be used. It also depends on the cultural values and needs and technological development of a community. Cultural response matters to people’s willingness to adopt robotic systems (Michael, p.67).
This is particularly important in areas of service, particularly care giving services of one sort or another, where human comfort is both the goal and to some degree necessary for human cooperation in achieving that goal. It is expected that caregiving services be provided by beings that can connect emotionally and have feelings of sympathy and empathy, which might not be provided by robots. Another cultural response is one of reluctance to adapt robotic systems because they lead to unethical issues concerning the social life of humans (Tatsuya et al, p.172).
Some societies are very reluctant as they see these systems as replacing or supplementing healthy human contact or more darkly, retard normal development of the society. Some cultures like in Japan view these robots as helpmates and instruments to help the society grow to higher standards of development. Thus, the people in these and such communities will strive to care for the robots and to even create more and better robots. Human beings have a high affinity or loving for robots that help them in the transport sector. These kinds of robots are like trains, which can be electric one or the ones that move without a driver.
This are welcomed and adored by people as they help them move and traverse various parts of the world faster and effectively. Additionally, human beings also adore robots in the communication industry where this is what connects people around the world by enabling transfer of information around the world within no time hence making the world seem like a village through globalization. The uses of some robots could determine the way human being act towards other intellectual beings. In some places, robots are used in war.
This will bring a bad or negative attitude to victims of wars where these robots were involved hence making human beings in that area and those to come after them to have a dislike to these robots and such advancements and developments in technology even in other sectors of life. People from developed areas will have a better and positive attitude towards technology and more so robots and their other intellectual counterparts after knowing and witnessing their importance in the society. This will be different in another area where technology has not advanced. There will be likelihood to be withdrawn to adapt new systems hence people from such places will act harshly towards the robots (Wallach & Allen, p.79).
Conclusion
Other intellectual beings have some characteristics that are similar to those of human beings in terms of their smartness, their thinking and intelligence though it is different since human beings think on their own while other intellectual beings depend on the programming done on them by humans. The other intellectual beings also depend on either mechanical or electrical processes for their functioning. The criteria for differentiating the two categories of intellectuals can only be based on their characteristics as listed above. Intellectual beings have rights of expression, rights to a long lifespan and rights to think freely A robot is a virtual or mechanical agent that is artificial guided a an electronic circuit or computer program. It has some form of sensing capabilities that helps it to perceive the world around it and a “brain” that directs its actions. Robots and other intellectual beings ought to be treated with caution with so much care and protect them from danger so that their lifespan is not shortened.
Robots are to be protected from defilement of their rights in the same manner as humans and animals are protected even by the law. The behavior of human beings towards other intellectual beings will be determined greatly by the cultural beliefs and reservations of a particular group of people, their level of technological advancement, and how these intellectual beings will be put into use in their geographical areas. Moral values of machines and robots may be achieved but this can only be possible to a certain level depending on how technology has advanced. Robots and the other machines and non-human intellectuals can only be called artificial moral agents when they have reached that level of making decisions on their own which later affect the happenings in the society. Systems that use artificial intelligence are mostly susceptible to learning new forms of content, logic and processing. Human beings have a high affinity or loving for robots that help them in the transport sector. These kinds of robots are like trains, which can be electric one or the ones that move without a driver. This are welcomed and adored by people as they help them move and traverse various parts of the world faster and effectively. For a system to be morally conscious, it has to make choices that are sensitive to the humans and things that concern and are important to them. As technology advances, humans will need machines to make the decisions on whether an action is morally correct on their own.
Works Cited
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