Article

Elegant chemistry, a humane view of robots, and refugee economics: Books in brief

via Nature

May 12, 2021

By Andrew Robinson 

The New Breed

Kate Darling Henry Holt (2021)

The word ‘robot’, from the Czech for ‘forced labour’, was coined in a 1920 play by Karel Čapek about artificial people, exploited in factories, who rebel against their makers: a conflict-based, influential vision of artificial intelligence. Technology ethicist Kate Darling pursues a different view in her original, humane book. She compares robots with animals, long used for work, weaponry and companionship. “Like robots, animals can sense, make their own decisions, act on the world, and learn.” But they cannot replace human beings.

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