Bridging science fiction and reality. Publicado originalmente en Short. Sweet. Valuable..
I, Robot | Source
When, I, Robot was released in 1950, Isaac Asimov had already published all nine chapters of the book as separate short stories for popular science fiction journals at that time.
Each story had its characters, some overlapping, but Asimov combined them into a coherent work, creating one of the most famous science fiction novels of all time.
- Robbie (1940)
- Runaround (1942)
- Reason (1941)
- Catch That Rabbit (1944)
- Liar! (1941)
- Little Lost Robot (1947)
- Escape! (1945)
- Evidence (1946)
- The Evitable Conflict (1950)
Some of these stories would later be adapted for television and become the inspiration for the well-known Will Smith movie.
Runaround
But one of the narratives, ‘Runaround’, could arguably be the most important science fiction short story of all time.
Source: Runaround
It proposed the Three Laws of Robots:
- First Law. A robot may not injure a human being or, through inaction, allow a human being to come to harm.
- Second Law*.* A robot must obey the orders given to it by human beings except where such orders would conflict with the First Law.
- Third Law*.* A robot must protect its existence as long as such protection does not conflict with the First or Second Law.
Nowadays, the general consensus is that we are still far away from considering machines as moral agents.
However, this reality is not so far away…
In 2019, an algorithm affecting over 200 million people in US hospitals was found to favor white patients over black patients in predicting medical care needs.
It prioritized patients based on healthcare spending, a metric that didn’t accurately reflect the medical needs of all racial groups.
This led to certain racial groups receiving inappropriate healthcare services.
This was a violation of Asimov’s First Law of Robotics.
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